A Report On The Translation Of China Dolls(Excerpts)

The text of this translation report was selected from American writer Lisa See’s work,China Dolls.This novel describes the story of three “Chinese” dancing girls who danced at the Forbidden City Nightclub in San Francisco during World War II.Readers can appreciate each social class’ s life style in San Francisco and LA during the 1930 s or 1940 s through the perspectives of these three girls.The author chose two chapters from the second part of this novel(about 10,000 words)to translate and analyze.This translation project belongs to the category of literary translation and the author completed it under the guidance of Vermeer’s skopos theory.According to skopos theory,the most important factor that determines the translation process is the purpose of the whole translation: “The purpose determines the means.” There are three principles in this theory— the skopos rule,coherence rule,and fidelity rule.Under the guidance of these three rules,the author analyzed this translation practice with specific cases,which not only helped the author come to a better understanding of the translation theory but also summarized several translation methods.This translation report can be divided into four parts besides the original English and its Chinese translation.The first part describes the task,including the source of the task and gives an introduction of the original text as well as explains the significance of this project.The second part illustrates the translation process,including the preparations before the translation as well as the first draft,reversion,and the creation of the final version.The third part is an analysis of specific cases,which is the key part of this report.Under the guidance of skopos theory,the author chose different translation strategies and methods to translate different sentences.The fourth part comes to the conclusion in which the author summarizes the difficulties she encountered and their solutions,thus deepening her understanding of literary translation.The author also lists the unsolved problem in the translation process and looks to the future of her translation work.After successfully finishing this translation,the author realizes that it is difficult to translate literary works although it seems quite simple.The author should choose appropriate translation strategies and methods according to the style of the original text and the language feature under the guidance of proper translation theory,and try to convey the original thoughts and emotions vividly and accurately.All in all,the author hopes this translation report can provide some available translation methods for future translators as the author also hopes that she can contribute a miniscule effort for the sake of literary translation.