A Report On The Chinese-english Translation Of A History Of Chinese Folk Tales(The First Three Sections In Chapter One)

With the deepening of reform and opening-up to the outside,China has enhanced its economic and cultural exchanges with the rest of the world.In order to make people around the world have a better understanding of China and its culture,Chinese Academic Translation Projects has been established.The source text of the translation report includes the first three sections in Chapter One of A History of Chinese Folk Tales,which is one of the 2016 Chinese Academic Translation Projects.The book is a masterpiece written by Liu Shouhua who is a professor from Huazhong Normal University.With a grand scale,the book has initially established a framework of the history of Chinese folk tales extending for 2,500 years so that it has been called the pioneering achievement in the field of folk literature.Therefore,the book is of special academic and cultural significance in the study of Chinese folk literature,and its translation will also play an important role in spreading Chinese culture and promoting the academic exchanges between China and foreign countries.This translation practice takes the Skopostheorie of German Functional School as its theoretical guidance.The theory was proposed by Hans.J.Vermeer,a scholar in Germany.It gets the translation studies out from the constraint of the original text-oriented theory,pointing out that translation is a communicative action,and the skopos determines the whole translation procedure as well as the translation strategies.In addition,translation needs to follow three rules:skopos rule,coherence rule and fidelity rule,among which the first one is on the top,and the other two submit to it.Under the guidance of Skopostheorie,the translator has adopted the corresponding translation methods during the whole translation process.This report consists of five chapters.The first chapter gives a comprehensive description of the translation task,including its background,features,and significance.The second chapter describes the translation process,including the preparation before translation,the overall translation process and the text checking after translation.The third chapter mainly introduces the translation theory,Skopostheorie,and its application in the translation practice.The fourth chapter,which is the main body of the report,discusses some translation difficulties,such as the translation of titles of books and folk tales,culture-loaded words,classic quotations,as well as long sentences,giving some typical examples as case analyses.The last chapter summarizes some experience and lessons the translator has acquired from the translation practice,and points out some unsolved problems.The translator sincerely hopes the translation methods and strategies she has concluded during the translation process can offer some references to the people who are interested in the translation of Chinese folk literature.