A Research On The English-Chinese Translation Of Red Star Over China From Back-translation Respective

As one of the famous American war-field journalists,Edgar Snow created Red Star Over China,recording in details what had happened in China and in Red Zone in particular,and describing the daily lives as well as the beliefs of Red Army soldiers and ordinary civilians.Wide spreading of the book in the Western counties helped promote the reputation of the Communist Party of China.The publication of the book attracted much attention in China and was translated into Chinese.Taken the Chinese version of Red Star Over China translated by Dong Leshan as the subject matter for research,the present thesis intends to make an in-depth exploration into the English-Chinese translation of the book from back-translation perspective,examining the strategies for as well as the approaches to translation.Back-translation refers to the fact that a text of language A which describes events in culture B is translated into a text of language B.Back-translation falls into two categories: back-translation with a parallel text;back-translation with no parallel text.In the English-Chinese translation of Red Star over China,there was no parallel text for reference.In creating Red Star Over China,Edgar Snow tended to express such proper nouns as names of people and place,culture-loaded terms,titles of books and periodicals,and historical allusions in a way which is familiar to English-speaking natives rather than in Chinese Pinyin.By contrast,in the process of English-Chinese translation of the work,Dong Leshan adopted domesticating methods,restoring these proper names into their original Chinese names,terms and concepts.Dong Leshan adopted addition and omission strategies for syntactic economy making the translated version in conformity with Chinese convention.At cultural level,Dong Leshan adopted the strategies of adaptation,annotation,and explanatory insertion during his translation to make the translation accurate and coherent.Adaptation refersto cultural domesticating during back-translation,annotation refers to the addition of historical background facts to the original,and explanatory insertion refers to the supplementing of information which is critical to the understanding of the original.As an American native,Edgar Snow was impossible to have a full-scale understanding of Chinese history and culture while creating his documentary literature Red Star over China.In the process of back-translation of such a work,the translator shall have the ability to differentiate the truth and make necessary supplement so to restore historical figures and events as they were in original culture,thus making the translated version authentic and descriptive.