"Faithfulness" And "Transmutation" In English Translating Of Drama

As a deep-rooted but doubtful belief in translation community,“faithfulness” is still regarded as a standard for evaluating translations in most cases,regardless of age and literary genre.“Transmutation”,on the other hand,is less frequently discussed.Nevertheless,its function and significance are,to some extent,widely used terms.And they two play a vital role especially in English translating of drama.There are numerous works related to Dream of the Red Chamber.However,the research on the translating of drama is hardly involved.Incidentally,the present author stumbled upon an English translation of Dream of the Red Chamber in drama by the famous journalist Thomas Ming-hung Chao during his study in the United States.In this thesis,Chao's translation will be firstly presented and discussed in detail.In this research,literature review is firstly used to discuss relevant documents so as to review and analyze the research status.Then the English translation of Dream of the Red Chamber by Thomas Ming-hung Chao is taken as an example for further study.Besides,close-reading and comprehensive analysis are applied to thoroughly discuss the “faithfulness” and “transmutation” of Thomas Ming-hung Chao's adaptation in the light of form and language.Thus it helps to better understand the translation as well as his translation thoughts,so that the English translating of drama can be analyzed reasonably and the problems and deficiencies associated with it can be clarified.Consequently the English translating of drama is not only influenced by translator and audience,but by many stage circumstances and social backgrounds.Apart from that,the English translating of drama is not simply equivalent to that of literary works.The principles of stability and flexibility in translating process require sufficient considerations and sensible balance.It is inevitable to meet certain conflicts and contradictions among language systems in translating,so translation methods and principles need further testing and developing.The adaptation of Dream of Red Chamber by Thomas Ming-hung Chao has,with no doubt,enriched the research field and unveiled a new perspective for the study of Dream of Red Chamber.Furthermore,it will bring light to researches on English translating of drama later on.This thesis consists of seven parts.Firstly,the present author introduces the subject of the study after reviewing and analyzing the development history of drama translating.Secondly,the interpretations of “faithfulness” and “transmutation” are analyzed based on text form,measurement criteria,and creating flexibility,which lays a cornerstone for later research.In addition,the author presents the adaptation of Dream of the Red Chamber by Thomas Ming-hung Chao,including the details about his study experiences in the United States and his intention for doing so.Through the systematical analysis of the adaptation from the perspective of “faithfulness” and “transmutation”,Chao's principal intention,skills and influences are unfolded.It is expected to inspire follow-up researches by exploring the influencing factors and principles involved in English translating of drama.In the end,it goes on to review and document existing research findings and views.At the same time,the conclusions and difficulties encountered in the research process are elaborated,which aims to enlighten relevant researches in the future.