A Comparative Study Of Chinese Versions Of Shakespeare's Sonnets From The Perspective Of Skopos Theory

Based on Skopos theory,this study selects two Chinese translation versions of Shakespeare's Sonnets by Mr.Liang Zongdai and Prof.Gu Zhengkun as the research target to explore how translations serve their purposes.It attempts to analyze and compare translators' background and to study their ways of translating concerning sentences,discourse and figures of speech.Firstly,it gives introduction of Shakespeare's Sonnets and its translation situation and difficulties.Then it briefly compares the translation backgrounds of Mr.Liang Zongdai and Prof.Gu Zhengkun.Mr.Liang Zongdai lived mostly at the time of the New Culture Movement,which actively promoted the introduction of foreign literature and he took"poetry form"as the top standard.On the contrary,in the time of Prof.Gu Zhengkun,poetry was tended to express personal feelings and its form was taken as pluralistic,so he holds the theory of"Plural Complementary of Translation Standard".Different backgrounds lead to different translation goals,for which they chose different translation strategies.Secondly,it compares the translation of words,sentences and discourses from the coherence rule.Based on their individual purpose,the translators make appropriate adjustments to make the translations more readable,acceptable and more in line with the target language.Finally,it compares their translation of various rhetorical devices by the perspective of loyalty rule.It's difficult to translate the rhetorical devices in poetry,but if translators abandon them it may lose the beauty of the original poetry.So to keep the literary charm of the original poetry,the translators adopt corresponding translation strategies.With the above comparison,it discovers that they both have preserved and promoted the"form"and"spirit" of the original poetry to a degree as high as possible.The study draws upon Skopos theory to compare the two Chinese versions of Shakespeare's Sonnets and to explore how translations serve the purpose of translating act.It is hoped to provide a certain reference for the research in the related fields.