A Report On E-C Translation Of The Woman Who Went To Bed For A Year

Literary translation is different from non-literary translation.It conveys not only the thought and content of the original work,but more importantly,represents as much as possible the elegant language form in the target language so as to produce a version which gets close to the original both in content and in style.In order to achieve this purpose,the translator must first understand the original work in its entirety,comprehend the thoughts,be familiar with its various forms and styles,and then based on correct translating principles,represent the content and style of the ST(hereinafter referred to as Source Text)in a form as intact as possible.With the above view,this dissertation was written based on my own translation of a light satirical humorous fictional work entitled The Woman Who Went to Bed for a Year,,written by contemporary British author Sue Townsend.Guided by Yan Fu's translating principles of“Faithfulness,Expressiveness and Elegance",it analyses the features of this contemporary English novel from three separate aspects:lexis,syntax and discourse and discusses the basic methods of and strategies for its Chinese translation from the same three aspects so as to see how Yan Fu's principle of translation is actualized in the Chinese translation of this story.Finally,the thesis comes to a conclusion which contains its findings and limitations as well as suggestions for the progress the author hopes to make in the future in the field of literary translation.The whole thesis comprises five chapters.The first chapter introduces the background,purpose,and significance of the task.The following chapter analyzes the main concepts of Yan Fu!s translation principle and its applicability to literary translation,focusing on what the three-character principle "faithfulness,expressiveness and elegance,convey and how to achieve them in literary translation.The third chapter explains the procedures of translating which cover preparation,understanding,representation,and lastly testing.The fourth part centers around both understanding of the source text and translation of the target text The former offers a detailed analysis of the lexical features of the source text in terms of colloquialism,cultural connotation,and consecutive Usage of basic words,syntactical features including variable sentence patterns,different logic in arranging words,style of expression;and discourse features such as stream of consciousness and rhetoric.The latter clarifies the application of translation methods for word,sentences and text translation,such as adaptation,shift of perspective,amplification,etc,which can help actualize Yan Fu's principle in the rendition.The concluding part summarizes the whole thesis and finalizes major findings during the translation practice and makes clear the limitations and suggestions for future reference.From the reflection based on translation practice and case analysis,the thesis demonstrates that the procedure of translation is the process of finding a balance between readers and writers,culture of ST and culture of TT(hereinafter referred to as Target Text),ST and TT.The key point it clarifies is to improve the translator's language ability and the knowledge of cultural background.