A Translation Practice Report On Salem Is My Dwelling Place:A Life Of Nathaniel Hawthorne(Chapter12 To Chapter 14)

This is a practice report on the translation of Salem Is My Dwelling Place: A Life of Nathaniel Hawthorne,a biography written by Edwin Haviland Miller who is a well-known editor and author in the U.S.The biography offers a panorama of Hawthorne’s life and literary career in a chronological order.Especially,it gives a very vivid portrayal of Hawthorne’s personality and inner world by means of many historical materials such as jottings,sketches,diaries,letters and novels of Hawthorne and his contemporaries.Chapter 12 to Chapter 14 of this biography is chosen as the translation material for this report.During the process of translation,the translator mainly encountered three problems:(1)At the lexical level,the original text uses uncommon words extensively,and Old English appears in some letters.Moreover,many words need to be understood in context,so the translator needs to think twice to determine the specific meaning of the words.(2)At the level of sentences,the original text has many long and difficult sentences and the sentence patterns are complex and changeable;(3)At the textual level,the original text makes a lot of references to Hawthorne’s correspondence with his friends and wife,as well as to the original text and characters in Hawthorne’s works,resulting in the changeable writing style of this biography,which makes it difficult to generalize.The translator uses the semantic translation and communicative translation theories proposed by Peter Newmark as theoretical support,and adopts the translation methods such as literal translation and free translation to solve these problems.Semantic translation tends to be literal translation,but it respects the context,sticks to the original text and takes the author as the center.Communicative translation tends to be free translation,reader-centered,focusing on the effect of translation and conveying the meaning of the work.The translator chose to use these two translation theories to guide the translation practice.This translation practice made the translator realize the inadequacy of his translation skills.The translator ’s lack of understanding of the background of this biography and Hawthorne’s literary works has led to the fact that he has not done enough to understand the original text and convey the original information.The translator need to work harder to enrich himself,keep accumulating,and improve his translation skills.