A Practical Report On The Translation Of Autobiographical Novels From The Perspective Of Functional Equivalence

This paper is a translation practice report.The translation materials are selected from the autobiographical novel A Death in the Family written by American writer James Agee.The author is responsible for translating chapters 17 to 20 of this book.This translation practice is conducted under the guidance of Nida’s functional equivalence theory.The core of functional equivalence theory is to reproduce the information of the source language with the closest and most natural equivalent from semantics to style.This means that the translator must focus on the meaning and spirit of the original text in the process of translation,not on the language structure of the original text,that is,not on the formal correspondence.Therefore,under the guidance of functional equivalence theory,the author pays more attention to the content equivalence rather than the formal equivalence in the process of translation,trying to reproduce the original meaning of the novel.In order to reproduce the original information,the translator must make grammatical and lexical adjustments.Therefore,based on the theory of functional equivalence and the problems encountered in the process of translation,the author uses translation skills such as literal translation with annotation,word formation,negation,syntactic linearity,sentence restructuring,semantic supplement and reappearance and amplification to translate the original text,so as to achieve natural equivalence and meet the readers’ needs expectation.This report consists of five chapters.The first chapter is the task description,which introduces the background and significance of the task.The second chapter is the task process,which includes pre-translation preparation,translation process and post-translation proofreading.The third chapter is a brief introduction of functional equivalence theory and its application in autobiographical novel translation.The fourth chapter is the core case analysis of this report.The last chapter is the summary of translation practice,which summarizes some experience and thoughts gained by the author in this translation,as well as the shortcomings of this translation,and puts forward a clearer direction for future translation study.