Comparative Study On Mainland's And Taiwan's Translations Of The Hunt For Red October From The Perspective Of Adaptation Theory

Although Mainland and Taiwan share the same ethnicity and language,the long term estrangement due to historical,geographical and political reasons results in the differences in their languages and cultures.Comparative studies on Mainland's and Taiwan's translations contribute to the understanding and communication of their cultures.However,there were few literary works translated by both sides and Taiwan's translated literary works were rarely introduced into Mainland,so previous studies mainly focused on the translations of film titles,advertisements and subtitles.Studies on their translations of literal works are rare.This thesis is a comparative study on Mainland's and Taiwan's translations of a military novel,The Hunt for Red October,in terms of words,sentences and translation strategies from the perspective of Adaptation Theory and on the cultural and linguistic differences of Mainland and Taiwan and is also a research on translation strategies of military novels.It's found out that both translations adapt to the language habits and cultures of their audiences though they differ in translations of words,sentence styles and linguistic structures and choices of translation strategies.The study on words involves differences and features on translations of names of people and places,measure words and military and scientific and technical vocabularies;the study on sentences involves sentence styles and linguistic structures where Taiwan's translation prefers colloquialism and Mainland's translation tends to use four-character structures;the study on translation strategies involves differences and similarities on choices of amplification,domestication,foreignization and deletion.These comparisons are classified and analyzed in this thesis.Guidance for translation of military novels is also presented: Military novels involve a lot of military terms and vocabularies,so the translator must adapt to the target audience's culture background and choose translations familiar to and accepted by the target audience.Moreover,a military novel may inevitably mention some historical events unfamiliar to general audience,translators are encouraged to give a brief introduction.If the addition of certain military knowledge or contents is helpful for audience's understanding or a vivid description,translators are allowed to give a proper expansion.The author hopes that this thesis will be helpful for the study on differences of languages and cultures between Mainland and Taiwan and translation of military novels.