On The English Translation Of Official Titles In James Legge’s Rendering Of Shangshu From The Perspective Of Newmark’s Translation Theory

In recent years,the translation of Chinese classics into English has become one of the focuses of translation studies,especially the cultural studies in classics.In the process of translating Chinese classics into English,we often encounter the problem of translating ancient official titles into English.Some scholars once pointed out that Chinese feudal tradition lasted for a long time and the dynasties frequently changed,which caused problems and difficulties in official translation.The official title is undoubtedly one of the most representative culture-loaded words in Shangshu,China’s oldest historical book record.However,the existing researches on the English translation of official titles in Shangshu are relatively rare and unsystematic.Given this situation,this thesis attempts to take the official titles in Shangshu as the research object,with the help of Newmark’s translation theory and descriptive research method to analyze the English translation of official titles in Shangshu,hoping to explore what unique translation methods Legge employs and how effective they are in transmitting the cultural meaning of those official titles.A classification and comparison of the official titles in Shangshu indicate that although the official titles in Shangshu are diverse in form and rich in connotations,the composition of their English rendering,or counterparts,has specific rules to follow,which provides a basis for the systematic research on the translation of official titles.Focusing on Legge’s translation methods of official titles in Shangshu,this thesis draws the conclusion that when translating official titles in ancient China,the translator adopts a series of methods such as free translation plus annotation,generalization plus annotation,literal translation plus annotation,substitution plus annotation,and paraphrase,among which literal and free translation plus annotation enjoy the highest frequency.Actually,Legge employs different translation methods to serve different purposes:using literal translation to transmit the original information;adding annotations to make up for the cultural default;and using paraphrase to diminish the comprehension difficulty of the original as well as increasing the readability of the rendering.In a word,while translating the official titles in Shangshu.Legge tries his best to reach a sound balance between faithfulness and expressiveness by comprehensively using multiple semantic translation and communicative translation methods.In this way,he manages to convey the rich cultural connotations of the original text as well as maintaining the unique linguistic features and flavor of the ancient Chinese language,hence transmitting the Chinese culture quite successfully.It is hoped by the author of this thesis that the description and analysis of Legge’s translation methods in rendering the official titles in Shangshu may provide some enlightenment and reference for later translators the standardization of official titles translation,especially ancient official title translation.