A Report On The Chinese Translation Of The Journal To Stella(Letter ⅩⅩⅩⅧ To Letter XLⅠ)

The Journal To Stella is a collection of letters,including 65 letters written by the famous writer Jonathan Swift to “Stella” who has an intimate relationship with him.All65 letters are written in the form of a diary,recording what Swift saw,heard,and felt in London.These letters describe Swift’s daily communication and political life between 1710 and 1713,involving profound British cultural background and political affairs.Based on the understanding of the source text and the analysis of the characteristics of the source text,this report mainly focuses on the Chinese translation practice from the Letter XXXVIII to Letter XLI of the book.This report adopts the “Comprehension,Expression and Adaptation”(CEA)analytical framework put forward by Li Changshuan and Shi Xiaojing to analyze a large number of translation examples,find out the challenges encountered in these three aspects and try to solve them.In “Comprehension” aspects: the challenge mainly includes the comprehension of words,sentences as well as text.Comprehension of words includes not only the understanding of personal names,place names,official titles,and institutes,but also the understanding of abbreviations,“little languages” created by Swift;Comprehension of sentences mainly discusses the understanding and translation of long difficult sentences and passive sentences;Comprehension of texts involves the interpretation of political texts.In “Expression” aspects: the challenge includes avoidance of overforeignization,accurate translation of official titles,proper translation of parenthesis and coherence of speech.In “Adaptation” aspects: the challenge mainly focuses on how to use different translation strategies to adjust the translation and bring readers a better experience in reading.Through this translation practice,the author realizes that the correct understanding of the content in the source text is the key to the whole translation of epistolary texts.And only if the translator conveys the purpose of the author of the source text correctly,a better experience in reading may be brought to readers.Furthermore,the author should try to keep the style of the target text consistent with the source text in the process of translating expressive texts such as letters.