A Report On The Translation Of Tribute To The Dedicated Doctors In The Fight Against COVID-19 (Excerpts) From The Perspective Of Relevance Theory

The year 2020 has witnessed the global outbreak of COVID-19.Under the strong leadership of the Party Central Committee,China has become the focus of global attention by successfully containing the spread of the virus in the country at an astonishing pace.However,some international voices deliberately discredited China’s anti-epidemic efforts and achievements,which put China’s foreign publicity at a disadvantage.Under the guidance of“proactively responding to international concerns and better telling stories of China’s fight against the epidemic”,a series of documentary works were produced.The source text of the translation practice,Tribute to the Dedicated Doctors in the Fight against COVID-19,is selected from one of the series Tribute to the Dedicated Medical Workers in the Fight against COVID-19,the key publication honored by the Publicity Department of the CPC Central Committee in 2020.100 articles under five themes written by frontline medical staff are included in the book: marching straight,tough figures,comrades in arms,family letters and handwritten diaries.The translation aims to depict the real situation of China’s frontline fight against the epidemic for English readers and publicize the great spirit of the Chinese people.The report is completed under the guidance of Relevance Theory.Based on the principle of optimal relevance,the translator analyzes the translation difficulties and summarizes relevant translation methods at the lexical,syntactical and textual levels.At the lexical level,free translation,shift and addition are proposed to manifest the contextual implication of the source text in order to render the translation of Chinese idioms,figurative words and medical terms more understandable and natural for target readers.At the syntactical level,the translator focuses more on the retainment of the style and the faithfulness of the source text so that literal translation,free translation and shift are frequently applied in the translation of repetitive sentences,figurative sentences and Chinese poems,which also reduces the processing effort of the readers from the perspective of Relevance Theory.At the textual level,the cohesion and coherence of the translation are discussed,and the translation methods of addition,combination and division are pointed out to enhance the contextual effect.The translation report consists of five chapters.Chapter One introduces the translation task,including the background,objectives,significance,text selection and the structure of the report.The second chapter describes in detail the three stages of the translation process.The third chapter introduces the basic idea of Relevance Theory,focuses on the two key theoretical foundations of the ostensive-inferential process and optimal relevance,and states their application in translation practice.The fourth chapter is about case analysis,which includes a detailed discussion on the translation difficulties and methods in light of the feature of the source text from the lexical,syntactical and textual level.Finally,the translator’s reflections and the limitations of the translation practice are summarized in the last chapter.