A Study Of The English Version Of The Peony Pavilion

As a means of communication, translation plays an important role in cross-cultural exchange. However, the linguistic and cultural differences pose untold difficulties to literary translation. Some even think the barriers to effective translation are so enormous as to make the translation equivalence almost impossible, especially in translating literary works like The Peony Pavilion, one of the ancient Chinese literary classics. All its notable features, from the versed lyrics to its unique form, can cause serious problems to an effective rendition.This thesis starts by briefly introducing the background and features of the original works, then makes a detailed study of its English version in light of Nida's functional equivalence and draws a conclusion that through combination of proper skills acquired through practices, correct understanding of the contextual meaning and functional equivalence theory, cross-cultural communication can be achieved, and the feasibility of the theory can be proved as well.This thesis falls into four chapters. Chapter One gives a brief introduction to the original works and the author. The works belongs to "qu" (also called "legend" in some places in the Ming Dynasty), a very special literary type. It tells a fantastic story about how an aristocratic girl dies and regains her life for love, and it reflects the newly sprung humanist ideasstruggling against the dominant feudal ethic code.Chapter Two first of all provides a brief history of the concept of "equivalence" and then focuses on Nida's functional equivalence with the importance of understanding and translating procedures stressed at the beginning and the end respectively.Chapter Three makes a study into the rendition in terms of meaning, style, culture and dramatic form. The study at the semantic level is classified into denotative meaning and associative meaning with the latter subclassified into connotative meaning, social meaning and affective meaning. The second part focuses on the style of the play in terms of implicit and explicit qualities. The third part discusses the translation of cultural factors involved from seven aspects: customs, festivals, social concepts, examination system, conventional expressions, Buddhist and Taoist terms, as well as myths and legends. The principles of cultural equivalence are applied to guide the translation concerning culture-loaded expressions. The last part deals with the complicated dramatic form, a hard nut to crack for a translator.In Chapter Four, the focus is laid upon problems in the rendition. The problems are roughly categorized into three groups: undertranslation, overtranslation and mistranslation. Reasons that cause the problems are briefly given respectively. Several points are finally restated in the conclusion.1. Exact equivalence is impossible. There is always some loss or screw of information. One purpose of translating is to keep such disparities at a minimum.2. The success of a translation depends on the accurate analysis of the purpose for which it was made.3. The correct meaning of a word or sentence is the one that fits the context best.4. In order to maintain the cultural feature, a translator should try to find the balance between equivalence and acceptability.5. whether the form is reproduced successfully affects the overall translation quality.