| This thesis has carried out a research on a less-touched field—translation of Shakespeare's wordplay, because, on the one hand, wordplay has been neglected for a long time owing to the conception of language as a logical, transparent, or precise medium and it is always considered as a typical example for untranslatability; on the other hand, Shakespeare is famous for his abundant wordplays, which have different poetic values such as: help to build up the theme, characterize both lower and high characters, create rich imageries, and arouse laughter, etc. This research focuses on the translation of Shakespeare's wordplay from an inter-disciplinal perspective, where linguistics, poetics ana translation studies are applied.Firstly, the thesis will define and classify wordplay, which is regarded broader than pun in sense with three distinctive characteristics: Wordplay is first of all a reference to the systemic operation of language from linguistic perspective; then it has several functions, especially the poetic function in view of stylistics; and it is also called as 'positive rhetoric' by Chen Wangdao. All these characteristics show that wordplay cannot be neglected any more either in research or in translation. Wordplay will be classified into types of graphology, phonology, morphology, syntax and pragmatic according to the hierarchical relationship within language.Secondly, five possible modes to translate wordplay are discussed, supported by examples from Shakespeare's plays. Though wordplay is always considered as typical examples for untranslatability, Derrida's deconstractural idea helps understand that wordplay, even as a signature of language, must have a repeatable, iterable and imitable form(refer to: Davis, 2004). The five modes include wordplay to wordplay, wordplay to non-selective non-wordplay, wordplay to selective non-wordplay, wordplay to paraphrase and wordplay to zero. The modes to treat wordplays are of course open to further refinement. However, the discussion of this part does show that wordplay is available to translation, though it is just a descriptive study.Thirdly, a case study of Romeo and Juliet is carried out. On the basis of differentpoetic values of wordplays (to build up love theme, to create images and to talk taboo) in the play, three Chinese translations are analyzed. Zhu Shenghao's version, which was very popular during the 1940s-1960s, neglects most of the wordplays which in turn influences the poetic values of his translation. Liang Shiqiu, who declaims he has tried to convey what Shakespeare 'actually' is like, including his wordplay and bawdiness, treats major wordplays in a rather clumsy way—paraphrasing in endnotes, which conveys the meaning but affects the reader's appreciation of Shakespeare's subtle usage of language. Fang Ping actually treats some wordplays by wordplay to wordplay and thus remains their poetic functions, but just like Zhu's omission of taboo wordplay, he also shows the tendency to domesticate some taboo images. There are some cases that all the three translators omit some wordplays, especially those help to build up the true love theme and images. The omission results in the vagueness of love theme and the loss of images in the translations.Finally, the following conclusions can be drawn from the research: more attention should be paid to wordplay; wordplay is available to translation; different treatments of wordplays in translation affect the original poetic values.
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