On Zhu Shenghao's Translation Of Hamlet From The Perspective Of Semantic And Communicative Translation

Translating Hamlet, to every translator, is a great challenge. Of all the current translation of Hamlet in China, Zhu Shenghao's translation is the best and most popular, enjoying a high reputation in and out of China. Peter Newmark is an English translation theorist and practitioner. His theory of semantic and communicative translation is his major contribution to general translation theory. Semantic translation attempts to render, as closely as the semantic and syntactic structures of the second language allow, the exact contextual meaning of the original. Communicative translation attempts to produce on its readers an effect as close as possible to that obtained on the readers of the original. This theory has something in common with Zhu Shenghao's views on translation. Zhu Shenghao's translation of Shakespeare is an excellent combination of semantic translation and communicative translation. It is his translation theory that has much influence on his success.Semantic and communicative translation requires different ways in translating different types of texts. Therefore, this thesis analyzes Zhu's translation of Hamlet in the aspects of diction, rhythm, cohesion, rhetoric devices, etc, with a few comparisons with other translations. The shortcomings of his translation will also be discussed according to semantic and communicative translation.