Study On Translation Of Huangdi Neijing From Perspective Of Intertextuality Through Contrastive Analysis Of Li Zhaoguo’s Version And Maoshing Ni’s Version

Due to historical and cultural reasons, some conceptual terms of Huangdi Neijing are characterized by ambiguity, abstractness and literariness. However, as a classic of the Chinese medicine, Huangdi Neijing is enriched with ancient science including medicine, astronomy, calendar, meteorology and phenology. In view of this, the conceptual terms, particularly some key conceptual terms in Huangdi Neijing, should have certain significations or stable meanings just as the language of science does. The contradiction between the ambiguous meanings of the conceptual terms in Huangdi Neijing and the necessity of their meanings being stable makes it difficult to translate Huangdi Neijing into English.By studying the intertextual structure of Huangdi Neijing in light of the textuality theory, this research analyzes the ambiguity of Dao, Qi, Yin and Yang, Wuxing or Five Phases, the key conceptual terms in Huangdi Neijing and discovers that these conceptual terms originate from ancient astronomy and meteorology. Based on this discovery, this study differentiates the scientific meanings of the conceptual terms in Huangdi Neijing from their pan-cultural-extended connotations. With this differentiation, this paper points out the ambiguity of the key conceptual terms in Huangdi Neijing is caused by the extension of their meanings when used in non-science fields. Accordingly, this paper defines the text of Huangdi Neijing as a text of natural science, and the chief task of the translation of Huangdi Neijing is to transmit the information of ancient science at maximum.This contrastive study selects the English version of Huangdi Neijing of Li Zhaoguo, who is proficient in Chinese traditional culture and was specialized in English literature, and that of Maoshing Ni, who is a Chinese medicine expert and proficient in western science and culture. With a monographic study of the translation of Wu Yun Liu Qi, or the Five Phases and Six Qi theory, this study compares the two versions by evaluating the accuracy and the degree as to the interpretation of the information of ancient science in Huangdi Neijing. Based on the comparison and evaluation, it is concluded that a good knowledge of natural science including cosmology, astronomy, meteorology, phenology and medicine is a prerequisite for the translation of Huangdi Neijing.