Norms In The E-C Translation Of Popular Science Novels ——A Case Study Of Silent Spring And Its Two Chinese Versions

Since the 1980s,translation researchers have increasingly realized the important role of social and cultural factors in translation.In this context,Toury（1995）divides translation norms into preliminary norms,initial norms,and operational norms.At present,studies from the perspective of Toury’s translation norms in China are mostly limited to the analysis of cases of specific sentences and paragraphs,and few studies have drawn upon qualitative analyses of the corpus.This study selects two Chinese versions of Silent Spring,a novel in English,and based on a self-built parallel corpus,compares the two versions at the lexical,syntactic,and discourse levels,and analyzes their translation strategies from the perspective of Toury’s theory of translation norms.Silent Spring is a popular science novel written by Rachel Carson in 1962.With specific examples,it shows readers thoughtfully and vividly the severe harm of the abuse of pesticides.Since its publication,the book has initiated people’s enthusiasm and attention to environmental protection.A total of more than 20 Chinese versions have been published to date.This study selects the first translated version published in 1979 by Lyu Ruilan and Li Changsheng and the translation published in 2018 by Ma Shaobo.The 40 years between the two versions may imply considerable,if not maximum,variation in sampling.The first research problem is to explore the language characteristics of popular science novels.For this,the study quantitatively analyzes a few linguistic phenomena（i.e.,STTR,"被" sentences,and rare Chinese characters）in the two translations,and explains the causes for the differences by drawing on translation norms.The second research question aims to,with the help of Toury’s translation norms,interpret the differences of text selection in Silent Spring under the constraints of preliminary norms,the different choice of translation strategies by translators under the constraints of operational norms,and the different text performance under the constraints of initial norms.For this,the thesis makes a detailed textual analysis for the book.Based on the analysis of corpus data and specific cases,it is found that（1）in terms of preliminary norms,translators’ professional background was considered in the choice of translators or source text in both cases.Ma also considers making improvements on previous translations of the same source text.The two versions were published 40 years apart,fully reflecting the influence of social factors on translation norms.Lyu’s version received more pressure from society and publishers than Ma’s,while Ma’s version received more social support and technological resources.（2）In terms of operational norms,the original preface and acknowledgment are omitted in both the two versions,while more annotations are added in Ma’s version.In terms of specific translation strategies,Ma makes more changes to the word order,while Lyu prefers literal translation.In terms of specific nouns of species and other chemical substances,Lyu tries to "Sinicize" them,although this strategy sometimes leads to mistakes.（3）In terms of initial norms,both versions try to strike a balance between"adequacy" and "acceptability" Lyu’s version is more inclined to be "adequate" while Ma’s is more inclined to be "acceptable" for his flexible adjustment of the source text.But at the micro lexical level,the two versions have opposite tendencies.