A Report On The E-C Translation Of Autobiography Miracles Of Life (Excerpts)

The sixth,seventh and thirteenth chapters of the autobiography Miracles of Life by James Graham Ballard,an English science-fiction novelist,are selected as the source text of the translation practice.The source text mainly describes the author’s childhood in the Lunghua Camp and his first contact with surrealism art world.The source text is characterized by proper nouns as well as long and complex sentences in terms of linguistic features,and by the literariness and authenticity in terms of stylistic features.Based on such analysis of the text features,Newmark’s semantic translation and communicative translation are selected as the guiding theory.Semantic translation tries to preserve the form and contents of the source text,and reproduce the author’s thinking process,whereas communicative translation focuses on the target readers,and appropriate adjustments can be made to the source text.The combination of these two methods ensures that,information in the source text is conveyed faithfully,and that reading barriers are removed for the target readers.With abundant examples,the translator analyzes how semantic translation and communicative translation are applied in the practice.Guided by the semantic translation,the techniques of literal translation,literal translation plus annotation and transliteration plus annotation are employed to keep the language style,structure and information of the source text,which are reflected in the translation of metaphors,proper nouns and so on.Guided by the communicative translation,the techniques of conversion,addition,omission as well as division and restructuring are adopted to achieve a readable,natural and smooth translation,reflected in the translation process of words,phrases and sentences that aren’t consistent with the language characteristics and ways of expression of the target language.This translation practice is significant in that it provides the target readers with the historical facts about Lunghua Camp in Shanghai during the World War Ⅱ,and that it offers some insights into the studies on the translation of autobiography and the application of Newmark’s theory.