A Study On Metaphor Translation Under Frame Theory

As Lakoff titled his book, metaphor is the language phenomena and the thinking manner "we live by". Chinese pastoral poetry, as the treasure of Chinese culture, making no exception, is filled with metaphors. The pastoral poets not only present the beauty of nature as well as the comfort and peace of rural life, but also express their emotion in the implied form of metaphor.Frame theory is proposed by linguist Fillmore on the foundation of cognitive linguistics. It states that linguistic expressions function both as triggers to activate and as anchors to stabilize the cognitive frames on which meaning in language relies heavily on its generation.The thesis attempts to analyze the metaphor translation in pastoral poetry from the perspective of frame theory, and explain the feasibility of frame theory to the interpretation of metaphor translation in pastoral poetry, then propose some advisable strategies under the study, in order to explore a brand new perspective for the translation study, which is also the creative point of the thesis.The research train of the thesis is as follows:the thesis reviews the frame theory, including its origin and development with the focus on its core principles in order to make a general summary and analysis on metaphor study basing on frame theory. Furthermore, through the analyzing the translations of three Chinese pastoral poems, the thesis discusses the feasibility of applying frame theory to the metaphor translation, as well as strives to propose the effective translation strategies generated from the research, with the aim of helping the further study in the field of English translation of Chinese poetry.