A Study On Translation Compensation For Chinese Idioms In Yang Xianyi's Version Of Hong Lou Meng

In the process of translation, the. loss of meaning and aesthetic, features is inevitable due to the linguistic and cultural differences between the source language and target language. Therefore, translators need to use various strategies to reduce this kind of loss to the least. Compensation is one of the most important strategies. So, theory on translation compensation plays a very important role in both translation study and practice. However, studies on compensation have not received due attention till the 1980s. And in spite of the fact that more and more attention had been paid to this theory since 1980, there is still no agreement on its definition and theoretical framework, Nida, Steiner, Xia Tingde and so on all have their own theories from different perspectives. Therefore, it is necessary to develop a theoretical framework to justify and analyze compensation strategies during translation process. And this thesis is to make a study on it. To make a modest contribution to the task, the author analyzes the compensation strategies employed in translating Chinese idioms of Hong Lou Meng by Yang Xianyi and Gladys Yang, and tries to use the author's findings to give some light to the compensation process of general translation.The English version of Hong Lou Meng completed by the Chinese translator Yang Xianyi and his wife Gladys Yang is widely praised by many scholars both at home and abroad. His translation shows the translator's fidelity and creativity. The idioms, in particular, are translated vividly and accurately. Therefore, a sample survey of idiom translations may represent the translation strategies used for the whole book. This thesis selects 150 idioms by random sampling methods. Then, they are classified and analyzed on its translation strategies at both linguistic and aesthetic level, in accordance with known translation compensation theories. The advantages and disadvantages of them are evaluated as well, and the reasons why these strategies are used by the translator are explored.The study shows that seventy five percent of the 150 example idioms were translated with compensation of various kinds, and these compensations are more often made at the linguistic levels than at aesthetic levels. Yang adopts five compensation strategies at the lexical level. They are amplification, specification, generalization, omission and annotation. As to the aesthetical level, the translator focuses on sound and structure. Moreover, the compensations for sound and for structure interact with each other. The author also notices that the principle of demand and the same function play a leading role in dealing with compensation of idioms.