Pragmatic Translation Of Fictional Conversation

As an indispensable part of a fiction, conversation serves to delineate the character and develop the story. So in translating a work of fiction, the translator must attach great importance to fictional conversation. Conversations in a fiction are regulated by pragmatic principles, and the study of pragmatics will help the translator understand and render the original work faithfully and effectively. This thesis aims at a full discussion of pragmatic translation of fictional conversation. It points out that the translator should make the best possible use of context, the cooperative principle and the politeness principle so as to grasp the intended meaning, convey it in translation and achieve pragmatic equivalence.Chapter I is a survey of fictional conversation. It covers two parts. Part 1 explores the fictional conversation from the rather traditional perspective of narrative, pointing out the nature of fictional conversation, four main forms, as well as the functions, of fictional conversation. Part 2 analyzes the fictional conversation from the perspective of pragmatics. It begins with an overview of pragmatics, which covers its definition, evolution and a few key concepts, i.e. context, the cooperative principle and the politeness principle. Then the application of pragmatic principles to understanding the fictional conversation is illustrated in detail.Chapter II begins with an overview of pragmatic study in translation. It continues to look at the nature of pragmatic translation and a detailed discussion of pragmatic translation of fictional conversation, pointing out that the translator should make the best possible use of context, the cooperative principle and the politeness principle so as to grasp the intended meaning, conveying it in translation and achieving pragmatic equivalence.Chapter III expounds the application of context to the translation of fictional conversation. It has two parts. Part 1 gives a brief account of the significance of context in the translation of fictional conversation. In Part 2 the author compares different versions of the same utterances and points out that taking the elements of context into consideration the translator can better understand and reproduce the implied meaning.Chapter IV discusses the application of the cooperative principle and conversational implicature to the translation of fictional conversation. It consists of three parts. The first two parts tell of the significance of the cooperative principle and conversational implicature in the translation of fictional conversation. The last part proposes a general principle and a few translation crafts in transferring conversational implicature. The point is made that conversational implicature should be translated as it is, with nothing added and nothing removed. This part is devoted to case studies, i.e. a few examples from A Dream of Red Mansions, in which some common translation crafts are illustrated.Chapter V discusses the possibility of applying the politeness principle to the translation of fictional conversation. It is made up of three parts. Part 1 tells of the politeness norms which are perceived by different cultures and points out that, difficult as they are, politeness norms are translatable. Part 2 makes the point that the translation of politeness norms may achieve pragmatic equivalence on the condition that the translator alternates between covert translation and overt translation as he or she sees the occasion. Part 3 uses a few examples to expound how the two alternative translation methods work in translating the addressing terms in fictional conversations.