English And Chinese Existential Sentences And Their Translation

Translating is a kind of activity that involves two different languages. Accordingly, researches on translation have much to do with contrastive analyses between the two related languages. The more researches we do, the higher quality of translations we can render. English and Chinese are the two languages being discussed in this thesis. The major difference between these two languages is that the organizational characteristic of English is hypotaxis while that of Chinese is parataxis. But in both languages, there are many existential sentences, which have special structures commonly used to indicate the existence or emergence of things, usually found in descriptive writings. This point is the semantic similarity between English existential sentences and their Chinese counterparts. However, structurally, the typical existential sentence of English is different from that of Chinese. In English, the typical structure is There+ existential verb +existential noun phrase (+locative/ temporal phrase) (the locative/temporal phrase can be placed in different positions). But in Chinese, the typical structure is Locative/temporal phrase+ existential verb + existential noun phrase. The existential sentences of Chinese are more complex than those of English. In translating the existential sentences between English and Chinese, translators can not always find, in the target language, the formal correspondences of the original sentences.Different peoples have different ways of speaking and different languages have different ways of expression. Thus translators often have to sacrifice the form for the sake of meaning. In terms of translation of existential sentences between English and Chinese, if translators always want to have a word-for-word translation, the translation may be awkward or even misleading, conveying wrong meanings to the target language readers, thus breaking away from the principle of "faithfulness" and "smoothness". Eugene A. Nida, in his book The Theory and Practice of Translation, pointed out that "Translating,consists in reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source language message, first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style." (Nida, 1974:12). His viewpoint is suitable to the translation of existential sentences between English and Chinese. But how to get, in the target language, the closest natural equivalents of the original existential sentences needs more and further researches.This thesis discusses the major similarities and differences between English existential sentences and their Chinese counterparts on the basis of contrastive analyses of the two languages—English and Chinese. By analyzing lots of examples, it aims at getting some methods and skills that translators can follow in the translation of existential sentences between the two languages. Translators should first try their best to get adequate formal correspondences of the original existential sentences. If keeping formal correspondence affects the understanding of the meaning, translators should alter the forms of the original existential sentences, to get the closest natural equivalents in the target language and make the translations faithful and smooth.