On Strategies And Methods In English Translation Of Suzhou Classical Garden Introduction

With a long history of two thousand odd years, Suzhou classical gardens take a unique historic position in world gardening history and are praised as the gems of Chinese culture and the finest specimens of classical gardens in China. In December, 1997, Suzhou classical gardens were listed as world cultural heritage by UNESCO Heritage Committee. The English translation of Suzhou classical garden introduction plays an important role in spreading ancient Chinese gardening art and traditional culture in the world. Proper and elegant translation may inspire the readers with a clear picture of vision and stimulate their desire to make a personal tour. Therefore, good English translation aids to enhance the popularity of Suzhou classical gardens. Unfortunately, partly due to territorial constraint, studies on English translation of Suzhou garden introduction have remained an almost unexplored field up till now. Most available English publications introducing these picturesque gardens are not devoid of problems,which undoubtedly harms the publicity of Suzhou classical gardens abroad.Certain degree of distortion of meaning,mistranslation or misinterpretation, inaccuracy and ambiguity can be found here and there, which can be partially attributed to lack of adequate knowledge of cultural and historical background of the classical gardens and weakness in theoretical basis. This thesis is to discuss the translation strategies and methods in English translation of Suzhou classical garden introduction through application of scientific approaches to translation studies and related translation theories for the purpose of drawing more academic concern into this field.The rapid development of contemporary research on translation studies has brought about fruitful achievements, among which the function-oriented approach, culture-based approach and equivalence-oriented approach provide solid theoretical foundation and guideline for the exploration carried out in this thesis.Suzhou classical garden introduction, a kind of pragmatic text, bears three striking features which are complexity of text type, rich cultural flavor and elaborate style. Suzhou classical garden introduction can be rendered under the government of three principles, namely faithful, expressive and elegant. As for the translation strategies, if viewed from a functional perspective, instrumental translation strategies can be applied to Suzhou classical garden introduction; and if viewed from a cultural perspective, both domestication and foreignization may be justified in their own right. When there are no cultural differences to hinder the reader's comprehension, literal translation can be safely employed to keep fidelity to the source text. In contrast, free translation is used to provide the TL reader with unique cultural flavor.Under the guidance of translation standard and strategies, this thesis further explores the specific methods that can be employed for achieving an ideal translation of Suzhou classical garden introduction mainly by way of contrasting different English versions. Detailed illustrations are made to show how such methods as transliteration, annotation, amplification,omission and restructuring are used in different cases.In addition, this thesis points out the problems and difficulties in translating Suzhou classical garden introduction in hope that more translators and scholars will make efforts to further the research in this field. Two serious problems, mistranslating and non-unification, are analyzed in-depth with corresponding solutions.Finally, this thesis summarizes the main ideas and theoretical conclusions derived from a careful study of the research topic. What's more, suggestions are made for further exploration into this domain.