Functional Equivalence Applied In The English Version Of Thunderstorm

Functional Equivalence is the core of Eugene A. Nida's translation theory. It had great impact on translation studies in the 1960s and 1970s and was one of the theories which were introduced into China at an early time. Therefore its influence upon translation studies in China is profound. The role of functional equivalence in guiding translation practice can be by no means ignored.Although drama translation is only one part of literary translation, it has its own features due to the specific requirement of performance. An expert says, "drama translation is a far more difficult job than other literary works' translation." The reason probably is the peculiar features of drama literature. Since the purpose of drama is for actors to perform, consequently drama could not be isolated from the stage. The other is that "drama is a mirror which reflects focusing points of the society." (阿?尼柯尔: 1985: 41). That is to say drama should be highly-concentrated to reflect life concisely. These characteristics of drama determine the difference between drama translation and that of the other literary works.Nida's theory of Functional Equivalence provides a completely new criterion for the evaluation of translated works, which shifts from the focus of message to that of the response of the receptor. The closest natural equivalent translation is the translation that can evoke from its readers the same response as the source text does from its readers. This is in concordance with drama translation, since if the translated text of a drama is not natural, it will be hard for the actors to pronounce, nor will it be immediately understood and appreciated by the audience, if the English version is not the closest equivalence translation, it will be useless. In this paper, the theory of functional equivalence serves as a guiding principle to analyze the special literary pattern—Thunderstorm, an English version of this drama. The author tries to reveal the feasibility of applying functional equivalence in drama translation and find the methods to achieve "the closest natural equivalence" on different language levels.The paper is composed of four parts. Part one is mainly an introduction of this paper; part two reviews functional equivalence theory, the main plot of drama Thunderstorm and the translation procedures adopted by Wang Zuoliang, the translator of Thunderstorm; part three is the main part, examples are taken from Thunderstorm to illustrate how to achieve functional equivalence on three aspects, language, style and culture; part four is the conclusion. To achieve functional equivalence, translators of drama are required to study the source drama with its unique characteristics, while the basic principle of functional equivalence is required to achieve linguistic, stylistic and cultural equivalence.