Transmission Of Cultural Default Constituents In The Perspective Of Relevance Theory-A Comparative Study Of Two English Versions Of Hong Lou Meng

Hong Lou Meng, one of well-known Chinese classical novels, viewed as an encyclopedia of the late feudal society in China, is closely connected with Chinese culture. On the one hand, it is just the fascination of its profound cultural connotation and language art that attracts a number of scholars and translators doing the translation work about it. On the other hand, due to its abundance in cultural content, the translation of the novel is regarded as a challenging task. Meanwhile, cultural default is one of the factors that make for this difficulty. Cultural default, defined as the absence of the relevant cultural background knowledge shared by the writer and his intended reader, is a culture-specific communication phenomenon which numerously exists in Hong Lou Meng. To compensate the cultural default constituents in translation seems a challenge for it requires translators to have good bi-cultural competence. What is more, treatment with the cultural default is essential for effective translation.Hong Lou Meng has been translated into English and some other languages such as German, Japanese, French, and Russian. By now, the novel has two influential translations offered by Chinese couple Yang Xianyi and Gladys Yang and British translators David Hawkes and John Minford, i.e. A Dream of Red Mansions and The Story of the Stone. With different cultural backgrounds, translators of the two English versions have different cultural orientations in rendering the novel. Yang's version is source language culture oriented whereas Hawkes' target language culture oriented, which determines translation strategies to be adopted. One may assert Yangs' version is close to foreignization whereas Hawkes' domestication. Why do we regard these two English versions with different translation approaches both classic? This question will be answered from the perspective of relevance theory (RT).RT is a theory about communication and cognition, the adoption of which in translation field provides new perspective and effective translation approaches for translation research and practice. In the light of RT, translation, considered as an act of communication, is defined as an interlingual ostensive-inferential interpretive act, in which the comprehension and interpretation of utterance depends on optimal relevance. Translation with optimal relevance achieves the closest relevance in implicature and explicature between the source and target texts, fulfilling meeting the intention of the author with the expectation of target language (TL) readers. According to RT, translators have right to choose appropriate translation strategies as long as they are consistent with principle of optimal relevance. In addition, the application of RT avoids the argument between content and form, literal and free translation, domestication and foreignization. This thesis attempts to make a comparison about the transmission of cultural default constituents in the two English versions, so as to find what exact approaches different translators choose to deal with cultural default in Hong Lou Meng. In addition, the thesis also discusses how such strategies are taken and what contextual effects could be achieved.Through comparative analysis, the author considers that Yangs' version keeps original cultural flavor and holds the same aesthetic effect in the TL but the version causes much more processing effort on the part of the intended readers, whereas Hawkes' domestication strategy transfers necessary information but may fail to produce the same contextual effect in TL readers' mind. Therefore, the thesis endeavors to draw a conclusion that though the translators may take quite different approaches in dealing with the cultural default in Hong Lou Meng, the approaches are justified on condition that they are consistent with the principle of optimal relevance. Translators could vary translation techniques with various translation purposes and in different contexts. On the basis of this, the author makes a tentative conclusion that comparing with the traditional faithfulness principle, the guidance of optimal relevance in translation is more flexible and dynamic and can achieve faithfulness in culture.