A Critique Of Three Different Chinese Translations Of The Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn From The Perspective Of Skopos Theory

Translating is a purposeful activity. The prime principle determining any translation process is the purpose (skopos) of the overall translational action. Accordingly,"adequacy"which refers to the qualities of a target text with regard to the translation brief is taken as the criterion of translation. This is what Skopos Theory states. As a beak with the traditional idea of equivalence and an important complement to translation theories, Skopos Theory thus opens up a new perspective for the translation practice and studies. The author of the thesis tries to make an analysis and contrast of the three different Chinese translations of The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn by the American author Mark Twain from the perspective of Skopos Theory, pointing out that it is because of different translation purposes that different translation strategies and methods are used in the three translations. According to Skopos Theory, the production of a certain translation is confined to specific social, historical and cultural conditions. With different translation purposes, the translations of the same source language text will surely focus on different points. Therefore, an evaluation of the three translations must take into account the intended purposes of the translations and their respective social, historical and cultural background.First a brief introduction is shown to the research background, the structure of the thesis, the research method and the significance of the thesis. Then comes the literature review. Brief introductions of Skopos Theory and The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn are made, and then related studies on them are shown. Then comes the theoretical framework of Skopos Theory. At the very beginning, the three basic rules of Skopos Rule, Coherence Rule and Fidelity Rule in Skopos Theory are introduced, Then the function of the translator, the importance of the target language readers in Skopos Theory are analyzed. Then follows the main body of the thesis. The author presents an analysis and contrast of the three different Chinese translations of The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn from the perspective of Skopos Theory, in which Fidelity Rule is subordinate to Coherence Rule, while the two are subordinate to Skopos rule. An introduction to the author, the SL text is made with regard to the Skopos Theory. After introducing the three translations and their respective historical and cultural background, the author expounds in detail the different translation strategies adopted by the translators with different translation purposes from three aspects of the faithfulness of content, style and other genres such as poetry, letter and bulletin. Since translation is culture-specific, the translator as well as the critics must take the specific cultural factors into consideration when carrying out a translation or criticizing a specific translation. In the end, the author of the thesis emphasizes that an evaluation of a translation must be carried out on the basis of translation purpose and the specific historical and cultural background of the translation. Finally the author draws a conclusion. After a thorough review of the thesis, the author points out that Skopos Theory is of great significance to translation, both in theoretical and practical sense. Based on different translation purposes and taking different social, historical and cultural factors into consideration, the translation of The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn adopt different translation strategies and methods in their respective translations, thus they are all"adequacy".