On Style Transfer In Bian Zhilin's Translation Of Hamlet

Nida and Taber defined 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 & Taber, 1982, p. 30). Besides, Liu Miqing once stressed we should maintain the'adaptation'of the style in translated text to the original one for the grasp of the whole meaning in source text which would be out of the question if the original style is ignored in target text(刘宓庆, 2005b, p. 239). But, what style is and how to reproduce it have been discussed hotly among scholars and translators for a long time. According to Liu Miqing, language is the carrier of style. Not only is style embodied in the content of a work, but also found in its form of expression.One of the unique characteristics of Hamlet, as analyzed in this thesis, is that it is basically written in blank verse which is a literary form absent from Chinese literature. As a result, various literary forms have been taken in the translation. Roughly, these versions can be divided into two groups: one being verse translated into prose represented by Zhu Shenghao and the other being verse into verse by Bian Zhilin respectively. However, there is no consensus on whether blank verse should be rendered into verse or prose. Those who favor prose version argue prose is smooth, natural and easy to understand and verse version is always being doubted about whether it can be performed onto stage. On the other hand, those who approve translating verse into verse hold that the poetic version is more faithful to the original form. Most discussions have been focused on the unique style of verse drama Hamlet in terms of its practicability on the stage. In the past few decades, a large number of researches have been done on the Chinese versions of Hamlet, however, inadequate attention has been paid to Bian Zhilin's version,a representative of translating verse into verse, not to mention its style transfer. Therefore, this thesis,based on Liu Miqing's style theory,attempts to explore the style transfer exemplified in Bian Zhilin's version of Hamlet.The thesis consists of five chapters. The first chapter generalizes what this thesis is about by three parts: background and significance of the research, research question and methodology, and the structure of the thesis. The second chapter briefs Bian Zhilin's life stories as well as translation practice and summarizes his main translation thoughts, aiming to building up a connection between personal development and his style grasp in the translation of Hamlet, which will be discussed in chapter five. Chapter three studies translation of drama and its style transfer including the concept of drama translation, style and style transfer, the translatability of drama style, the characteristics of drama, the existing research of Hamlet in china and dramatic stylistic features during Shakespeare's day, which is a preparation for Chapter Five. Chapter four is comprised of the introduction to the theoretical basis, namely, the origin and development of Markedness Theory, its application in literature translation and the detailed illustration of Stylistic Markers Theory which paves the way for the later discussion. The fifth chapter analyzes the Bian Zhilin's style transfer of the original Hamlet with examples in which performability of his version and the influence of his translation principles on his translation are also partly discussed. The sixth chapter sums up the whole thesis together with the limitations of present study and speculations for future research.