Hermeneutics Study Of Translations Of Chapter Titles And Back Comments Of San Guo Yan Yi

Chinese classics is the crystallization of Chinese traditional culture,with special characteristics different from modern works in the aspects ofideological content, language forms, cultural implications, etc. In generaltranslation, translators need to connect the communication of twodifferent languages, cultures and audiences, while in translating theclassics, they have to try to cross the time and space. However, ThreeKingdoms, one of the four famous classics，has rarely been studied on.And the only few articles mostly discuss obvious problems in Roberts’translation, such as the translation of quantifiers and length-unit words.But Taylor’s version has been ignored because of its too many defects.Although Taylor’s translation is far inferior to Roberts’in faithfulness, itis right in the former’s reference that Roberts produced a better text. Andfrom the perspective of Hermeneutics, Taylor’s translation owns a lot ofadvantages.From the perspective of Hermeneutics, the author comparesTaylor’s and Roberts’translations of the chapter titles and backcomments of San Guo Yan Yi. With Hermeneutics theories, the authorexplores the reasons why the two translators have similar translations anddifferent translations now and then: Roberts’pre-understanding of SanGuo Yan Yi was influeced by Taylor’s translation, so their translations has something in common; Roberts’pre-understanding was influencedby his own subjectivity and the historical background, so theirtranslations has more differences. Then the author concludes that there ishistoricity and subjectivity of interpreters’understandings, as well asthe possibility of a new translation version of San Guo Yan Yi . Thethesis will expound the author’s ideas through the following parts:Part one serves as an introduction to the research, briefly introducingthe necessity, significance and guiding theory of the research, andsumming up the research at home and abroad. Then it makes a shortintroduction of the organization of the thesis. It points out the problems inthe study of the translation of San Guo Yan Yi as well as the necessity ofthe comparative study.Part two, that’s chapter one, provides a brief introduction to thecultural environment of the two versions of translation, from which theauthor deduces the aims and translation methods of the two translators, soas to lay a basis for part four.Part three, chapter two, presents the Hermeneutics theory, its keyconcepts as well as the role of Hermeneutics in translation. It mainlyelaborates the influence of translator’s subjectivity on translator’stranslation aim and methods.Part four, chapter three, compares Roberts’and Taylor’s translationsof chapter titles and back comments, analyzes their similarities and differences, and explains how translators make use of their subjectivity intranslation from the perspective of Hermeneutics in accordance with theprevious part: the culture the translator living in influences his translation,and the function of translator’s subjectivity.The last part, the concluding part, makes a summary of the thesis. Asthe historical property of understanding, people’s interpretations of a textare diverse. In different times and from different perspectives, differentmisunderstandings and prejudices may occur. Understanding is the fusionof the past vision of the source text (ST) and the present vision caused byinterpreter’s prejudice (pre-structure), the process of which brings to thetranslator the initiative, openness and creativity. The translator’s culturalbackground and his cultural value are important factors affecting thetranslating. They will directly affect the translator’s choice of translatingmethods, the treating of the content, in particular, the words andsentences embodying culture. Thus, the translators will inevitablyinterpret the text. Because of the historical property of understanding, inthe process of history, the younger generations, based on oldergenerations’knowledge as well as the influence of their own knowledge,will change their vision, and create more reasonable interpretation.