Metaphor Translation In Hong Lou Meng From The Perspective Of Adaptation Theory

As the epitome of Chinese culture, Hong Lou Meng embodies rich folk culture and is one of the most influential classical masterpieces in the history of Chinese literature. Up to now, there have been about16translation versions of Hong Lou Meng in different languages, which help it emerge in world literature. There are two most outstanding English versions, namely, The Story of the Stone, translated by Professor David Hawkes of Oxford University and his student John Minford, and A Dream of Red Mansions, by Chinese translator Yang Xianyi and his wife Gladys Yang. Hawkes’version is completely target language reader oriented. Considering readers’response to the translated message, it provides adjusted expressions and a better understanding of cultural connotations for target language readers. Now that his version has made extraordinary achievements in expressing the theme of the original work and revealed his purpose of translation and cultural orientation, the present study chooses Hawkes’version as the source of English material.As an important rhetoric device, metaphor is widely employed through all the book of Hong Lou Meng, which requires the translator to accurately understand and render it on both the macro-cultural and the micro-linguistic levels during the process of translation. So far, there has been no such kind of research into metaphor translation in Hong Lou Meng made from the perspective of Adaptation Theory. None of the previous researches into metaphor translation from the perspective of Adaptation Theory has chosen Hong Lou Meng as its source material. Consequently, the present thesis tries to make a tentative study of metaphor translation in Hong Lou Meng within the theoretical framework of Adaptation Theory.In his famous work Understanding Pragmatics published in1999, Jef Verschueren, the secretary-general of International Pragmatics Association, proposes the Theory of Adaptation and interprets Pragmatics from this completely new angle. This theory meets the need of metaphor translation in Hong Lou Meng on both the macro-cultural and the micro-linguistic levels. According to the Theory of Adaptation, human language has three properties, namely, variability, negotiability and adaptability. The process of language use is a process of continuous choice making, which can be conscious or unconscious, and for intralinguistic reasons (also known as linguistic context, including all levels of language such as phonetic, phonological, morphological, syntactic, lexical and semantic levels) or extralinguistic reasons (also known as communicative context, consisting of physical world, social world, mental world and communication participants).The present study chooses the metaphorical expressions from Hong Lou Meng and the English equivalents from The Story of the Stone and makes a detailed analysis of how metaphor translation as a process of choice making on different levels makes dynamic adaptation to the linguistic context and communicative context. Meanwhile within the framework of Adaptation Theory, the author gives a systematic description of metaphor translation in Hong Lou Meng and makes an analytic research of the ways in which the translator deals with it.The major findings of this thesis can be listed as follows:1) Adaptation Theory provides an effective and powerful interpretation and certain theoretical guidance for metaphor translation as a process of making language choice;2) during the process of metaphor translation, as well as the process of making language choice, the translator has made adaptation to various factors, including target language structures and norms, temporal and spatial dimensions and material conditions within the physical world, socio-cultural context within the social world, target language readers’cognitive ability and emotive elements and so on. Therefore, the reason why Hawkes’ translation has gained great achievements and popularity among Western readers lies in that he has made appropriate adaptation to both the linguistic context and the communicative context;3) the present research provides a new angle for the study of metaphor translation, which is helpful to both the construction of a systematic theoretical framework of metaphor translation and its higher quality. It can also give us a deeper and better understanding of the process of translation.