A Contrastive Study Of Two English Versions Of Ah Q Zheng Zhuan From The Perspective Of Skopos Theory

Translation, especially literary translation, has a key function which is to promote the culturalexchange and make people understand foreign cultures. China boasts its long history and brilliantculture. Facing the increasingly tense global economic competition, it is becoming increasingly urgentand necessary to spread the national culture, promoting the common prosperity of all ethnic groups inthe world, making the world know better about China and its culture.Ah Q Zheng Zhuan is a wonderful work in the literature of China and the world. Its creation andinfluence has been marked by profound historical and cultural stigma and related translation activitiesalso permeate with cultural factors. Functionalist translation theory–Skopos theory holds thattranslation is a purposeful behavior, and the first and most important rule that all translations shouldfollow is the Skopos rule, that is, the translation purpose determines the translation strategies andmethods. Translation purposes are influenced by the combined effects of a variety of factors.Therefore, whether it is“sufficient”to achieve the purpose of translation has become an importantstandard to evaluate translations. Skopos theory is a major breakthrough and important complement totranslation theories of traditional“equivalent”, providing a dynamic and multi-dimensionalperspective of the translation practice, at the same time it has opened up a new field of vision fortranslation practice and research.According to the three basic rules of Skopos theory, that is, Skopos rule, fidelity rule andcoherence rule, this thesis is intended to conduct a contrastive analysis on the two English versions ofAh Q Zheng Zhuan by Yang Hsien-yi and Gladys Yang and Lyell. The author’s analysis states that,with different translation purposes in the process of translation, translators use different translationstrategies, and achieve expected translation results. Yang’s translation in most cases conforms to theSkopos theory, and largely succeeds in the purpose of the translator for foreign readers to understandthe way of Chinese culture. But what cannot be ignored is that one of the obvious languagecharacteristics of Ah Q Zheng Zhuan is the common use of classical language and modern vernacularof China. And the Yangs do not well reflect the classical Chinese language characteristics in thetranslation of the original classical language, which do not achieve the coherence rule. Meanwhile, theclassical language is also an important part of the Chinese traditional culture. The purpose of theYangs’version, namely introducing Chinese culture to foreign readers, is also affected to some extent. On the other hand, from the framework of Skopos theory, Lyell’s translation not only achieves thepurpose of conveying his own understanding of the original text generally to the readers, but alsobetter reflects the fidelity rule and the coherence rule, which ensures adequate translation. At the sametime, the study also proves that the criticism of translation should not be simply based on normativestandard of translation in evaluating its merits, but the scope of criticism should be expanded toinclude translation purposes, translation instigators, translators and translation of recipients into thecategories of criticism, so as to evaluate the translation from a broader perspective, and thus ensurefair and reasonable evaluation of the translated text.