| Hong Lou Meng with its profound connotation and cultural value attracts many scholars’attention both at home and abroad. In the1970s, David Hawkes, a professor of OxfordUniversity, and the Chinese translator Yang Xianyi translated Hong Lou Meng into Englishversions respectively. Thereafter, the translation of Hong Lou Meng has entered a brand new era.From the perspective of contemporary cognitive linguistics, it can be easily detected thatmetaphors abound in the original version which presents fantasy images and enchant charm tothe work. Therefrom an upsurge of research into the translation of metaphors in the work hasbeen aroused. Scholars have an in-depth analysis of relevant topics such as the prerequisiteconditions of metaphor translation, translating Chinese conceptual metaphors into English,cultural differences and metaphor translation as well as the cognitive analysis of conceptualmetaphors and their translation strategies, etc. Such studies testify that metaphor is an importantdomain of translation studies. Based on this situation, the study on metaphorical translation inHong Lou Meng is necessary and valuable.The formation of metaphor is ultimately based upon man’s cognition towards the world andthis kind of cognition lies in culture tightly. Therefore, cognitive models differ from each other indifferent culture settings. Anderson (1987) points out that cognitive pattern depend, to a largeextent, on what people have been modeled and enforced by childrearing practices. Such practicecommonly varies from culture to culture. Thanks to the influence of culture settings, religiousbelief, living environment, social system and natural conditions, English and Chinese translatorshave multinomial, multidimensional, pluralistic interpretation and presentation of the selection ofcognitive models of different metaphors.Cognitive model refers to man’s response to objective world in the brain, which is involvedin man’s processing and treatment of psychological information. Lakoff (1987) points out thatman’s cognitive models are stored in the brain in the form of prepositions and images. It alsoplays an important role in the connection of human beings and objective world. Therefore,cognitive model as a high generalization of our life experience provides mankind with a conciseand idealized cognitive frame. The study of cognitive model occupies an important position incognitive linguistics. Its essence is the psychological reflection of the stored knowledge in acertain field. The cognition of the world is interrelated with the surrounding situation and culture.It is such factors that result in the formation of cognitive models. Cognitive models are notuniversal, it depends on the culture in which a person grows up and lives. In reverse, culturalmodels can be seen as cognitive models that are shared by people who are belonging to a certainsocial group, thus a cognitive model for a particular domain ultimately depends on cultural models. Different cultures may have different cognitive models about the same concept. It isobvious that great differences exist in English and Chinese cultures, as a result these culturedifferences lead to different cognitive models, and it is such barrier that makes cross-culturaltranslation unsatisfactory. Confronted with this urgent situation, the author attempts to make acomparative study on C-E cognitive differences.Based on the relevant theory of cognitive linguistics, the thesis makes a comparative studyof Chinese and English translators’ selection of cognitive models in dealing with metaphoricalculture-loaded words and presents they keep a different understanding towards prototypes,categorization and construal, which causes immediate impact on the quality of translation. Withthe purpose to promote fusion of cultures, avoid misunderstanding and lessen the target languagereaders’ reading burden, the thesis has classified its differences and pointed out the causes ofthese differences. Thereby, to better achieve the classic Chinese cultures go global strategy. |
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