The Translation Of The Antiques In Hong Lou Meng In The Perspective Of Functional Translation Theory

Hong Lou Meng, the greatest achievement in art and literature, is the treasure of Chineseclassical civilization. Many branches of culture including poetry, history, medicine, cuisineculture, clothing and furniture, etc were mentioned and demonstrated in this fiction. No onecan manage to translate it without a rich and profound accumulation of Chinese culture.The clothing and furniture, significant symbol of human beings’ transition towardcivilization, are carriers of both material and spiritual culture. The aesthetic charm and beautyof Chinese traditional antiques were expressed in Cao Xueqin’s masterly appreciation of artand culture. What’s more, the description of the antiques is closely related to the developmentof the plot, the portrait of the characters, their social status and the aesthetics of the characters.Dealing with the researches on the translation of Chinese traditional culture is quitecritical to the translation of Hong Lou Meng. And the translation of the antiques is animportant branch of culture translation. This immortal work has many translated versionsamong which The Story of the Stone translated by David Hawkes was one of the mostinfluential works.In this thesis, navigated by German Functional Translation Theory, the translation of theantiques is to be evaluated in terms of the functions and the communication of the culturaldeposits contained in the original work. The pattern, color and material of the antiques will bedissected. At the same time, the hiding information such as the Chinese classical value andideology reflected by the clothing and furniture will be demonstrated. Some typicaltranslation clips are analyzed in this thesis as well. Generally speaking, the antiques in thisbook are translatable, though the translatable degrees vary from words to words. Some oftranslations are quite effective and excellent from which other translators should gain someinspiration. Nevertheless, some of them can be regarded as typical mistranslation. The reasonof the mistranslations will be dissected. By learning this, other translators need to realize thathow to avoid as much mistranslation as possible. All the researches are based upon functional translation theory, especially the core theory-----Skopos Theory. Through the whole work, it istended to offer some practical and theoretical inspiration to the translators.