A Report On The Translation Of Roderick Hudson (Chapter Ⅲ)

The translation task, a novel entitled Roderick Hudson written by Henry James, isprovided by the Foreign Language and Research Press. Cooperating with other fiveteammates, the writer is responsible for the translation task of Chapters3and4, from whichthe writer choose chapter3, about12thousand words, as my translation material in thistranslation practice.Roderick Hudson, the first saga novel of Henry James, is recognized by himself as his firstsuccessful piece of work. Before translation, the writer did lots of researches and did not findthe Chinese version of this novel. Therefore, the writer perceived the challenge in translatingit and the writer thought it is of vital importance to translate the work of high literary value.On phonetic level, the adaptation theory can convey the phonological aesthetic feeling ofsource language. In lexical level, the adaptation theory helps to grasp the meaning of wordsfrom the level of vocabulary, grammar and context. In sentence level, in order to adapt thetranslation activity to the cognitive context of the target language culture, the adaptationtheory helps to understand it from the aspects of literal meaning and language style. Insentence-group level, the theory does well in achieving cohesion and coherence. For thedifficulties in this practice, the writer tried to guide the translation with adaptation theory andobtained the desired effect.The thesis is composed of six parts. The first part is task description. The second part istext analysis and governing principle of this translation. Part three mainly gives anintroduction of the process of this translation task. Part four is about the introduction ofAdaptation Theory and case studies. The fifth part is the summary of the translation practice.And the last part is the conclusion. By doing the translation task, the writer has a further understanding of the adaptationtheory. If we want to do translation well, we’d start from different levels which constitute thediscourse and employ the translation skills flexibly. Moreover, we shall learn some translationskills and know how to guide translation practice with translation theory. Besidesimprovement, the writer has a better understanding of translator quality and responsibility.