A Comparative Analysis Of Two Versions Of Great Expectations Based On Berman’s Theory

Translation theory comes from translation practice and in turn serves us guidancefor translation practice. The development of translation theory provides more and moreuseful and effective guidance to literary translation activities. In translation practice,different concrete criteria different translators go after would lead to differenttranslation strategies they take.As one of Dickens’ famous work, Great Expectations is widely known in China.It reveals the true aspects of the society and the life of the lower-class through thenarration and description of Pip’s whole life that is full of bitterness and happiness aswell. But the researches of this Chinese version mainly in figure’s character andpsychology, the images and symbols, narrative technique, outlook on life, moraloutlook. Few of them studied in the light of a translation perspective, even none ofanalysis is based on some theory.Antoine Berman’s ’Translation as the Trial of the Foreign’ was translated andintroduced to the English-speaking world by a famous translation theorist LawrenceVenuti in2000, and this made his theory well known. Meanwhile, Berman’s theoryprovides wider and more objective perspective for subsequent translation researchesand makes great contributions to descriptive translation study. But just few people areinterested in his theoretical feasibility of literary translation. Taking Berman’s theory oftranslation as the theoretical framework, this thesis chooses the two Chinese versions ofGreat Expectations that are quite representative to comparatively analyze his translationtheory in the process of translating and discusses how Berman’s theory embody andinfluence in the translation and process of translation. Specifically, based on Berman’stranslation theory and "the trial of the foreign", this thesis analyzes the differentstrategies of translating of the two translators from the perspective of twelve deformingtendencies. By analyzing, the author has been found that different translation theorygovern choices of the two translators in different strategies. This thesis not onlyprovides supplement to the descriptive research on Chinese versions of GreatExpectations but also illustrates Berman’s translation theory practically in some degree.