On Goldblatt’s Translation Of Big Breasts And Wide Hips From The Perspective Of Skopos Theory

In recent years, the famous contemporary Chinese writer, Mo Yan and his works have attracted much attention overseas. In the process of transmission, Goldblatt plays a crucial role. As one of the most representative works of Mo Yan, the translation of Big Breasts and Wide Hips is received high remark. This translation has aroused public attention from influential media like The Washington Post and New Yorker. And it also causes the attention of sinologists and overseas scholars. As for previous studies on this translation, scholars mainly use Rewriting theory to analyze the translators’ subjectivity or they study the translation strategies in this translation. There are few studies to do a research on this translation from the perspective of skopos theory. This thesis applies Vermeer’s skopos theory to analyze this work and to illustrate the embodiment of the three rules of skopos theory, namely, skopos rule, coherence rule and fidelity rule. It has typical significance to study this translation from the viewpoint of skopos theory, which has positive meaning and academic value in Chinese literary translation practice and literature research.The study includes three parts. The first part is the exploration of the skopos of this translation. In the translation of Big Breasts and Wide Hips, Goldblatt omits and rewrites some contents. The thesis thinks that the reason for such arrangements is to make the translation more adaptable to the reading habits of English readers and to help English readers more easily accept this translation. Then the embodiment of coherence rule in this translation is analyzed. The thesis discusses the deliberate omission and rewriting of Goldblatt to a certain degree to illustrate the effect of the two strategies, namely, to make the narration of the novel more acceptable and to make this translation more concise and coherent in general. The third part talks about the fidelity of this translation to the original text at three levels, namely, lexicons, sentences and texts. And the thesis finds that Goldblatt uses literal translation and free translation to achieve the fidelity at the three levels.After the study on the translation of Big Breasts and Wide Hips under skopos theory, the thesis finds that the reason for using omissions, rewriting, literal and free translation methods to a certain degree in Goldblatt’s work is to help English readers more easily accept and understand this work. Then, the thesis concludes that skopos theory has a strong guidance on Goldblatt’s translation and that skopos theory enhances translators’ responsibility in literature translation.The study not only makes up the vacancy of the researches on Goldblatt’s translation of Big Breasts and Wide Hips from the perspective of skopos theory, but also sheds new lights on the study of skopos theory.