An Analysis Of Translation Of Culture-loaded Words In "Hong Lou Meng" From The Perspective Of Translators’ Subjectivity

In traditional translation studies, translators’ subjectivity has long been neglected and placed in a marginal position. Due to the development of modern translation theories and "the cultural turn" in particular, these changes highlight the role of translators’ subjectivity in selecting and interpreting the original texts, determining the translation approaches, and reproducing the artistic effect and cultural connotation of the original works, and thus it has arouseed an academic concern in translation studies.As a literary treasure of China, "Hong Lou Meng" has been deeply appreciated by the translators because of its splendid artistic and cultural values. "Hong Lou Meng" has numerous English versions, among which only two complete English versions of "Hong Long Meng" are widely recognized as the best ones. They are "The Story of the Stone", translated by David Hawks and his son-in-law John Minford, and "A Dream of Red Mansions", translated by Yang Xianyi and his wife Gladys Yang. The academic studies on the two English versions are too numerous to enumerate. But there are few specialized comparative studies on the two English versions from the perspective of translators’ subjectivity. The culture-loaded word is regarded as a sign of the great cultural value of "Hong Lou Meng". The cultural connotation behind culture-loaded words can help the foreign readers understand Chinese traditional culture. However, the huge difference in languages and cultures makes the delivery of the cultural information even harder. Therefore, an accurate reproduction of the cultural connotation of culture-loaded words has become a big issue for the translators in the translation of "Hong Lou Meng".The thesis will make a comparative analysis of the two versions to achieve the following objectives: 1. the connotation and significance of translators’ subjectivity in literary translation; 2. the relationship between the representation of cultural connotation and the translators’ subjectivity; 3. how the translator’s identity is manifested through cultural tendency, ideology, social background and translation thoughts.