A Study On Simile And Its Translation In Shakespeare’s Plays From The Perspective Of Prototype Theory

Shakespeare, a master of language, is one of the greatest playwrights to create 37 plays. Shakespeare’s plays remain the most excellent literary works after centuries, mainly due to the use of the rhetorical language. Among them, simile is frequently used in the plays. The word of simile is originated from the Latin of Similis which means like, look like......almost the same. Simile is an old figure of speech which is common in verse and prose. Simile, in essence, is actually a form of metaphor. A number of Chinese scholars define Simile as:Tenors and vehicles appear simultaneously and they are similar to each other. The generation of simile is based on the psychological association.This paper uses the prototype theory of cognitive linguistics as the new perspective and analyzes the simile in Shakespeare’s plays. Prototype theory argues that the prototype is a typical member of the category, the same category with the most common characteristics of members instance. Prototype has the most common characteristics of the members in the category, the most "family resemblance". Members in the same categories are connected together by "family resemblance". The prototype has the most common features of members in the same category and the least common features of those members in the adjacent areas. Category boundary is fuzzy. Adjacent areas are overlapping and infiltrating each other.In this thesis, all examples are from Shakespeare’s four tragedies, namely "Hamlet," "Macbeth," "King Lear" and "Othello". According to Li Dingkun’s classification of simile by figurative words, this paper divides simile into four categories, namely "like" as the figurative words, "as" as the figurative words, "as...as" as the figurative words and the compound words. Every classification is analyzed separately. This paper uses the prototype theory to analyze the choice of vehicles and the composition of simile in the Shakespeare’s plays, exploring the cognitive mechanisms. This paper also makes a conclusion of simile translation strategies by analyzing translation versions written by Liang Shiqiu, Zhu Shenghao, Bian Zhilin and Sun Dayu. Three translation strategies are keeping the prototype of vehicles, keeping the prototype of vehicles plus the explanation and conversing the prototype of vehicles. Each translation strategy is concluded through the cognitive analysis of several typical examples. Simile is not only a positive rhetoric, but also a cognitive method. According to the further exploration in the prototype theory’s explanative power, this thesis can provide a unique perspective for the study of Shakespeare to analyze simile from the perspective of prototype theory.