An Analysis On The English Translation Of Conceptual Metaphors In Big Breasts And Wide Hips By Howard Goldblatt

Studies on metaphor have undergone a long history of more than 2000 years both in China and in the West. In traditional theories, metaphor is considered a figure of speech, and studies on metaphor translation are mainly carried out from the rhetorical perspective. However, in Conceptual Metaphor Theory, first proposed by Lakoff and Johnson in their book Metaphors We Live By, metaphor is no longer regarded as a mere linguistic phenomenon but a universal way of thinking and cognition. Many scholars have gradually recognized the cognitive value of metaphor and impressive progress has been achieved in this field. Feng Ru Fei Tun, one representative novel written by Mo Yan, which has embraced worldwide attention after its publication, is full of metaphors to construct its ideology. Viewed from the conceptual metaphorical perspective, it can provide a new angle for the study on Feng Ru Fei Tun and its translation.In Feng Ru Fei Tun, there are four major types of conceptual metaphors, namely, the conceptual metaphor of breast, the conceptual metaphor of animal, the conceptual metaphor of emotion and culture-specific conceptual metaphor. Among them, the conceptual metaphors of breast and animal play an important role in constructing the theme of life in the novel. Therefore, the author applies the approach of Conceptual Metaphor Theory to analyze their functions in constructing and comprehending Mo Yan’s thematic verbalization of the theme of life and explores the corresponding realization of functions of these metaphors in Big Breasts and Wide Hips. In the thesis, Howard Goldblatt’s translated version is researched to discover to what extent those conceptual metaphors are reproduced in the target language and what translation strategies are used. It also tries to summarize causes for translator to adopt different translation strategies.The thesis consists of five chapters to study the English translation of conceptual metaphors in Big Breasts and Wide Hips. Chapter One is an overall introduction to the research, including reviewing previous translation studies on Big Breasts and Wide Hips both abroad and in China, and pointing out the room for study so as to testify the creative significance of the thesis. Chapter Two deals with the conceptual metaphorical basis of metaphor translation as well as metaphors of breast and animal in Big Breasts and Wide Hips. Chapter Three and Chapter Four serve as the nucleus of the thesis. They provide case studies for metaphor translation of breast and animal metaphors in the translated version of Big Breasts and Wide Hips by Goldblatt. By careful probing into the translated texts regarding these metaphors, the author first identifies and analyzes how Goldblatt’s translation conveys meanings from the original texts onto the target text, and then summarizes translation strategies adopted in his translation process and explores causes of different translation strategies for conceptual metaphors in Big Breasts and Wide Hips. Chapter Five concludes and summarizes the main findings, and points out the limitations of the study.