| Known as the essence of Chinese language, Chinese idioms possess the merits of concise form, vivid expression, profound meaning and so on.... However, these positive attributes have in reverse become negative barriers in idiomatic translation. A large number of scholars have discussed C-E translation of Chinese idioms so far, from the various angles of culture, linguistics, psychology, and aesthetics and so on. Some of these researches are confined by traditional theories and methods, while some others are conducted merely based on empirical analysis, in want of explanations of inner mechanism in idiomatic translation. Therefore, it becomes visible for the necessity of discussion on C-E translation of Chinese idioms from cognitive perspective, which is the main topic of this thesis. With the dramatic development of linguistic science, cognitive linguistics on the foundation of embodied philosophy has made great achievements, inspired by which this thesis tries to explore the cognitive properties of idiomatic translation from a totally new perspective based on the cognitive formation of Chinese idioms, expecting to do some favor for translation practice.In line with the core principle of cognitive linguistics(Reality—Cognition—Language), this thesis describes the formative process of Chinese idioms as follows: people take part in several realistic incidents directly or indirectly through interactive experience with objective world. From those incidents with similar properties, people would get a common prototypical meaning through a few cognitive operations in the mind, which would be symbolized in further step by an individual incident or be lexicalized straightforward to be a fixed Chinese idiom. Three cognitive operations namely embodiment, metaphtonymy and conceptual blending have played crucial roles in the formative process of Chinese idioms. It is indicated from the process that the meaning of a Chinese idiom contains three levels, which are called meaning on linguistic level(literal meaning of a Chinese idiom), meaning on cognitive level(conceptual meaning of a Chinese idiom) and meaning on realistic level(contextual meaning of a Chinese idiom). The three kinds of meanings can serve as direct objects respectively for translation operation. Therefore, we put forward the leveling view of English translation of Chinese idioms that the C-E translation could be conducted on linguistic level, cognitive level or realistic level.On linguistic level,translators could restate literal expressions of Chinese idioms in English,which is beneficial to reflect language expressive features of original idioms intuitively.On cognitive level,translators could reword conceptual meanings of Chinese idioms in English,which is helpful to convey semantic content of original idioms accurately.On realistic level,translators could describe the contextual reality of Chinese idioms in English,which is conducive to maintain pragmatic functions of original idioms completely.For instance,the Chinese idiom“tou liang huan zhu(????)”can be represented as“stealing the beam and changing the pillar”on linguistic level,as“deceitful scheme”on cognitive level or as“underhand plan to fob off a different bride on Baoyu”on realistic level.In this thesis, the author randomly pick out 300 items of Chinese idioms(one item from every three pages) from Hong Lou Meng, and look for their corresponding English expressions in three English versions of Hong Lou Meng respectively(The Story of the Stone by Hawks & Minford, A Dream of Red Mansions by Xianyi Yang & Gladys, Red Chamber Dream by Bonsall). Through analysis, it is found out that there are six kinds of operational modes in practice. In language-level translation, there are complete translation, partial translation and LL+CL translation. Among them, complete translation is overwhelming in number. Besides, between the two categories of operational modes in cognition-level translation, translation of conceptual meaning is more than image-replacement translation. Last but not least, contextual translation is applicable in some situation.With the help of particular cases, this thesis also elaborates the operational process and expressive effects of translation on each level. Linguistic translation of Chinese idioms is lexical conversion between two languages, which is good for the maintenance of lexical traits of original idioms. Cognitive translation of Chinese idioms is supposed to go through a delexicalized operation to bring out the prototypical meaning which could be retold in English. This method is good for the maintenance of semantic traits of original idioms. Realistic translation of Chinese idioms is realized through combination of prototypical meaning and context, which is good for the maintenance of pragmatic traits of original idioms.It can be known from the statistical analysis about levels of idiomatic translation in three English versions that:(1) The distributions in the Yangs' and Hawks' versions are alike roughly. The cognition-level translations account for more than a half. Language-level translations rank in the second place, while the number of reality-level translations is the least.(CL > LL > RL);(2) Bonsall has preference for the translation on linguistic level. The proportion of cognition-level translations takes the second place and there are few translations are conducted on realistic level.(LL > CL > RL).(3) In general, translation on cognitive level is commonly employed and it is the least popular to translate Chinese idioms on realistic level. This result implies that the understanding and translation of conceptual meaning of Chinese idioms is the major concern to translators. The proportion of language-level translation and reality-level translation might be influenced by the factors such as translators' personal experience and intentions of translation.This thesis provides a theoretical explanation about the mechanism of C-E idiomatic translation, which broadens the research scope and enriches the research content. It is sincerely hoped to shed some light on the relevant research in the future. |
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