Translation Variation In The Chinese Subtitles Of House Of Cards: A Holistic View

A large number of overseas teleplays have gained increasingly popularity among the Chinese audience in the last few years. The political webisodes House of cards have received 29 Emmy Awards nominations and won the prize for 9 times since its premiere on Netflix in 2013. The overwhelmingly popularity of House of Cards in China has caused the “House of Cards fever”. The successful Chinese subtitles have made undeniable contributions to the popularity of House of cards in China. Subtitles which serve as the bridge of connecting the text and the target audiences have been taken as one of the most important standards to evaluate the quality of House of cards.The literature review on subtitle translation has been observed in the paper. The time and space constraints and translation approaches have been paid much attention to among existing researches. Relevant case studies have focused on researches from Functionalist and Manipulation perspectives. Huang Zhonglian put forward the concept of complete translation and translation variation based on the established categories. Seven Accommodation methods and twelve translation variation approaches are explicitly elucidated in Translation Variation Theory. Translation Variation Theory has provided a new perspective for investigating the realization of holistic style of subtitle translation. Holistic Theory provides a macroscopic frame and translation variation approaches serves as the concrete method in the study. The two influencing factors of subtitle translation are first observed in the discussion. The extratextual factors include the audiences' demands, social background and ideology, techniques requirement and revision of subtitles and translators' comprehensive accomplishments. Intratextual factors concern with text types, linguistic style of the film and register influence. The concrete translation variation approaches employed in the cases and the reasons of adopting the particular approaches are the first season of House of Cards.The paper is in an attempt to examine the translators' approaches to achieve the holistic results of meeting the target audience' expectation and conforming to the holistic style of the original text under multi-dimensional influencing factors by studying the Chinese subtitle of House of Cards. It has been discovered that the elucidation translation, edition translation, condensed translation, paraphrase translation, adaptation translation, review translation and referential translation approaches are widely employed in the subtitle translation of House of Cards. The elucidation translation method has been frequently adopted in the translation. Subtitle translation is deeply restricted by the cultural factors, the text types, personal characters of the particular film, translators' abilities and target audiences' requirements. The extratextual and intratextual factors involved have made a supplementary for the reasons of translation variation of Translation Variation Theory.