A Study Of The Chinese Version Of Empire Falls From The Perspective Of Relevance Theory

Novels, as a kind of literature are popular among the mass of people. Novels have the beauty of art, rich culture-loaded expressions and specific linguistic styles, which call for a translator not only to convey the content but also to reproduce the linguistic style of the original text in the course of translating a novel. Thus, the translation of a novel is not an easy task. The question of what strategies should be used in translating a novel has long been troubling a lot of translators. However, the Relevance Theory can provide some guidance for the translation of a novel. This thesis attempts to make an analysis and study of the Chinese version of the novel Empire Falls under the framework of the Relevance Theory. First, the author of the thesis analyzes specific examples relating to the translator's translation of the cultural-loaded words. Then the author studies the strategies used by the translator in retaining the linguistic style of the original text from the aspect of communicative clues. By analyzing the examples taken from the Chinese version of Empire Falls, the author draws some conclusions as follows:1. Relevance Theory can provide some guidance for the translation of novels.2. Translation is not confined to one or more certain strategies, so what the translator should do is to take the cognitive environment of the target readers into consideration and make flexible use of the strategies that can help the target readers achieve a better contextual effect so long as the cultural differences in the novel are concerned.3. The retaining of communicative clues plays an important role in reproducing the linguistic style of the original text. This thesis shades lights on the guidance of translating novels and avoids the argument concerning direct translation and free translation in the previous translation to some degree. Meanwhile, the thesis suggests that translators should make flexible use of strategies and ways of translation in the course of translating novels by taking target readers into consideration.