On The Reproduction Of Characters In Fiction Translation

Since fiction is one of the most common forms of literature,the cotemporary China never ceases to introduce various Chinese versions of English fictions.Although the fiction Small Town is not a classic one,it still has an innovative narrative tone and a delicate writing style,especially its characterizations of characters.Therefore,the translator chose this fiction as translation material for two reasons—firstly,the translation skills could be profoundly improved;secondly,a new understanding on reproduction of characters could be achieved.This is a report concluded through the translation of the source text excerpted from the first two chapters of a mystery fiction Small Town written by Lawrence Block.The chapters the translator chose have described three major characters in this book and demonstrated a mysterious murder happened in a town.Lawrence is a master in establishing mysterious,suspenseful environment,and shows great talents on depicting the small potatoes from the bottom of the society.These characters' features and personalities are vividly depicted through dialogues,mental descriptions,behavioral descriptions and appearance descriptions.In the translation process,the translator found it challenging to reproduce the characters from all aspects as the source text did.Besides,the translator encountered many obstacles,such as the translation of phrases under specific historical period,the translation of colloquial expression and idioms,the accurate understanding of the characters' inner world,etc.To solve these problems,the whole translation process was conducted under the principle of “faithful,clear and literary graceful”,which means the translator not only should correctly understand the original meaning of the source text,but also accurately and properly convey the literary elegance in target text.This is the only way to reproduce full images of characters,and to enable the audience to perceive a person vividly through reading.This report would analyze and discuss the translation strategies through successfully reproducing the characters and figuring out the best way to maintain the spirit of source text through case studies.In the part of case study,the translator demonstrated her translation strategies in reproducing characters from four parts: appearance description,behavioral description,metal description and dialogues.In the first part,since the author was inclined to combine his attitudes and personal feelings with appearance description,the translator would grasp the nature and essential features of characters based on the comprehensive analysis of the whole text.In the second part,since the author tended to manifest great expressiveness and power through behavioral description,the translator would analyze her translation strategies in reproducing characters from coherence of behaviors,vivid representation of verbs and flexible translation influenced by context.In the third part,since the source text was excerpted from a detective fiction,the translator showed her translation strategies not only in reproducing characters' emotions in Chinese version,but also in reproducing characters' rigorous logical mind in mental description.In the last part,since the author authentically depicted characters' characteristics to a maximal degree through concise dialogues,the translator summarized her translation strategies in two aspects: reproducing characters' identities and emotions.From this translation practice,the translator gained new understandings on translation skills in reproducing characters in fiction translation and hoped that this report would offer some help to other fiction translators.