A Practice Report On The E-C Translation Of Complex Sentences In Trying Not To Try (Excerpt)

This practice report is based on the translation of the Second Chapter of Trying Not to Try.As a public reading with many historical figures and events,it is featured by formal,logic and concise language in that Edward Slingerland blends ancient Chinese philosophy and modern science.In order to explain his perception of wu-wei,he applies many complex sentences.In the source text,complex sentences usually have complicated structures with tightly logic relations,involving many modifiers and nominalized structures.How to make the translation of complex sentences in Trying Not to Try fluent and readable to target readers becomes the difficulty of this translation task.Therefore,the author classifies the complex sentences in the source text into three categories,which are complex sentences with nominalized structures,complex sentences with adverbial clauses and complex sentences with embedded structures or parenthesis.On the theoretical base of the Functional Equivalence theory and taking syntactic differences between English and Chinese into consideration,the author summarizes the specific treatment methods-conversion,reverse translation,restructuring and amplification in the hope of making the translation more natural,fluent,and readable.