Science Fiction Translation Methods Based On Relevance Theory Of Translation

Since science fiction originates from abroad,it is translators who bring in this kind of literary genre to China.Science fiction translation in China dates back to late 19 th century.As a result,this specific literature form became available to Chinese readers.This special literature becomes popular gradually,with the development of economy and technology in China.And during this process,translators function as a bridge between original authors and target readers.Therefore,science fiction translation plays a big part in the sino-foreign cultural exchange.Besides,science fiction features scientific,literary and fantasy.Translations should retain these characteristics.However,there are few studies on the science fiction translation and the translation methods of whom are not included in a uniform norm.This thesis tries to explore translation methods for science fiction,under the guidance of Relevance Theory of Translation initiated by Gutt.The author attempts to provide a new theoretical view for the development of translation theory and references for the practice of science fiction translation.Based on Relevance Theory from the pragmatic perspective,translation is a communication process between human beings,and the nature of communication is inference.Translation is a ternary Ostensive-inferential communication procedure,which consists of three communicative bodies,original author,translator and target reader.Gutt shows two translation methods in his theory,direct translation and indirect translation.Direct translation achieves optimal explanatory resemblance by way of communicative clues,thereby delivering intentions of original author to target readers.Indirect translation is amount to indirect speech,which tries to preserve resemblance of cognitive effects.The two translation methods highlight respectively the delivery of literal meanings and connotation meanings.Finally,it draws a conclusion that although there are various translation methods in science fiction translation,it can be explained within the direct translation and indirect translation.Relevance Theory of Translation provides a theoretical foundation for science fiction translation.In order to realize optimal relevance,translators should take consideration for reappearance of communicative clues of original and the characteristics of science fiction,such as literariness,scientificity and literariness.The thesis structures as follows.Chapter one is an introduction.The Relevance Theory acts as the theoretical perspective of this thesis.Chapter two is literature review.The main contents of it are studies on translation of science fiction and Relevance Theory of Translation at home or abroad.Chapter three discusses key concepts of Relevance Theory of Translation.Chapter four is case analysis.It briefly explains applications of Relevance Theory of Translation on science fiction translation,then it discusses translation methods in Shen's version of The Time Machine in three levels from direct translation and indirect translation,such as word level,sentence level and discourse level.