On C-E Idioms Translation From The Perspective Of Skopos Theory

In 2002,the national “Culture Going Global” strategy was officially put forward,in which the pioneering and leading role of classic literature is very obvious.Idioms,as an indispensable part and essence concentration of Chinese language culture,is demonstrating its brilliant expressive ability and semantic integration for the rich connotation in Chinese language.In another word,the success of idiom translation in classic literature will directly exert an influence of Chinese literature spreading and broadcasting abroad.However,being short in form and profound in meaning,idioms translation is facing a long way ahead with the cultural differences between China and the West.Mo Yan won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2012,then Chinese culture began to be the focus in the world.However,the success of Mo Yan will never be separated from the translator Howard Goldblatt,and one of the Howard Goldblatt's most outstanding works is the well-known Big Breasts & Wide Hips.The application of a large number of idioms in Mo Yan's novel Feng Ru Fei Tun has made the characters more vivid and the language more humorous,enriching the storyline and character personality at the same time.There is a total of 733 Chinese idioms in Feng Ru Fei Tun,and here the author therefore asks: Does the English translation of the Chinese idioms in Big Breasts & Wide Hips truly convey the original Chinese culture? With the trend of “Culture Going Global” prevailing,does the Chinese idioms translation promote Chinese culture to go abroad and carry forward the Chinese classic literature?Skopos theory believes that translation is a purposeful cross-cultural communication activity,in which the most important factor is the purpose of the overall translation behavior.Under the Skopos theory,the success of one translation is evaluated by whether it has achieved the intended purpose of the target language reader.In the three rules of Skopos theory,the Skopos rule comes first,which means that the translator should specify the purpose in a given translation context and decide which translation method should be adopted.Howard Goldblatt's translation is exactly experiencing the historical stage of China's implementation of the "Culture Going Global" strategy,so the translator must first preserve the original flavor of Chinese culture,then the language expression should be easily accepted and understood by the target language readers,which means if the translation is unacceptable to the foreigners,even the best culture cannot be spread.Therefore,this thesis takes the Skopos theory as the theoretical framework,picking the material culture,institutional culture,and spiritual culture as the starting points,to explore the form equivalence and effect equivalence in the idioms translation in Big Breasts & Wide Hips based on whether it's beneficial for Chinese culture going global,meanwhile to explore their advantages and disadvantages to further conclude which is easier to be accepted by the target readers and which one is more conducive for the promotion of Chinese culture spirit.By combing the Chinese idioms translation in Big Breasts & Wide Hips,the author figured out what translation strategies that Howard Goldblatt has mainly adopted to reach the translation purpose,namely the dominant use of foreignization and the minor use of the domestication,coupled with various translation methods,and come to the conclusion: For retaining the original Chinese culture,foreignization should be the top translation strategy considered.However,given the huge differences between Chinese and Western cultures,if the foreignization strategy does not convey the Chinese culture,then it is time to adopt the domestication strategy to help the translation be easily comprehended by the target readers.In the English version of Big Breasts & Wide Hips,Howard Goldblatt adopts the foreignization to keep the original culture as much as possible,and at the same time,he also fully considers the reading requirements of Western readers,combined with various translation methods such as free translation,amplification,omission,and substitution,striving to provide a smooth and fluent translation for Western readers,but to a certain extent it indeed has sacrificed the output of the original flavor of Chinese culture,especially the translation of some idioms with omission method,which has lost some of the artistic and phonological beauty of the original works.Therefore,this is the part that deserves careful thinking and attention of idioms translation in Chinese classic literature in the future.