A Report On English-Chinese Translation Of The History Of Bhutan(Excerpts)

As a neighboring country of China,the Kingdom of Bhutan is one of the important countries along the Silk Road.Without formal diplomatic relations,there is inadequate exchange between China and Bhutan.The History of Bhutan,written by Bhutanese famous scholar Karma Phuntsho,provides an important reference for the world to know about the country,diachronically depicting the historical development of Bhutan,concerning such aspects as Bhutanese politics,economy and culture etc.Thus,the translation of the book is conducive to deepening the Chinese understanding of Bhutan.The report is based on the translation on Chapter Seven of The History of Bhutan,which mainly includes Bhutanese unification in the 17 th century.Katharina Reiss,a representative of the German Functionalist Translation Theory,advanced Text Typology Theory and classified text types into three kinds,that is,informative text,expressive text and operative text,suggesting that it is the text type that determines translation principles and specific translation techniques.According to Reiss' s text classification,The History of Bhutan is an informative text,whose translation should focus on information conveyance.The source text in formal style,contains a large number of long sentences with rigorous sentence structures,and involves an amount of proper nouns such as persons' names,places' names,official posts,religious and historical events,which are two major difficulties in this translation practice.Guided by Text Typology Theory,the translator explores the translation techniques of proper nouns and long sentences in the translation of historical texts to render the information better.Borrowing,transliteration and transliteration plus annotation are employed to realize the accuracy of proper nouns.Long sentences can be tackled by adopting synthetic linearity,inversion and division to guarantee the readability of the translation.By reflecting on this translation practice,the translator sums up the above translation techniques in order to provide feasible references and inspiration for the translation of historical texts.