A Corpus-Based Analysis Of Translator’s Style

The thriving children’s literature sector in China has become a highly promising segment within the broader domestic book market,fueled in part by a significant influx of foreign works.In this context,translators assume a crucial role,as the quality of their translations directly impacts the materials available to young readers.Consequently,it is vital to examine both the translation process of children’s literature and the translators involved.This study examines the translation style of Ma Ainong(1964-),a female translator specializing in children’s literature,through a combination of corpus-based quantitative methods and qualitative descriptive strategies.To gain a comprehensive understanding of Ma’s style,small corpora have been constructed,including her translated works,the corresponding original English texts,multiple translations of selected original texts by three other translators,and original Chinese children’s literature with a similar lexical difficulty to Ma’s translations.Utilizing the parallel and comparable corpora established,this thesis conducts a macro comparison between Ma’s translated texts and non-translated Chinese children’s literature in terms of vocabulary,syntax,rhetoric,and deixis to investigate her distinctive style.Moreover,a micro comparison of shared and unique language features between Ma and other translators is carried out to provide a deeper insight into Ma’s individual translation style.The research findings indicate that Ma’s translations exhibit the highest type-token ratio,average word length,and frequency of four-character Chinese idioms.When compared to the translations of the same source material by three other translators,Ma’s work features a lower frequency of conjunctions,personal pronouns,and demonstrative pronouns,resulting in a more authentic Chinese expression.Furthermore,her translations have the longest mean sentence length.Ma’s translations frequently employ modal particles to convey characters’emotions vividly,and her use of repetition and onomatopoeia is relatively high,although not the highest among the studied translators.