A Report on the E-C Translation of Children’s Novel (Excerpt)

摘要：本篇翻譯实践报告选用儿童文学小说《小公爵》（The Little Duke）一书为英译汉笔译实践材料。此书主要讲述了一名八岁的男孩历经艰辛、克服阻碍，成功成为诺曼底公爵的故事。笔者结合儿童文学特点和翻译方法，探讨在《小公爵》翻译过程中出现的问题，从词汇、句法这两个层面进行具体分析。本报告共有三章内容。第一章描述任务及分析文本;第二章是报告的核心部分，进行案列分析，结合具体翻译策略，重点分析翻译实践中的问题及解决方法。最后一章进行实践总结。目前，对儿童文学翻译进行的研究尚不多见，因此本论文在研究对象方面有新意，也对儿童文学翻译有一定的实践意义。通过进行本次翻译实践，笔者不仅要了解儿童文学翻译的特点，正确翻译原文信息的同时，还要考虑文本受众的接受水平，以达到儿童文学的传播目的。希望本报告可以为同类文本的翻译提供借鉴性意见。

关键词：小公爵;儿童文学翻译

Chapter One

Brief Introduction to The Little Duke

1.1 The Author

Charlotte M. Yonge（1823–1901） is a prolific novelist in the UK.

She was the only daughter of a landed gentleman of Hampshire. She was born near Winchester， and in her girlhood came under the influence of Keble， who was a near neighbour. The profits of her works were devoted to religious objects. She writes mainly for young people， especially young girls. She began writing in 1848， and published during her long life about 100 works， chiefly novels.

Her works were widely read in the 19th century and had far-reaching influences. She had published more than 160 works， mainly novels， especially childrens literature， like The Little Duke. But she and her works were rarely studied.

Miss Yonge， whose series of books have added quite a new world of excellent Church people， good， noble and true， with all their fads and little foolishnesses， all their habits of mind and speech， their delightful family affection， and human varieties of goodness， to an existing universe， that a sympathetic and interested audience can never be wanting.

1.2 Content Summary

THE LITTLE DUKE is the heroic and exciting tale of the boy who would become King Richard the Fearless. After suddenly losing his father （King William of the Long Sword）， The little duke experiences many hardships and sorrows. However， with the help of his loyal friends， he overcomes capture and many other obstacles in his quest to succeed his father. The story embodies the theme of tolerance， loyalty， courage， and heroism. It reproduces medieval life through a boys perspective and describes the growth process of a true leader. The characters in the novel are quite heroic， and the content is inspiring and positive for the growth of young people.

THE LITTLE DUKE is an inspiring story for all youth， and an excellent addition to any family library.

Chapter Two

An Analysis on E-C Translation of The Little Duke

This text contains a large number of French names and place names. There are many complicated sentence structures in the source text， which leads to longer sentences and increases the difficulty of understanding and translation. Because these sentence structures are translated literally according to the original order， the translation logic will be confused and difficult to understand， which may lead to ambiguity and even mistranslation. How to correctly translate these sentence structures and make the translation equivalent is the problem that the author has to face and solve in this part. There are also a lot of background descriptions in the whole book. The background description mentioned here includes scene description， environment description， detail description， etc.， which paves the way for the story of the novel. These descriptions are indispensable in the novel， and the author brings the reader into the world depicted by the author through a concrete visual description. these descriptions should aim at achieving similar responses between the target readers and the original readers， and give full play to the advantages of the translated language， and describe the various details in the original text in the translation reproduced for the target reader.

2.1 Lexical Level

In translation practice， the most common obstacle for most translators is the lexical level. The key to translating words is to put the meaning of the words in context， and to be reader-oriented， as far as possible to find accurate and appropriate correspondence in the translated language. The translation corpus of this article， “ The Little Duke” contains a large number of French names.

2.1.1 Names

Example 1：

原文：as he ran forward flourishing a bow in his hand， and crying out， “I hit him， I hit him！ Dame Astrida， do you hear？”

译文：他向前跑去，手里拿着弓，喊着说：“我打了他，我打了他！阿斯特丽达夫人，你听到了吗？”

“Astrida” is the name of the heros servant. “Dame” is a title given to a woman as a special honour because of the work she has done， or it means woman. Here， I translate the name into“夫人”， it conforms to Chinese expression and the reader-oriented principle.

Example 2：

原文："To be sure I shall，" answered Richard. "I will be called Richard of the Sharp Axe， or the Bold Spirit， I promise you， Fru Astrida. We are as brave in these days as the Sigurds and Ragnars you sing of！ I only wish there were serpents and dragons to slay here in Normandy."

译文：“我敢肯定，”理查德回答。 “我将被称为夏普斧的理查德，或者大胆的精神，我向你保证，弗鲁·埃斯特里达。我们在这些日子里像你唱的西格德和拉格纳一样勇敢！我只希望有蛇和龙杀死在诺曼底这里。”

According to historical facts， Sigurd is the great hero of the Nordic mythology and also one of the most well-known heroes in Northern Europe. He hold the excalibur Gram， killed the dragon Favna and ate the dragon heart， got the ability to understand the bird language， and then fell in love with Brunhild. But this beautiful relationship has not escaped the bondage of fate. When Sigurd was killed because of a misunderstanding， Brunhild， who was informed of the truth， was grieved and chose to accompany Sigurd in the fire. Ragnar is also the hero of the Nordic mythology. I translate “Sigurd” into “西格德”， “Ragnars” into “拉格納”，because they have appeared in the mythology.

2.2 Syntactical Level

2.2.1 Passive Sentences

English uses a higher frequency of passive voice， so English readers are used to this expression， and the main and passive voices of Chinese are sometimes implicit and vague， and the frequency of use is relatively low， in order to let Chinese readers and English readers obtained the original text information smoothly， in the translation， the author should translate according to the context and Chinese expression habits.

Example 1：

原文：Richard was bidden to greet them， but， though he held out his hand as desired， he shrank a little to his father's side， gazing at them in dread and shyness.

理查德被要求向他们致意，但是，尽管他如愿伸出了手，他还是向父亲的一边缩了一下，害怕羞怯地凝视着他们。

Example 2：

原文："Even so，" said Rainulf， slowly and sadly， and the silence was only broken by the long-drawn sobs of old Count Bernard.

译文：“即便如此，”雷努尔夫慢慢地，悲伤地说道，沉默只能被老伯爵的长长的抽泣打破。

These two sentences are passive. Sometimes in order to highlight the bearers of the action， the sentence form is often passive. In this way， the part that needs to be highlighted is placed in the position of the subject， and the position of the predicate is in the passive voice. In the expression of the Chinese sentence， the sentence structure “... is...by…” is not often used. This multi-purpose passive form of writing also creates obstacles to translation.

Chapter Three Conclusion

Translating classic foreign childrens literature can not only consolidate the reading foundation of domestic small readers， but also broaden their horizons and highlight the educational significance of childrens literature. Through this translation practice， it is possible to deepen the translators understanding of childrens literary works， and constantly summarize methods and strategies in the translation process to lay the foundation for future translation practice.

When encountering problems during the translation process， we can use the translation strategies we have learned to solve the problem. In the process of exploring the translation of childrens literature， by solving the problems encountered， the translation strategies of such translated texts under the guidance of the reader-oriented principle of dynamic equivalence theory are summarized to achieve a smooth translation and better to pass the original information to meet the needs of readers.

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作者简介：刘甜（1992—），女，湖北荆州人，硕士，翻译，学校：内蒙古工业大学。