英汉翻译学习Lesson2

英汉翻译学习Lesson2

Lesson 2 Paradoxes(似非而是的论点, 自相矛盾的话) of

Translating Activity 1 Quiz

Task 1 Translation from English to Chinese

1. John is now with his parents in New York City; it is already

three years since he was a bandmaster. (grammar: since从句中的过去式联系动词was 或were 是一种状态的结束。注意：主句用一般现在时)

约翰现同父母住在纽约市；他不担任乐队指挥已三年了。

2． John can be relied on. He eats no fish and plays the game.

(注意短语用法)

约翰为人可靠，他既忠诚又正直。

3．Don’t cross the bridge till you get to it.

不必担心太早。（不必自寻烦恼。）

4．Do you see any green in my eye?

你以为我是好欺骗的吗？

5．There’s no pot so ugly it cant find a lid.

罐儿再丑，配个盖子不发愁。（姑娘无论多么丑也能配个汉子。）

Task 2 Translation from Chinese into English

1.“武装到牙齿”（armed to the teeth）

“象牙塔”（ivory tower）

趁热打铁（strike while the iron is hot）

“血浓于水”（Blood is thicker than water．）

2.不愛紅妝愛武裝 .To face the powder and not to powder the

face.

3.“情人眼中出西施” Beauty is in the eye of the beholder

4.一日之计在于晨 An hour in the morning is worth two in the

evening.

5.無邊落木蕭蕭下不見長江滾滾來

The boundless forest sheds its leaves shower by shower

The endless rivers rolls its waves hour after hour

Activity 2 Questions

1. Could you write down the difficulties that you have come

across when doing translation? (5mins)

2. The following 4 questions are mainly based on Eugene A.

Nida (1993). Please think over the questions below and write

down your understandings.

(1)Translating is a complex and fascinating task. In fact, some

scholars

have claimed that it is probably the most complex type of

event in the history of the cosmos(宇宙). And yet, translating is

so natural and easy that children seem to have no difficulty in

interpreting for their immigrant parents. These children normally

do very well until they have gone to school and have learned

about nouns, verbs, and adverbs. Why?

Answer:Because they then try to match the words and

grammar rather than the content.

(2)Most people assume(vt.假定, 设想, 采取, 呈现) that

literalness(n.

文字的, 表面意义上的, 无修饰的) in translating means

faithfulness

to the text. Because of the many discrepancies (n.相差, 差异,

矛盾)between meanings and structures of different languages,

some people have insisted that translating is impossible. What

do you think?

Answer: Those who insist that translating is impossible are

usually concerned with some of the more marginal(adj.记在页边的, 边缘的, 边际的) features of figurative (adj.比喻的, 修饰丰富的, 形容多的) language and complex poetic structures. The use of

figurative

language is universal(adj.普遍的, 全体的, 通用的, 宇宙的, 世界

的), but the precise figures of speech in one language rarely

match those in another. Yet translating is simply doing the

impossible well. In fact, though some famous authors insist that

translating is impossible, they do not hesitate to have their own

writing

translated.

(3)What do you think of the view that

paraphrase(explanation) should

be avoided in translating?

Answer: In fact, all translating involves different degrees of

paraphrase, since there is no way in which one can successfully

translate word for word and structure for structure. For example,

the Chinese saying 他下海了is literally “He went down to the

sea”, but is more appropriately translated as “He became a

businessman”.

Since languages do not differ essentially in what they can say,

but in how they say it, paraphrase is inevitable. What is important

is the semantic(语义的) legitimacy (n.合法(性), 正统(性), 正确(性), 合理(性)) of the paraphrase.

(4)There is a widespread( adj.分布广泛的, 普遍的) view that a

translator should first produce a more or less literal

rendering(translating) of the source text(source text

源程序正文) and then proceed to improve it stylistically(adv.在

文体上). Do you agree?

Answer: Style is not the frosting on the cake(蛋糕上的糖霜),

but an integral part（integral part

主要的部分）of the text right from the beginning. It must be

built into the text right from the beginning. It is usually better to

aim first at a stylistically satisfactory rendering of the source text

and then review it carefully to “tighten it up” by analyzing and

testing the correspondences（n.相应, 通信, 信件）. A few errors in

the correspondences of lexical meaning are much more

excusable （adj.

可原谅的, 可容许的, 言之有理的, 可免除的）than missing the

spirit and aesthetic （adj.美学的, 审美的, 有审美感的）character of

the source text.

(Now how did you feel after going through the above 4

questions? You might feel a bit disappointed for there seems to

be nothing particularly exotic and exciting in Nida’s saying. At

the same time, you might also

feel a bit confused, for the above 4 questions do not present

a very clear and well-organized picture of translation. Well, do

not worry too much at this stage. In the rest of the book, we shall

take a closer look at the nature and the procedures of translation.

Our focus, however, will be on introducing some useful

translation skills and on practicing translating ourselves. We shall

also spend some time examining those language points on which

English and Chinese differ, hence are difficult to deal with in

translation. One such point is presented in Activity 3 below.)

Activity 3 Language Differ: Differences in Lexicons

Since translation theories and skills are both built upon the

differences and similarities between the source language and the

target language, in each chapter of this course, we shall examine

one or two language points on which English and Chinese differ.

First of all, Chinese and English show a lot of discrepancies in their

lexicons, especially in word meanings and word combinations.

Task 1 Words sharing the same designative（指定的） and

associative （adj. 联想的）meanings

Some English words and their Chinese counterparts share

exactly the same designative and associative meanings. These are

mainly some proper names, technical terms and the names of

some everyday objects.

Can you give their Chinese equivalents?

The U.S. State Department 美国国务院

Cognitive linguistics 认知语言学

The Indian Ocean 印度洋

AIDS 艾滋病

Helicopter 直升飞机

Skyscraper 摩天大楼

Now please list 5 English examples and their Chinese

counterparts and 5 Chinese examples and their English

counterparts in the space provided below. Discuss with your

partner if all the examples you list indeed share the same

meanings and the same connotations（内涵） with their

counterparts in the target language.

List A

List B

Task 2 Words Not Sharing the Same Meanings

When you were thinking of your own examples for Task 1,

you might already notice that many English words and their

seeming （adj.表面上的）Chinese counterparts do not really

share exactly the same meanings or connotations.

(1) Is the following translation version provided the only

possible one?

If not, can you offer other versions?

Brother哥弟

Mother-in-law岳母婆婆

Grandparents祖父母外祖父母

Aunt姑姨、婶、

Uncle叔伯、舅

(2) Now can you think of your own English and Chinese

examples? If yes, please write them down in the space provided

below. You may have a brainstorming （自由讨论，智力爆发）with your partners if you happen to get stuck on your own.

Task 3 English Words with More Than One Meaning

As learners of English, we are familiar with the fact that most

English words have more than one meaning depending on

different context. When translating into Chinese, these different

meanings are usually matched with different Chinese words

rather than with one Chinese word.

A. To take “hard” as an example, can you translate the

following phrases into Chinese?

rocks 坚硬的岩石

2.a hard blue 一种刺目(眼)的蓝

drugs 烈性

sounds 清音

currency 硬通货

water 水质较硬的水

evidence 确凿的证据(铁证)

8.a hard winter 一个严寒的冬天(严冬)

times 艰难岁月

on somebody 对某人很严厉

11.a hard smile (一个)冷酷的微笑

hard 认真地思考

work 辛苦的工作

14.a hard question (一个)难回答的问题

B. Loo k at the meanings of ‘man’

and his wife 丈夫和妻子

rs and men 官和兵

man Friday 他的仆人礼拜五（丹尼尔·笛福《鲁

滨逊漂流记》）

-of-war 军舰

a man! 要像个男子汉﹗

C. sophisticated

ticated man 老于世故的人

ticated woman 狡黠的女子

ticated columnist 老练的专栏作家，资深专栏作家

ticated electronic device 高度精密的电子装置

ticated weapon 尖端武器

D. run

to seed 花谢结子—不修边幅—丧失活力—

破旧不堪

the streets 流浪街头

a hare 追捕野兔—追捕坐车不买票的人

one’s eyes down a list匆匆看一下单子

one’s head into a wall撞南墙；碰壁

machine runs well 机器运转良好

river runs east 河水流向东方（大江东流去）

news runs rapidly in the town 这个消息迅速在镇上传开Task 4 Chinese Words with More Than One Meaning

You might already be saying to yourselves “Well, English is

not alone in giving one word many different meanings. Chinese

is even more extreme in this respect.” You are certainly justified（

v.证明...是正当的）in thinking that way.

To take a very simple word下as an example. Can you

translate the following into English?

1．下班 get off work/ knock off

2．下半辈子the later half of one’s life

3．下策 an unwise decision/ a stupid move 4．下厨房 go to

the kitchen (to prepare a meal) 5．下蛋 lay eggs

6．下饭 go well with rice

7．下岗 go off sentry（卫兵，岗哨） duty 8．下课 finish class/

the class is over 9．下列 listed below

10．下坡路 a downhill path

11．下棋 play chess

12．下属 subordinate

13．下乡 go to the countryside

14．下旬 the last ten-day period of a month 15．下意识 sub-consciousness

Task 5 Co-occurrence with Other Words:

Many English words and their Chinese counterparts also

show a lot of differences in their combinations with other words.

To take “play” as an example, to play basketball is 打篮球, to

play football is踢足球 , and to play the piano is弹钢琴 .

Now please try to translate the following sentences into

Chinese, paying special attention to the italicized parts.

wore a pair of dark glasses and a thick grey overcoat.

他戴一副墨镜，穿一件厚厚的灰外套。

2.I just had a glass of milk and a piece of bread for my

breakfast this

morning. I got up late.

今天早上我只喝了一杯牛奶，吃了一片面包。我起晚了。

was a good Christian, a good father, a good husband,

and a good

employee.

他是虔诚的教徒，慈爱的父亲，尽职的丈夫，优秀的员工。

the one week we stayed in HK, we got into the

streets, shops,

parks, theatres and restaurants.

我们在香港的那一个星期，遛大街，逛商店，游公园，上剧场，下饭馆。 student of his, we have all benefited a lot from his

great knowledge,

experience, wisdom and humor.

作为他的学生，我们(都)从他广博的学识、丰富的经验、卓越的智慧和诙谐的幽默中受益匪浅。

I would like to draw your attention once again to the five

sentences you’ve just translated. In English, you can wear

glasses an d coats, but in Chinese you can only戴眼镜,穿衣服. In

English, you can have your milk and bread, but in Chinese you

can only 喝牛奶,吃面包. Different verbs go with different nouns

and Chinese and English do not always match in this respect. This

is a point worth bearing in mind.

Activity 4 A Passage for Practice (6 students a group- hand

in the translation before class is over) (154words)（Discuss about

the translation next time）

When we look at the difference between some of the other

Wireless Application computing models that are out there, we

can quickly see some benefits that we can accomplish by using

J2ME?. First of all, we look at thin Client Applications（ client

applications

[计] 客户应用程序）. Thin Client Applications are the Wireless

Internet Applications （internet applications Internet[计]应用软件）,

browser-based applications using WML, HDML, XHTML,

HTML itself, different markup languages that are delivered to a

browser in an online only fashion. These sets of applications

typically will only work for you when you do have a constant

network connection, you lose that network connection, you no

longer can use the application, and that can be very problematic.

The J2ME? platform along with J2EE?--that combination allow us

to develop Smart Client Applications, applications that can work

in connected or disconnected modes, and from the end-user

perspective that is a very powerful combination. It goes well

beyond what we can accomplish or just Web browsing.

Activity 5 For your enjoyment

老子道德经汉译选

1).知人者智，

自知者明。

胜人者有力，

自胜者强。

知足者富，

强行者有志，

不失其所者久，

死而不亡者寿。

He who knows others is wise;

He who knows himself is clever;

He who conquers others is forceful;

He who knows contentment is rich;

He who perseveres is a man of will;

He who does not lose his root can endure;

He whose Tao survives him is long-lived.

2).知不知，

尚矣；

不知知，

病也。

夫惟病病，

是以不病。

圣人不病，

以其病病，

是以不病。

Knowing one's ignorance of certain knowledge is the best

attitude; Not knowing certain knowledge yet pretending to know

is a bad attitude. The sage is of no shortcoming,

Because he considers shortcoming as shortcoming.

He considers shortcoming as shortcoming,

Thus he has no shortcoming.

Activity 6 Homework

on (text book P19-34) & notes in class

ses (textbook P34-35)

tion (for you enjoyment part)

4．Translate the following into English

1)上当to be taken in

2)上访to apply for an audience with the higher authorities

to appeal for help

3)上坟to visit a grave to honour the memory of the dead

4)上钩to rise to the bait

5)上口to be suitable for reading aloud

6)上马to mount a horse

7)上年纪to be getting on in years

8)上任to take up an official post

9)上台to come to power

10)上相to come out well in a photograph; to be photogenic

11)上帐to make an entry in an account book （account book

n.

帐簿）

12)一连上了好几道菜several courses were served in

succession 5. Translating the following English phrases into

Chinese.

1) a love letter 情书

2) a suicide letter 绝命书

a suicide note 寥寥数语的绝命书

3) a “Dear John” letter（女孩子写给男友的）绝交信

a political “Dear John”政治上的绝交信

4) a thank-you letter 感谢信

a “thank you” letter 感谢信

a thank-you note 感谢信

5) a commendatory letter表扬信

a bread and butter letter表扬信（客人对于受到款待的感谢信）

6) a letter of recommendation推荐信

7) a get-well letter （祝别人康复的）慰问信

8) a congratulatory letter 贺信

9) a farewell letter 永别信

10)a letter of introduction 介绍信

11)a letter of condolence 唁函