Abstract

Hong Lou Meng is a remarkable work in Chinese classic novels by Cao Xueqin. It describes a vivid picture of four feudal families and hundreds of characters, reflecting the complex relationship in old society. On one hand, because of the cross blood-tie of the four families—Jia, Wang, Shi and Xue, the kinship address terms are of various kinds; on the other hand, social address terms are also highly used to indicate the classes of characters, sometimes even though some are relatives. 

Taking Peter Newmark’s communicative translation theory as the framework of this thesis, this thesis makes analysis of the translation of address terms in two most well-known translation versions of Hong Lou Meng—Yang Hsien-yi’s and David Hawkes’s English version focusing on the differences in the translation of kinship address terms and social address terms and the reasons behind such differences.

The thesis finds out that the two translators translate the address terms into the same expressions in most cases. However, there are still many different translation expressions on some certain Chinese words. It is found that the differences are caused by the two different culture background, respectively Chinese ancient patriarchal ethic and English Renaissance. 

Anyway, under Newmark’s theory, the most effective translation is the one that can be understood by the target readers. 

As to the limitations of the thesis, though providing a general comparison on the translation of address terms, it just gives an analysis of the translation method in the two versions and thus leave much room for further studies.

Key words: Hong Lou Meng     translation of address terms     Yang Hsien-yi     David Hawkes     Peter Newmark     communicative translation theory  

Contents

Abstract

摘要

Chapter One Introduction-1

1.1 Research Background and Research Question-1

1.2 The Significance of This Research-1

1.3 The Overall Structure of the Thesis-2

Chapter Two Literature Review-4

2.1 Background Information-4

2.1.1 Information about the Novel and the Novelist-4

2.1.2 Brief Introduction of Different Versions of the Translation of the Novel-4

2.2 The Theory Framework-4

2.3 Current Studies-6

Chapter Three Methodology-9

3.1 The Research Hypothesis-9

3.2 Data Collection and Data Analysis-9

Chapter Four Results and Discussions-10

4.1 Comparative Analysis of the Translation of Address terms-10

4.1.1 Kinship Address Terms Analysis-10

4.1.2 Social Address Terms Analysis-14

4.2 Reasons for the Translation Differences-17

Chapter Five Conclusion-21

5.1 The Conclusion of the Thesis-21

5.2 The Limitations of the Thesis-23

5.3 The Suggestions on the Future Study-23

References-24