葛浩文的文学翻译忠实观及其实践

Howard Goldblatt’s Ideas on Literary Faithfulness and Their Application in His Translation Practice

美国著名汉学家葛浩文作为莫言作品的首席翻译家,为莫言2012获得诺奖做出了重大贡献。其连译带改的翻译策略引发了学界关于翻译忠实原则的争论和质疑。然而,事实上,葛浩文与其他翻译家一样,无论在翻译观还是翻译实践中都把忠实原则置于首位,只不过他对忠实的理解不同于传统的翻译观。在翻译实践中,他不仅尽力保留带有异质性的原语文化色彩,而且努力实现译入语准确性、可读性和可接受性的目标;不仅重视语言文字层面的忠实,更关注整体的忠实和文体风格的忠实。他的翻译实践诠释了文学翻译忠实的真谛。

Howard Goldblatt,a famous American scholar of Chinese literature,is the chief English translator of the novels by Mo Yan,winner of the Nobel Prize for literature in 2012.His translation strategy characterized by free editing and rewriting has caused a heated debate about and aroused suspicion on the validity of faithfulness among the academic community.However,as a matter of fact,just like other translators,Howard Goldblatt puts priority on faithfulness either in his ideas about translation or in his translation practice.What makes him outstanding is that his ideas on faithfulness are quite different from the traditional ones.In his translation practice,he strives to keep the cultural differences in the original language and to achieve accuracy,readability,and acceptability in the target language at the same time.He puts emphasis not only on faithfulness at the linguistic level,but also on faithfulness as a whole and in a literary sense.His translation practice is a typical interpretation of the essence of faithfulness in literary translation.