陈西滢“三似说”的符号学意义

陈西滢是第一个提出形意神三似的论者 ,这一划分对后世影响颇大。但是陈氏对神似的神秘、不可知态度使得他基本上否定了这一层 ,他的重心下落到意似。然而有别于他初衷的形意神三似均分的观点却在翻译界传播开来。本文首先运用社会符号学阐释了陈西滢“意似”的意义 ,然后运用皮尔士的符号学论证了形意神三分比形神二分更近于翻译本质。

Chen Xiying, the first advocator of 'three similarities' (similarity of form, of meaning and of spirit), holds an agnostic view about similarity of spirit, which almost results in his denial of it, and leads to his focus's fall down to similarity of meaning. Yet the three-level equal division has been widely accepted by the follow-up translators. This paper first interprets similarity of meaning through the perspective of Social Semiotics and then, from Peirce's Semiotics, proves that Chen's three-level similarity, compared with the two-level division (similarity of form and of spirit), is closer to the nature of translation.