英汉文化中的东风和西风内涵比较与争辩

Comparison and Dispute on the Connotations between West Wind and East Wind in English and Chinese Cultures

朱耀先等学者在英汉对比中将英国的东风、西风和中国的东风、西风的文化内涵对立起来,认为英国的西风相当于中国的东风,英国的东风相当于中国的西风。而在论述这一观点时,又引出雪莱的《西风颂》为证。此种论说是不妥的。风是一种自然现象,一年四季各种风都会刮,只是某个季节某种风占主导而已;虽然两国地理位置有很多相对之处,但英国的西风不同于中国的东风,其东风也不同于中国的西风;英国诗人雪莱的《西风颂》歌颂的不是英国的西风,而是意大利的西风,这里的西风也不像一些人所说的是指温暖和煦的春风,而是狂暴的秋风;中国文学作品中的东风代指春风,西风代指秋风,可将东风译作英语的spring wind vernal wind,也可将西风译作autumn wind。

In the comparison between English and Chinese cuhures, the scholars as ZHU Yao - xian believe that the east wind and west wind in Britain have different connotations when contrasted with the east wind and west wind in China. They also cite de to the West Windy Shelley, the Great Poet of Britain, as an example. The author of this paper holds that their arguments are established on a false ground., and demonstrates the mistakes in these arguments in the following aspects： Wind is a natural phenomenon and all kinds of winds may blow in any se, ason in a year in any places. The wind to one direction may be dominant in a season in a place. Though China faces the ocean in the east and Britain faces the ocean in the west, the west wind in Britain is not totally the same in nature as the east wind in China, nor the east wind in Britain is the same as the west wind in China. 3. The wind Shelley sings praise of in his he Ode to the West Winds not the west wind in Britain, but it is the wind in Italy. Not as some of the scholars that it is the warm, mild spring wind, it is the violent autumn storm. In Chinese literature, the east wind is the metonymy of spring wind and the west wind is the metonymy of autumn wind; therefore they can be translated into spring wind and autumn wind respectively in English.