杨宪益与霍克斯《红楼梦》译本的叙事对比

A Comparison of Translations of Dream of the Red Mansion by Yang Xianyi and Hawkes in Terms of Narration

《红楼梦》的叙事特征在杨宪益和霍克斯笔下得到不同程度的保留与转换:段落划分上,杨宪益折中了两种语言的划分方式,而霍克斯则主要以英语的段落模式代替,体现在杨译本的段落数量比原文多,比霍克斯译本少;视角方面,杨宪益更加能够在双语对比基础上,转化汉语多样的视角,以英语稳定的视角代替,霍克斯则一般忠实于原文,所以体现出来的视角仍然多样;文化方面,霍克斯的译文更胜一筹,全在于他在翻译过程中会适当添加解说,而杨宪益则对字面意义把握了,却没能译出文化内涵,从而降低了原文的叙事效果。

Narrative features of Dream of the Red Mansion have been retained and transferred with different approaches by translators Yang Xianyi and Hawkes. With regard to paragraph arrangement, Yang tried to mediate the two languages while Hawkes mainly adopts English paragraph arrangement approach. Therefore the former has more paragraphs than the original text while fewer than Hawkes＇s. In terms of focus, Yang, based on the comparison of the two languages, changes the varied focuses in Chinese and replaces them with steady English focuses; while Hawkes is loyal to the original text so his version has more focuses. In terms of culture, Hawkes＇s version is better than Yang＇s for the proper explanation in the process of translation while Yang transfers the literal meaning instead of the connotation, which reduces the narrative effect of the original text.