中国古典小说回目中高频词范畴翻译机制——以《红楼梦》中“情”字为例

On the Translation Mechanism of the Category Transfer of High-frequency Word in the Chapter Titles of Chinese Classical Fictions:“Qing” in A Dream of Red Mansions

通过对《红楼梦》回目中“情”字的范畴转移机制的探讨,我们发现结合言内和言外各种显性和隐性参数,“情”字除了作名词,可译成多种基本层次范畴,还可以进行语义迁移、扩大,译成域内范畴概念,此外,“情”字在经过非范畴化之后,可以作为形容词和副词,译为跨域范畴概念,在这个过程中,语境参数理论为古典小说高频词语义嬗变问题提供了一套可印证、可描述、可阐释的理论和方法,一方面语境参数理论中的各种显性和隐性参数能够突破“上下文”、“情景”等传统语境理论的泛化局限性,有利于译者在目标语中对嬗变性较强的高频词进行正确择义;另一方面,语境参数论与原型范畴的相关理论相结合可以借助后者的相关理论成果进一步丰富和印证语境参数论在翻译中的效益。

This study is to explore the mechanism of the category transfer of“Qing”in the chapter titles of A Dream of Red Mansions. The result shows that based on a combination of various intralingual and extra-lingual covert and overt parameters,“Qing”can work as an adjective or an adverb after de-categorization,and be translated into cross-category concepts as well as diverse within-category concepts when it is transferred and generalized apart from dozens of correspondent basic-category concepts when it works as a noun. In this exploration,the theory of context parameter provides a set of provable,descriptive and interpretable theories and methods for dealing with semantic transmutation in translating the high-frequency words in Chinese classical fictions into English. On the one hand,the explicit and implicit parameters of“context”parameter theory can break through the limitation of the traditional context theory such as context and“situation”,which is helpful for translators to choose the most suitable meaning when they are dealing with high-frequency words with strong transmutation;on the other hand,the combination of contextual parameter theory and prototype theory can further enrich and validate the benefits of contextual parameter theory in translation.