“来/去”的语义镜像与译文隐现--以《红楼梦》霍译本为例

The semantic mirror image and translation of lai(来)/qu(去):A case study of David Hawkes'translation of The Story of the Stone

通过对《红楼梦》“来/去”出现频次及类别进行提取和分析,并与霍克思的英译表达相对照,研究发现,英语直接使用“come/go”的情况远少于汉语,但借助丰富的方式动词和路径小品词,“来/去”蕴含的多层级语义获得了多样化呈现。具体而言,除水平方向的趋近和远离,“来/去”语义镜像通过霍译本中的路径矢量、空间维度、指向范畴和主体视角等得以更加清晰地映射。在翻译路径上,复合结构主要遵循“(非)位移动词+小品词”为主、“(非)位移动词”为辅的方式进行语义融合和重组;由于独立使用的“来/去”承担复杂的语法及结构功能,霍克思在忠实传达原文意义和风格的同时,采用语义对应、缺省及增译等显性和隐性策略进行翻译,贴切自然地再现了人物动作、性格及特定文化背景下的复杂关系。本文相关发现对于管窥汉英方向性词汇化模式及翻译教学与实践具有一定借鉴意义。

This paper,based on the analysis of the frequency and semantic categories of lai(来)/qu(去)in The Story of the Stone,compares them with their English expressions by David Hawkes,finding that although the English version uses“come/go”less frequently than its Chinese counterpart,the multifaceted meanings of lai(来)/qu(去)have been characterized more finely and diversely through the integration of manner verbs and path particles.In addition to the meaning of“being close to or away from”in the horizontal direction,the semantic mirror image of both words can be more clearly reflected via the path vec-tor,spatial dimension,direction category and subject perspective in Hawkes'translation.The translation of compound path expressions follows a relatively fixed way of“(non)displacement verb+path particle”or(non)displacement verb for seman-tic fusion and reorganization.As lai(来)/qu(去)in isolation undertakes grammatical and structural functions,Hawkes em-ploys explicit and implicit strategies,such as semantic correspondence,default and incremental translation in order to appro-priately and naturally unfold the complex relationship of the characters'action,personality and specific cultural background.The findings can serve as a reference for further exploration of the Chinese-English directional lexicalization model as well as translation teaching and translation practice.