论文总字数：32676字

摘 要

《红楼梦》是中国传统古典文学的代表性作品。其中关于各式服饰和珍玩器具的描写在整本书中占有十分重要的地位。《红楼梦》中提到的古玩、服饰以及屋中装饰大多都与情节发展和人物性格紧密相连。换而言之，这些器物描写都有着隐含意义，但读者一般很难注意到。而翻译这些器物名时，其中的隐含意义甚至更加难以表达。

因此本文将选取杨宪益译本与霍克斯译本对器物名隐含意的不同翻译作为语料，从隐含意角度对器物的翻译进行对比研究，以进一步了解作者的内在思想和写作目的，对汉英翻译和跨文化交流也具有一定的参考价值。

关键词：《红楼梦》英译本；器物；隐含意；翻译

Contents

1. Introduction 1

2. Literature Review 1

2.1 Researches on translation of Hong Lou Meng 1

2.2 Researches on articles 2

3. Classification of Articles in Hong Lou Meng 3

3.1 Chothes and accessories 3

3.2 Daily articles 6

3.3 Entertainment articles 6

3.4 Residential decorations 7

4. Comparison of the Two English Versions from the Perpective of Implied Meaning 8

4.1 Translation of clothes and accessories 8

4.2 Translation of daily articles 10

4.3 Translation of entertainment articles 11

4.4 Translation of residential decorations 12

5. Conclusion 15

Works Cited 17

1. Introduction

Hong Lou Meng is a masterpiece of Chinese classical fiction, and it is recognized as the pinnacle of Chinese novels. The intricacies of the plot and the various characters and figures in the novel make this novel, which was written in the mid-18th century, stand the test of time and popular all over the world. Some scholars have pointed out that “Hong Lou Meng is equivalent to a museum of Chinese language and literary, as well as an archive of Chinese style”. (Liang and Xie 10)

Hong Lou Meng has been translated into many languages, and a lot of critics make studies on these different versions in terms of translation methods. However, researches on the implied meaning of articles in Hong Lou Meng are few. Therefore, studying connotation in Hong Lou Meng will also help readers understand those underlying meanings of articles and their relationship with characters in this book. So this thesis takes the classical Chinese literature Hong Lou Meng as the corpus, analyzing the differences in the translation of articles between the two English versions from the perspective of implied meaning.

This paper includes five chapters. The first chapter introduces the study purpose and points out the problem existing in the research field. The second chapter introduces the foreign and domestic research on the translation of Hong Lou Meng and articles. The third chapter introduces the classification of articles in Hong Lou Meng. The fourth chapter makes a comparison of the two English versions from the perspective of implied meaning. The last chapter is a conclusion, including the findings this study and the future research.

2. Literature Review

2.1 Researches on translation of Hong Lou Meng

There are about 60 versions of Hong Lou Meng, including nearly 20 languages. In terms of influence and popularity, main English versions include Dream of the Red Chamber translated by Wang Jizhen, The Story of the Stone translated by David Hawkes and John Minford and A Dream of Red Mansions translated by Yang Xianyi and Gladys Yang.

In America, Hong Lou Meng was introduced by missionary Guo Shila, and was partly translated by Wang Zhiliang, which only focused on the love tragedy of Baoyu and Daiyu. In Britain, the translation of Hong Lou Meng began in 1830, and in 1970s, David Hawkes and John Minford finished the complete English version of the book. In the same period, Yang Xianyi and Gladys Yang also began to translate Hong Lou Meng, and between 1978 and 1980, A Dream of Red Mansions was published in four volumes.

The Story of the Stone and A Dream of Red Mansions received a lot of attention from domestic researchers after publication, and writings on them are abundant. Most criticism of the two versions shows moderation. So far, few scholars have made relatively straightforward judgments on the two versions. The more representative criticism is that Yang Xianyi is loyal to the original story, showing the alienation translation method and the tendency of metaphrase, while Hawkes emphasizes that the translation should accord with the syntax and cultural habits of the target language, reflecting naturalization translation method and the tendency of paraphrase(Dang 5). Such a criticism basically dictates the direction of artistic criticism research on the translation of Hong Lou Meng in the past two decades.

Although the translation history of Hong Lou Meng has a long history, the history of research on the translation of it is very short. The achievements reached account for only a very small proportion of contemporary Chinese translation studies. Researchers of Hong Lou Meng have to further broaden the horizon and improve their studies.

2.2 Researches on articles

Articles refer to various tools, vessels, weapons and other items used in daily life or religious ceremonies. The ancient article research derives from the Gold-Stone research in Song Dynasty. Luo Zhenyu, who has a great influence in this field, points out that ancient article can mainly be divided into clothes, ornaments, furniture, foods and porcelain. In the Dictionary of Ancient Chinese Articles, ancient articles include all aspects of clothing, food, living, transportation, civil, and costumes.

Actually there are not many papers about the articles in Hong Lou Meng, most of which only discuss them in terms of culture or the translation methods. But there are still some papers available to be referred to. Zuo Yaokun discusses the translation of articles in Hong Lou Meng in his paper English Translation of Several Old Articles of Daily Use Mentioned in A Dream of Red Mansions, such as gold and silver vessels, ceramics, lacquer and jade, but he does not mention the classification of the articles, just choosing some artifacts in the book for discussion(Zuo 1-13). Wang Juan analyzes the relationship between the clothes and characters" personality, and summarizes translation methods of clothing from the perspective of cultural communication. There are also researches on various jades and their meanings in Hong Lou Meng.

3. Classification of Articles in Hong Lou Meng

Articles in Hong Lou Meng show ancient China’s clothes culture, tea culture, wine culture, food culture, architectural culture, porcelain culture and so on. This thesis lists 147 articles through data collecting, and divides these articles into four categories: clothes and accessories, daily articles, entertainment articles and residential decorations.

3.1 Clothes and accessories

As a symbol of culture, the clothing and its accessories play indispensable roles in this novel (Zhang 6). In Hong Lou Meng, the description of clothes and accessories occurs 71 times, accounting for about 48.2 % in all the categories. The clothes include headdresses, coats, trousers and skirts and boots and socks; the accessories include rings, necklaces and bracelets.

3.2 Daily articles

There are many descriptions of daily articles in Hong Lou Meng. These daily articles occur 35 times in the book, accounting for about 23.8% in all the categories. This thesis categorizes them into three types: tableware, tea set, and other.

3.3 Entertainment articles

Entertainment articles include articles used in some games in ancient China, and some curios used for entertaining. The description of entertainment articles occurs 12 times in the book, accounting for about 8% in all the categories.

3.4 Residential decorations

This thesis divides residential decorations into five categories: gates and boards, tables and chairs, screens and curtains, vases and other. The description of residential decorations occurs 29 times in the book, accounting for about 20% in all the categories.

4. Comparison of the Two English Versions from the Perspective of Implied Meaning

Articles in Hong Lou Meng can show traditional customs in ancient China. In the book, the description of articles has an important position, and Cao Xueqin gives these articles underlying meanings, which can reflect characters’ personality or status. In this part, a specific comparative analysis on Hawkes’ and Yang’s translation of typical articles that have implied meanings from the perspective of implied meaning will be presented.

4.1 Translation of clothes and accessories

(1) 纱帽

“纱帽” occurs in Chapter 1: “因嫌纱帽小, 致使枷锁扛” (Resentment at a low official rank, May lead to fetters and a felon’s shame). This is a line of the poem which refers to that Jia Zheng and Jia She end in jail because they use illegal methods to get higher official rank. Here “纱帽” is used to describe official positions in ancient China, and official rank decides the material and pattern of “纱帽”. So actually it has an implied meaning of the official rank.. Hawkes did not understand this connotation of “纱帽”, simply considering it as a normal hat, while Yang Xianyi accurately expressed the underlying meaning.

(2) 赤金盘螭璎珞圈

This is a necklace which occurs in the description of Wang Xifeng’s first appearance in Chapter 3. This necklace is made of pure gold, namely “赤金”. Both Hawkes and Yang Xianyi translated “赤金” into “red gold”. But according to The Dictiomoy of Hong Lou Meng, when gold is highly refined，the golden color is mixed with a little reddish color(Li and Feng 199). Obviously, reddish gold is not the same as red gold. So actually the implied meaning of this necklace is Wang Xifeng’s extravagance and her power in the whole family(Cui 113). Therefore, “red gold” is a little bit misleading. It will be more appropriate if it is translated into “highly-refined gold” or into “pure gold”.

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