浅谈英语长句的汉语翻译 [4]
论文作者:高婧伟论文属性:短文 essay登出时间:2009-04-10编辑:黄丽樱点击率:12941
论文字数:6312论文编号:org200904101101428161语种:中文 Chinese地区:中国价格:免费论文
关键词:long sentencesunderstandingexpressingtranslating长句理解表达翻译
pay much more attention to structure and logic of the sentence. A reader, while reading a Chinese sentence or article, must try hard to find out its meaning, but the meaning of English sentences is much clearer because its structure makes the meaning quite clear.”[9]P53/58
(11) He stepped right in after them, like it or not, and he was determined that nothing as pretty as good manners should keep him from a chance of enlightenment. 他不管人家欢迎不欢迎, 紧跟着他们走了进去。什么礼貌不礼貌,他顾不得这一套了。他决心不错过这个机会,把心里的问题弄明白。
A detailed comparison between the above two sentences will show how the English sentences, in general, differ from each other.
2.2.5 Different relation of clauses
“Another big difference between English and Chinese sentences lies in the more frequent use of clauses in English than in Chinese. The structure of an English sentence can be compared to a “grapevine”, which means that many words in a English sentence have their own clause. In contrast, the words in a typical Chinese sentence don’t have their clauses, but appear in time sequence, each playing equally important role in the Chinese sentence.”[10]P43
(12) Lily, who is a very active girl at school, becomes quiet as soon as she arrives home, which makes her parents quite puzzled. 莉莉在学校里非常活跃,但一回到家却变得很安静,这让她的父母感到很迷惑。
In the above English sentences, there are two attributive clauses to modify two segments in the sentence, while in the Chinese sentence, all the sentences are equally important and come one after another in time sequence.
3. Steps and methods in long English sentence translation
Long sentences make up a large portion in English, and there are several reasons for its frequent appearance.
3.1 Reasons for frequent appearance of long English sentences
3.1.1 Frequent use of modifiers
Compared with Chinese, modifiers are much more frequently used in English, such as attributive clauses, adverbial clauses and appositives. But in Chinese, the specific nouns are not modified, but are explained by employing another independent sentence.
(13)These students, who rarely do any housework at home, will serve as waiters in the restaurant near the school, which draws a large number of customers everyday.
The main structure of this sentence is “the students will be waiters in the restaurant”, but the sentence is made long by the use of two attributive clauses, one of which is to modify the word “students”, and the other of which “the restaurant”. But in Chinese, this sentence will be put as followed. 这些学生在家几乎不做家务,而他们将要到学校附近的一家餐馆去当侍者, 而这家餐馆每天食客云集。We can see that the single English sentence is separated into three clauses, each expressing a specific meaning without employing any subordinate clauses.
3.1.2 Complex structures
“Compared with Chinese, in which verbs are arranged in time sequence, English sentences are much more complex with the use of various clauses, parenthesis, appositives and prepositions. Chinese students usually find it hard to identify the main structure of long English sentences, so it is necessary and quite helpful to learn the segments that make the simple sentences long.”[11]P61
(14)He, instead of standing back, walked forward to face the accuser, with others looking at him in astonishment as well as puzzlement.
This is a typical long English sentence with complex structures. A student without a thorough knowledge of English grammar is bound to fail to understand its meaning. To understand long sentences, a study of English grammar is required, and a large
本论文由英语论文网提供整理,提供论文代写,英语论文代写,代写论文,代写英语论文,代写留学生论文,代写英文论文,留学生论文代写相关核心关键词搜索。