4.3 The Principle and Strategies 19

4.3.1 Major difficulties in bird image translation 19

4.3.2 The principle and strategies 20

Chapter 5 Conclusion 24

References 25

Chapter 1 Introduction

Image is the soul and spirit of poem. It is widely acknowledged that the beauty of Chinese classical poetry lies greatly in images. As birds are very common in nature, ancient poets often spontaneously rest their feelings on birds. In the long history of Chinese classical poetry, the connotation of bird image became richer and richer. In Complete Tang Poems, there are more than four hundred poems about perse kinds of birds, like the roc and phoenix in Li Bai’s poem, the hawk in Du Fu’s works. In order to convey the function and ideorealm of bird images to English readers, the author is going to make a study of the translation of bird images in Chinese classical poetry from the perspective of Functional Equivalence Theory and put forward possible principles and strategies for such translation.

1.1 Research Background

China’s economic strength has rapidly developed into a new level. However, our cultural influence hasn’t grow into its equivalent level. At this historical moment, every Chinese descendent should take the responsibility to promote the dissemination of Chinese culture. Every state possesses its own literature, and each generation creates its own specialty. Ancient Chinese poems are exquisite works of art. They are the essence of Chinese culture. As far as 2000 years ago, Chinese people composed the fantastic work Book of Poetry and Elegies of the South. Later, poets created more splendid Tang poetry and Song lyrics. Some of these masterpieces were extremely significant in establishing and shaping the culture of the Chinese nation. These works link the thoughts and affections of Chinese people, and they are also a fantastic window through which the world can observe Chinese culture. 

   Image occupies an important place in Chinese classical poetry. The origin of applying images in poems can be traced back to Book of Songs, the first poem collection in the world. Among all the various images in Chinese classical poems, there are many kinds of bird images. Poems which eulogize birds reached its peak in Tang Dynasty, for they developed not only in quantity but also in content and style. In the early Tang Dynasty, birds were usually applied to extol the virtues of the rulers. Later, poets tended to add their own emotions into bird images and focusing on reality and criticizing existing evils. Moreover, in the late Tang Dynasty, poets paid more attention to pursue the persity of poems’ artistic style. In modern times, readers can still see vivid figures by appreciating the roc and phoenix in Li Bai’s poem, the hawk in Du Fu’s works and other species of birds, such as swallow, wild goose, cuckoo, crane and mandarin duck. Therefore, exploring the rich connotation of bird images is a necessary way to learn Chinese culture.

There are many scholars and translators who have put forward some practical theories on Chinese-English poem translation and image translation. However, the situation is still in a mess, because some people support translating in poetic style, some people are against that, and still some stand in between. Xu Yuanchong, Weng Xianliang, Yang Xianyi and other domestic scholars has made outstanding contributions to Chinese classical poetry translation. Foreign translators like Arthur Waley and Ezra Pound also had significant impact on this area.     

Nevertheless, very few scholars focus specifically on bird image translation. Also, Eugene Albert Nida’s Functional Equivalence Theory has just been applied to the study of Chinese poem translation. As a result, the author intends to take bird image as a breach and Functional Equivalence theory as a meter to explore the possible methods of disseminating Chinese culture.