论文总字数：24766字

摘 要

翻译是语言之间的转换，也是一种文化的移植过程, 是让其他民族了解本民族文化的重要途径。《红楼梦》中的宗教文化贯穿始终，表现出中国传统文化的博大精深。宗教文化意象的翻译使得外国读者更加深入的了解中国佛教文化。本文主要写了《红楼梦》中佛教文化因素的翻译，包括佛教起源及其反映、宗教文化意象在两译本（即杨译本和霍译本）中的翻译，而且本文的重点在于从归化异化角度对两译本中宗教文化因素翻译进行对比与分析，并得出结论。

关键词：宗教文化；佛教；宗教文化意象；归化; 异化

Contents

1. Introduction 1

2. Literature Review 1

2.1 A Brief Introduction on Domestication and Foreignization 1

2.2 Previous Translation Studies on Hong Loumeng 2

3. Buddhist and Hong Loumeng 3

3.1 Buddhist Culture in Hong Loumeng 3

3.2 The Translation of Buddhist Culture Image in Hong Loumeng 4

4. The Comparison and Analysis of Domestication and Foreignization Tendencies on Translation of Buddhist Culture Factors in Yang’ and Hawkes’ Versions 5

4.1 The Translation of Good Song 5

4.2 The Translation of Miaoyu Judgment 6

4.3 Other Related Examples on Buddhist Culture Translations 7

5. Conclusion 9

Works Cited 11

1. Introduction

Nowadays, Hong Loumeng has been translated into many versions of different languages and widespread throughout the world. The translator encountered sorts of problems in the translation process due to the diversity of culture, and it is also a challenge for the translator to choose a suitable and appropriate translation strategy in the process of translation. Religious culture running through Hong Loumeng shows the profoundity and diversity of Chinese Culture. Religious and cultural image translation makes foreign readers have a deeper understanding of Chinese Buddhist culture. Culture is the barrier for the people with different cultural background to understand the target language. The translator’s purpose is to remove these barriers as much as possible without ignoring the communication and dissemination of culture. A competent translator can maximally keep the original source, fully consider the readers’ taste, and integrate culture with translation.

2. Literature Review

2.1 A Brief Introduction on Domestication and Foreignization

Domestication is a translation strategy complying with the target language culture, it openly uses conservative assimilation means to cater to local canon, publishing trends and political needs or use transparent, fluent style in translation to dilute the original strangeness. “Domestication camp” with the purpose of target language as destination, proposed translation not only to overcome the language barrier, but also to overcome cultural barriers, and one of the translator’s responsibility is to avoid cultural conflict. Meanwhile, as a “communicator”, the translator could not demand the intelligence and imagination of the target language readers but do some efforts in the process of translation to achieve the culture peers between the source language culture and the target language culture.

Foreignization is a translation strategy deviated from the local mainstream values, retaining the original language and cultural differences or the original foreignness to some extent, and it deliberately breaks the routine target language translation. The “foreignization camp” who advocate that the language source culture should be preserved say that the propose of translation is the exchange between cultures, and language source culture will enrich the culture and cultural expression of the target language. Because the readers also want to know the purpose of a foreign culture, the translator should believe the reader’s intelligence and imagination to understand a foreign culture.

2.2 The Translation Studies of Hong Loumeng

Wang Liangzhi, a Chinese classical literature teacher at New York University in 1927, was the first Chinese person who has done partially translation of Hong Loumeng. The main content of his partially translation is the love story between Baoyu and Daiyu and it was divided into 95 chapters, about 60 million words. Between 1929 and 1958, Columbia University Professor Chi-Chen Wang has published two editions of section translation of Hong Loumeng the first edition translated by Arthur Waley had 39 chapters; the second edition had 60 chapters, and was translated by the famous scholar Mark Van Doren. In 1958, the New York translators Frorenee Mehugh and Isabel Mehugh had translated 562 pages of the booklet. In the 1980s, the two the full translations of Hong Loumeng were available and well-known. In 1980, China published a full translation of Hong Loumeng by famous Yang Xianyi couple and it had three volumes. In 1986, the British scholar David Hawkes published the full translation of Hong Loumeng with five volumes.

Since the appearance of the Yang’s version and Hawkes’ version, people do research and comparative studies on them from all kinds of perspectives. Shen Dan judged pros and cons of the two versions from the perspective of the faithfulness to the original literary work; Guo Jianzhong did some research on the application of “domestication” and “foreignization” from a cross—cultural perspective in two versions, “Yang xianyi wanted to introduce Chinese culture to Anglo—American readers who wanted to know more about Chinese culture, so he used foreignization strategy. The translation purpose of Hawkes is to please readers, so he translated it for Anglo—American readers by domestication strategy.” （Guo Jianzhong,1999:56）Zhu Jun made comparison of two versions by means of Han Lide’s convergence theory; Wang Jing researched from the perspective of culture; in addition, some scholars think that Yang focused on semantic translation and Hawkes focused on communicative translation, and so on.

3. Buddhist and Hong Loumeng

3.1 Buddhist Culture in Hong Loumeng

Buddhism, according to legend, created by ancient India Kapilavastu Prince Shakyamuni in six to fifth Century BC, widely spread in many Asian countries. Since the Buddhist scriptures spread in the Han Dynasty in China, the content and form ideas of Chinese literature have been influenced. “I don’t believe anyone opposed to the fact that there are a lot of Buddhism thought in Hong Loumeng, an encyclopedia of Chinese culture. Among other things, it contains Six Degrees spirit of Mahayana Buddhism in the protagonist Jia Baoyu.” (Li Genliang,2009:190) With the development of the plot and the decline of the games, the painful and empty real life makes Baoyu want to escape. The works have more specific and detailed description on the feeling, cognition and understanding of Dharma perception of Miaoyu and Xichun. Jia Baoyu talked about Zen Buddhism with Lin Daiyu. Miaoyu became deranged and Jia Xichun became a nun, all of which reflected that religious culture running through Hong Loumeng and were of great help for future generations to understand the Buddhist culture.

Despite, in the work, there is a large number of Taoist thought mixed with Buddhist thought. But Buddhism is still the predominant religious factor in Hong Loumeng. Firstly, in the novel, the appearance of a monk and a Taoist priest is the main line in the novel, and priest is always in a subordinate position. Secondly, Buddhism has a greater impact on main characters in Hong Loumeng. In Jia Fu, besides Jia Jing, all people believed in Buddhism, and Jia Jing, the unique Taoist followers, died of eating the elixir refined by himself. The beginning two stories in the novel best reflected Buddhist thought of Cao Xueqin, for example, the male lead Jia Baoyu finally “悬崖撒手”and became a monk；Miss Xichun, finally convertted to Buddhism for the destination. This series of Buddhist thought inevitably lay a deep imprint on the language of Hong Loumeng. The following examples show the Buddhist belief of the people in Jia Fu.

1. “王夫人因说道: ‘你舅舅今日斋戒去了, 再见罢。⋯’ ”(Chapter 3)

“我的菩萨哥儿,我说做了好梦呢,好容易得遇见了你。” (Chapter 8)

（2）“大老爷原是好养静的了, 已经修炼成了, 已算得是神仙了, 太太们这么一说, 这就叫做‘心到神知’了。”(Chapter 11)

1. “凤姐悄悄道: ‘放尊重些, 别叫丫头们看到了。’贾瑞如听纶语佛音一般, 忙往后退。”(Chapter 12) (Cao Xueqinamp; Gao E,1992:267)

3.2 The Translation of Buddhist Culture Image in Hong Loumeng

For cultural image, scholars have different definitions. In summary, the cultural image is a cultural symbol slowly formed in the long history of different peoples other than the literal meaning, also condensing the nation’s wisdom and the crystallization of history and culture. The cultural image penetrated in language, has a relatively fixed, unique cultural meaning and broad, deep connotation, some still with rich and profound associations. “Cultural image reflects the characteristics of different cultures, also reflects the unique understanding, attitude, and unique aesthetic view on the nature for the people using different languages.” (Wang Rongning,2012:23) Because of cultural differences, different nationalities have differences in the association with the meaning of language. These vivid associations are important way for cross-cultural communicators to understand the language and culture.

The cultural image is the condensation of national culture and a symbol in the long development of the culture. English and Chinese have different cultural image. For example, Chinese “dragon” has a different cultural image from that of English. Language is the carrier of cultural information and cultural image is bound to affect language translation activities in the process of rendering Hong Loumeng. For example, Grandmother took Daiyu in her arms, and burst into tears with saying“心肝儿肉”. As for the “心肝儿肉” in the sentence, Yang translated it as “Dear heat! Flesh of my child”, which is more faithful to the origin. Hawkes, however, translated it into “My poor lamb”, using “poor” to express the love of the grandmother, which is easier for target language readers to accept. Take the sentence “心较比干多一窍，病如西子胜三分” as another example. People who are familiar with Chinese culture may understand that “比干” is the prime minister of the Shang Dynasty, who is very smart and capable, and “西施” is a masterpiece of beauty, while English readers don’t understand this cultural background information. In two versions, Hawkes translated it into “than the martyred Bigan, than the beautiful Xishi”. Yang, however, introduced the relevant cultural background to the readers by a footnote. “In Hong Loumeng, Lin Daiyu said“把我的龙井茶给二爷沏上”, and “龙井茶” is a relatively rare Chinese tea by which the host show respect for the guest.” (Liu Shicong,2004:99) Hawkes translated “龙井茶” as “Dragon Well tea”, by which the target language reader may misunderstand the meaning of the original sentence, because Dragon is an evil monster in Western culture. Religious culture image translation is more complicated case, especially in Hong Loumeng. “Religion is the national culture heritage and has an important impact on the nation’s social systems, values, social customs, morals, etc.”(Shen Dan,1995:78) Yang’ translation of the Bodhisattva, fate, Buddha and other religious sayings in Hong Loumeng, is ‘Buddha, Heaven, Gracious Buddha’ which are faithful to the origin, while Hawkes’ translation is ‘Good lord, God, God save me soul’ etc. making Buddhist culture image become Christian culture image. In Yang’ translation, “斋戒” is “observing a feast”, in Eastern religion, referring to the vegetarian that avoids alcohol and meat. Hawkes translated “斋戒” into “retreat”.

So the religious and cultural image translation is more complicated. It need translators try their best to master religious cultures of two countries. Translators not only break through the barriers of the cultural differences, but also deal with the conflicts between different religions. the difficulties in the process of translating is unimaginably big, so the studies on the strategies in the two versions of Hong Loumeng which is respectively translated by a Chinese and a westerner is of great significance.

4. The Comparison and Analysis of Domestication and Foreignization Tendencies on Translation of Buddhist Culture Factors in Yang’ and Hawkes’ Versions

4.1 The Translation of Good Song

Example 1.世人都晓神仙好。（《好了歌》）

Yang’ version: All men Long to be immortals. (Yang,1994:169)

Hawkes’ version: Man all know that salvation should be won. (Hawkes, 1973:197)

Good Song is a wonderful part of Hong Loumeng. Several simple words said by “跛足道人” reveal “the absurdity of human existence and the fundamental contradictions of human existence”. The theme of good song is “色即是空”. Here, “色” refers to people’s pursuit of desire in the world, in general, refers to the desire of “color, sound, smell, taste, touch,” through the “eyes, ear, nose, tongue, body and mind” to pollute heart in Buddhism. Fame and fortune with the erotic is “dust” and people in the world are driven by the desire, longing for fame but gain nothing in the end.

The implication of Good Song is quite profound, and it advocates the thought of “清静无为” in Taoism and thought of “四大皆空” in Buddhism. The highest realm of Taoism is to be immortals after practicing and everything is illusory. From this we can see that the translation of Yang Xianyi reflects Taoist culture and Buddhist thought of China. Chinese culture and Western culture are the two main cultures in world culture system. “The moral ethical system of Chinese culture has a closed inward reflection from the date of born, including the “天人合一”, “世界皆空” and other ideas which are diametrically contrary to the belief of absolute obedience to God in Western culture.”(Wang Bingqin,2007:99) Salvation, the metaphorical structure constructed in Hawkes translation, is an opposite of various human activities in moral life. The translator tried to express the theme of “the contradiction between real world pleasures and salvation of souls”. Hawkes used domestication strategy in translating the conceptual metaphor of the original sentence and tended to caring more for the culture prototype of the target language readers and acceptance of the alien culture.

4.2 The Translation of Miaoyu Judgment

Example 2. 欲洁何曾洁，云空未必空。可怜金质玉，终掉泥淖中。（《妙玉判词》）

Yang’ version: Chastity is her wish, seclusion her desire; alas, though fine as gold or jade, she sinks at last in the mire.

Hawkes’ version: For all your would-be spotlessness and vaunted otherworldliness; you that look down on common flesh and blood, yourself impure shall end up in the mud.

The Buddha land is pure land. Yang translated “纯洁、贞洁” into “chastity”. This word is not only matched with “yu” in “Miaoyu”, but also implied the religion assessment on the notion of sex and sexual morality, which means Miaoyu’s desire is not gone out and her heart is not clean. Yang maintained the faithfulness to the original text by the foreignization strategy. “Spotlessness” in Hawkes’ translation means innocence of reputation, character and behavior. “空” means not only “四大皆空”in Buddhism but also Miaoyu converted to Buddhism. Yang translated “空”into “seclusion”, it showed that women away from the Red Dust and converted to Buddhism. “Otherworldliness” in Hawkes translation, failed to express the intended meaning that Miaoyu converted to Buddhism. Yang Xianyi used “alas” as “可怜”, which has lots of meanings, but Hawkes did not express this important religious feelings and deep humanistic ultimate concern.

4.3 Other Related Examples on Buddhist Culture Translations

Example 3: 王夫人因说道：“你舅舅今日斋戒去了，再见罢。”（Chapter 3）

Yang’ version: Your uncle’s observing a fast today…

Hawkes’ version: Your uncle is in a retreat today…

In China, fast, including vegetarian and quit, is mainly used to show piousness in fete, salute and other solemn occasion. “斋” comes from “tidiness”, such as bath, not to drink, not to eat meat. “戒” mainly refers to quit amusement, such as not to bed with wife, to reduce recreational activities. Afterward, it refers to the similar religious ritual. In Buddhism, “斋” means the clearing of heart sordidness; “戒” means the prohibition of the body’s immoderateness; fast is the meaning of putting an end to all excessive desires. There are also “斋戒”in Catholicism, but its meaning is different from the meaning in Buddhism. It means sacrifice in Catholicism. There are big fast and small fast. “Fast” in yang’ version is accurate and retains its Buddhism color. But in Hawkes’ version the “retreat”, referring to a period of time in which people stop their daily activities to pray or meditate, does not contain the cultural meaning of “fast”.

Example 4: 刘姥姥说：阿弥陀佛！全仗嫂子方便了。(Chapter 6)

Yang’ version: Buddha be praised! I’m most grateful for your help, sister!

Hawkes’ version: Bless you, my dear, for being such a help!

“Buddha”, is the transliteration of Sanskrit “amitbhabuddha”, and it is the most familiar Buddhist language. As the influence of Buddhist culture on people’s language and social psychology, secular people often take “Buddha” as a mantra. There are 40 “Buddha” in Hong Loumeng, and each person has different psychological states and reasons. The two translators used different strategies. In order to be faithful to the original text, truthfully convey the original exotic sentiment and religious overtones, Yang’ translation used more foreignization strategy to express thanks, applause, approval and other verbal behavior, and often uses “Buddha be praised” to express “阿弥陀佛”. Hawkes used domestication strategy to translate “Buddha” into “Holy Name, ” “Thank the Lord, ” “ Bless You, ” “Bless us and Save Us” and other Western Christian words. Although Hawkes eliminated barriers for English readers to understand, obliterated the cultural differences of the original text, his version is easy for readers to mistakenly think that the Chinese people also believe in Christianity.

Example 5. 凤姐悄悄道: “放尊重些，别叫丫头们看了笑话。”贾瑞如听纶音佛语一般，忙往后退。(Chapter 12)

Yang’ version: “Take care，”she whispered. “What will the maids think". He drew back instantly as if obeying an Imperial decree or a man date from Buddha.

Hawkes’ version: “Take care,” said Xifeng in a low tone. ‘The servants might see you! ’Obedient to his goddess’s command，Jia Rui quickly drew back again.

“Bodhisattva” and “Buddha” are the two images in Buddhist, representing the compassion and kindness. Therefore, there are “merciful Bodhisattva” and “My Buddha of compassion” in Chinese. The two Chinese religious images were retained in Yang’s version. By foreignization strategy, Yang’s version preserves the original religious overtones, conveys the Chinese Buddhist culture, while Mr. Hawkes, by domestication strategy, gave up the image of the original religion and only translated the figurative sense for the acceptance of the target language readers.

Example 6. 把这几个烦恼鬓毛剃去，寻个干净去处自了。（Chapter 33）

Yang’ version: I’ll shave off those few remaining hairs and retire to a monastery.

Hawkes’ version: I shall cut off my few remaining hairs (those that worry and wretchedness have left me) and look for some clean and decent spot to end my days in..

Buddhism called “Buddha” as pure land, because there is no the pollution of “five turbidity”. So Jia Zheng’s “find a clean place” means becoming a monk. “Trouble” here is a Buddhist term, meaning disruption on the body and mind. In this sentence, Yang’s translation embodied the Jia Zheng’s intention of becoming a monk, but Hawkes did not translate this meaning.

Example 7. “逝者已登仙界，非碌碌你我尘寰中人也。”(Chapter 15)

Yang’ version: The decreased has become an immortal and…

Hawkes’ version: The Departed is now in paradise…

Buddhists believe that people who do good things will go to heaven after death, while the wicked will go to hell after death. Yang translated “登仙界”into “become an immortal”, which is more faithful to the original text. In the West, people think that they will go to heaven after death. In order to facilitate the reader to understand, Hawkes translated it into “in paradise”.

From the above examples, it can be found that in the religious culture image translation Yang Xianyi accurately grasp the nature of the relationship between national culture and translation subjects, make the Chinese culture implant in Western culture, and promote the integration of the Western culture with Chinese culture while in Hawkes’s version the cultural images in the origin disappear and are sucked into Western religious culture system, which makes the original cultural charm vanished.

5. Conclusion

The transplanting and reconstruction of the different cultural image resulting from religious differences involves various factors such as the translator"s own religious inheritance, receiving and understanding of other religious culture. This article focuses on the different strategies resulting from two translators’(Yang’s and Hawkes’) different translation purposes and different audience orientation on the religious words and phrases. By the comparison of the translations of some typical sentences selected from the two versions, it can be drawn a conclusion that Mr. and Mrs. yang xianyi’s translation shows foreignization tendency, while Hawkes’ translation shows domestication tendency. From the perspective of translation itself, Yang, by foreignization strategy, retains the heterogeneous factors of Chinese culture successfully; from the perspective of acceptance of the reader, Hawkes, by domestication strategy, gives foreign readers a version of higher readability. Different regional culture will hinder the readers’ understanding of the region, so the translator"s purpose is to remove these barriers as much as possible without ignore the communication and dissemination of culture. A competent translator can maximally keep the original source, fully consider the readers’ taste, and integrate culture with translation. Only in this way, it will make readers understand the author"s intent furthest. It is undoubted that the construction of religious culture image will cause many difficulties in the process of translating, and they are inevitable obstacles for translators. In the process of translating religious image, translators must envisage their differences, discover their identities and believe that readers can accept and understand the diversity of religious culture on the premise of faster and faster globalization process.

Works Cited

[1] Hawkes, David. The Story of Stone. New York: Penguin Group, 1973.

[2] Yang, Xianyi. A Dream of Red Mansions. Beijing: Foreign Language Press, 1994.

[3] 曹雪芹,高鹗.《红楼梦》.西安：三秦出版社，1992.

[4] 郭建中.《文化与翻译》.北京：中国对外翻译出版社，1999.

[5] 李根亮.《红楼梦与宗教》.长沙：岳麓书社，2009.

[6] 刘士聪.《红楼译评》.天津：南开大学出版社，2004.

[7] 申丹.《文学文体学与小说翻译》. 北京大学出版社，1995.

[8] 王炳钦，《文化翻译学》.天津：南开大学出版社，2007.

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