Проблемы литератур Дальнего Востока. Часть 1

Секция 2 • Panel 2 Проблемы литератур Дальнего Востока. Т. 1. 2018 244 Even though the English translation of The Dream of the Red Chamber by David Hawkes is undoubtedly successful, without which the novel could never have received such readership in the English speaking world. However, when the common readers or scholars of the English speaking world are reading a novel of such kind, which was written in the 18th century, partly meaning to recall the ‘du temp perdu’ of an aristocratic family, it is fairly easy to fabricate such interpretations stimulated by imaginations of an exotic culture. As Cliff Goddard explains the misinterpretation excited by such imaginary cultural association, he writes, ‘When we encounter proverbs from a different culture, sometimes making reference to unfamiliar analogies and often embodying different value orientations to our own, the value of a meticulous paraphrase which spells out the message content in full detail is more apparent.’ (Goddard and Wierzbicka, 2004) Examples that may have indicated such misinterpretation could be selected from the translation of David Hawkes’, named as The Story of the Stone. ᡁׯᆖᠿˈҏ⋑ᖰཆཤ৫ୡDŽ ᡁањྣᆙ ݯ ᇦˈ⸕䚃ӰѸᱟ㊹ཤ䶒ཤⲴ ဘྦྦ ⣟н⵰ᶕ傲ᡁˈᡁ৸нᱟဘྦྦᇦҠⲴDŽ And suppose I have been trained as an actress. I’ve never played outside for money. I’m a little girl, not a trumpet or whatever it was you called me. And as for being ‘bought goods’, well, it wasn’t you who bought me. (Hawkes, 1973) By comparing the translation and the original text, some of the neflected cultural features could be confusing for the readers unfamiliar with the aristocratic culture of the Qing dynasty. Firstly, it is obvious that Hawkes did not quite catch the rhetoric trick Cao played on the so termed Nj㊹ཤ䶒ཤnj .Taking the cultural context into consideration Nj㊹ཤnj is originated from the opera culture. As all the opera performers will have to cover their face with cosmetic powder, so later Nj㊹ ཤnj , literally translated as ‘powdered head’, became the metonymy word for Njᠿ ᆀnj , the opera performer. Moreover, the opera performers were considered to be very low-class, because for the aristocratic class, the opera performers are not only considered to be the ones selling their talents for a living, and ‘selling’ is considered as a shame for the aristocratic families that mainly adopt the literati values; but also the opera performers were normally sold by their poor parents to the opera troupe, then later again sold to aristocratic families for their entertainment routine. Besides, since the opera performers make a living by selling their talents and they normally appear with heavymake-up, the metaphorical extension of ‘powdered head’ is prostitute. Furthermore, Nj䶒ཤnj in the text is purely a rhetoric trick. Normally Nj䶒ཤnj would not make any sense in the Chinese language, but Nj㊹nj and