futher explanations for choosing between chinese translations
In a previous post of mine, I talked about my own reading experience of choosing a better Chinese translation. I didn't explain much why I thought the 2nd one was better, because I doubted anyone would be interested in that topic, except for advanced learners, or native Chinese speakers.
Recently, Shivram, one of my favorite bloggers on Bear, asked me about the difference between those two Chinese sentences. I was surprised that someone would show interest in that post. What was even more surprising is that he actually doesn't know Chinese, but he was still willing to talk about the topic with me. Thus, I feel exceptionally motivated to make a new post to further explain.
Technically that topic is about contrastive linguistics. It was hard for me to talk about it, though, because I was trained in linguistics for only two years, so I only touched upon translation and language learning in that post. And I still have trouble putting my broken knowledge together now, but I will try my best. In this post, I will make the explanations based on what I have learned about contrastive studies between English and Chinese.
Here's the original text by Oscar Wilde:
The studio was filled with the rich odour of roses, and when the light summer wind stirred amidst the trees of the garden, there came through the open door the heavy scent of the lilac, or the more delicate perfume of the pink-flowering thorn.
Here's the 1st translation,
画室里弥漫着浓郁的玫瑰花香，每当夏天的微风在花园的树丛中流动，从开着的门外还会飘进来紫丁香的芬芳或嫩红色山楂花的幽香。
And here's the 2nd translation, which I think is better:
画室里弥漫着浓浓的玫瑰花香，夏日的轻风拂过园中的树木，开着的门便送来了馥郁的紫丁香味，或是满枝粉红色花的荆棘的清香。
Once again, the two sentences are both grammatically and semantically acceptable in Chinese. However, considering 1) the sentence structure; 2) the diction, I vote for the 2nd one.
1) compared to the 1st, the sentence structure of the 2nd translation is more genuine
As indicated by contrstive analysis, English is overt cohesion-prominent, while Chinese is covert coherence-prominent. In that post, I said the 1st translation is more like English. By that, I mean the tranlsator of the 1st translation didn't take the features of Chinese into consideration, while the 2nd translator did.
English is more hypotactic while Chinese is more paratactic. Put simply, English has more cohesive devices, like conjunctions and other connectives, whereas Chinese tends to put clauses together without connectives. In the 1st tranlsation, the conjunction 每当 is used, meaning every time / whenever. In contrast, there is not a connective in the 2nd translation, but a "run-on" sentence is used instead. (As far as I know, run-on sentences and sentence fragments are generally not grammatically accpectable in English. However, they are totally acceptable in Chinese grammar, and preferable in literary writing.) Moreover, instead of connectives, we prefer to use adverbs if we want to indicate how the ideas are linked to each other between clauses in Chinese, which would give the sentence a more natural and pleasant flow. So in the 2nd translation, the adverb 便 is used, meaning soon afterwards or as soon as, indicating that the scent of the lilac coming through the open door is a result of the light summer wind stirring.
In English, prepositions constantly appear, but not so much in Chinese, which is also a manifestation of English being overt / explicit, Chinese being covert / implicit. Prepositions might sound redundant in Chinese. But in the 1st translation, the preposition 从 is used, as an equivalent of through in the original text. That is acceptable, though. But the 2nd translation does a better job by turning 开着的门 (the open door) into the subject of the sentence, which is considered as a literary device in Chinese. So the 2nd translation goes like "The open door sent the heavy scent of the lilac (into the room)."
So in a word, the 1st translation keeps the characteristics of English, but the 2nd translation has managed to get rid of them, and is endowed with the essence of Chinese.
I'm not saying the covert coherence / parataxis is not used in English; or the overt cohesion / hypotaxis is not used in Chinese. In modern Chinese, overt cohesion is also widely used in formal writing, e.g. legal texts, because these texts have to give readers clear signals about how the ideas are related to each other. Also, when I researched hypotaxis / parataxis online, I found it very interesting that this video says "Ernest Hemingway uses a tremendous amount of parataxis, which creates a really interesting stylistic effect." But that's just the commonest way to compose a sentence in Chinese! (edit: i've never read Hemingway so don't quote me on that)
The point I'm trying to make here is that in literary translation (and other genres alike), those inherent features of Chinese help improve the flow of the text, and yield a style that feels more writerly. Therefore, a good translator should be aware of the different features of both the source language and the target language, rather than just making sure the meaning is accurately rendered.
2) the diction of the 2nd translation is slightly better than the 1st To Me
There's not much to say about diction. I only notice one difference between the two: in the 1st translation, the verb 流动, which means to flow, is a little bit bland. In contrast, the 2nd translation uses the verb 拂过, meaning (of a breeze) to brush lightly over, which is more likely used in literary writing, and gives the text a poetic feel.
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