英汉翻译理论与技巧之长句翻译

Chapter 4 Translation of Long Sentences
Translation of Long Sentences
I. Three Aspects to Think about
I. Logic I believe that I speak for every sincere and serious representative in the United Nations — so I am encouraged to believe by the speeches to which we have already listened this morning when I say that the anniversary must be an occasion for an honest assessment of our failures in the past, matched by an equally determined will to do better in the future, so that we can escape from frustration and turn the anniversary into an inspiration and an achievement.
It is popular for the fine views from the summit of the mountain. 从山顶远眺，湖光山色，尽收眼底；这儿风景绝 佳，遐迩闻名。
Aristotle could have avoided the mistake of thinking that women have fewer teeth than men, by the simple device of asking Mrs. Asristotle to keep her mouth open while he counted. 原译：亚里士多德本来能够避免这个错误的认识， 即女人的牙齿比男人要少些；他只要用这个简单 的方法，就是请亚里士多德夫人张开嘴巴，让他 来数就行了。 改译：亚里士多德认为女人的牙齿比男人少，其 实，他只要自己的夫人张一张口让他数一数，本 是可以避免这个错误的。
2. Time Sequence
In the winter of 1879, James Lecky, exchequer clerk from Ireland, and privately interested in phonetics, keyboard temperament, and Gaelic, all of which subjects he imposed on me, dragged me to a meeting of a debating society called The Zetetical: a junior copy of the once well known Dialectical Society founded to discuss John Stuart Mill’s Essay on Liberty when that was new.
1. Logic ① I believe that ② I speak for every sincere and serious representative in the United Nations // — ③ so I am encouraged to believe by the speeches to which we have already listened this morning—// ④ when I say that ⑤ the anniversary must be an occasion for an honest assessment of our failures in the past, ⑥ matched by an equally determined will to do better in the future, ⑦ so that we can escape from frustration ⑧ and turn the anniversary into an inspiration and an achievement.
译文1：詹姆斯·莱基是爱尔兰人，在财政部当职员，他本人 对语言学、键盘和声和盖尔语很感兴趣，并把这些课题强加 在我身上。1879年冬，他拉我去参加一个辩论会团体举办 的会议，该团体叫探索协会。当约翰·斯图尔特·米尔刚刚发 表《自由》一文时，成立过一个辩证学会来讨论这篇文章， 该学会曾名噪一时，探索协会仿照了辩证协会的模式，只是 规模没有它大罢了。 译文2：1879年冬，詹姆斯·莱基带我去参加一次辩论会。莱 基是爱尔兰人，在财政部当职员，有空喜欢研究语音学，弹 弹琴，学习盖尔语。他还硬让我也学这些东西。这次他带我 去参加的辩论会是一个名叫“探索学会”的团体举办的。当 年约翰·斯图尔特·米尔的文章《论自由》刚刚发表的时候， 成立过一个“论辩学会”来讨论这篇文章，该学会曾名噪一 时，探索学会就是仿照论辩学会建立起来的，只是没有它那 么有名罢了。
⑤这次周年纪念会应该是一个老老实实地 评估我们过去失误的大好时机,⑥同时也应 该是一个表达我们有同样决心要做好今后 工作的大好时机。⑦这样,我们就可免遭挫 折,⑧并可把这次周年纪念变成一种鼓舞和 成就。④当我讲这番话时,①我相信——— ③今天上午我们听到的发言也使我相信— ——②我是代表联合国每一位真诚而严肃 的代表讲话的。
II. Two Stages and Seven Steps in Translating a Long Sentence
Stage II: Presentation Step 5: enter on a tentative translation of each sentence division Step 6: rearrangement and synthesis Step 7: finishing touches
3. Space
(2).她久久凝视着夜空，茫茫然，不禁热泪 盈眶。她遥望着校园以北两英里处那灯火辉 煌的水塔，广播电台那摇曳的红光和随风从 月下飘过的朵朵灰云。
II. Two Stages and Seven Steps in Translating a Long Sentence
Stage I: Comprehension Step 1: present the long sentence in a skeleton form. Step 2: infer the main idea from the context and the whole text Step 3: distinguish between the principal and subordinate elements Step 4: find out the interrelations between principal and subordinate clauses
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife. 凡有产业的单身汉，总要娶位太太，这已经成了一条举世 公认的真理。 有钱的单身汉总要娶位太太，这是一条举世公认的真理 饶有家资的单身男子必定想要娶妻室，这是举世公认的真 情实理。 举世公认，一个拥有一大笔钱财的单身男人，必定想娶一 个女人做太太。这已成为一条真理。 世间有这样一条公认的真理――凡财产丰厚的单身男人势 必想娶个太太。
And he knew how ashamed he would have been if she had known his mother and the kind of place in which he was born, and the kind of people among whom he was born. 他出生在这一类人中间，他出生在这种地方，他 有这样的母亲，这些要是让她知道了的话，他知 道该多么丢人。
3. Space
(1). Imagine a lonely whitewashed steading set on a rain drenched loch amid ferocious mountains rising into grey mist, with long-horned cattle, like elders of the church, sternly munching thistles in the foreground.
Translation of Long Sentences
II. Reversing English long sentences, simple or complicated, may not in many cases arranged themselves in the same time or logical sequence as that in Chinese. Hence in translation we have to invert, partly or completely, the order of the original.
3. Space
(1).试想一座刷着白灰的小农庄，孤零零地 坐落在雨水浸淫的湖泊上，四周环绕着阴森 森的群山。山峰直插入灰蒙蒙的雾霭之中， 门前有长角牛群，象苏格兰教会长老那样神 情严肃地在咀嚼蓟草。
3. Space
(2). For long vacant moments, she stared at the sky, her eyes filling with tears, her vision absorbed the illuminated water tower two miles north of the campus, the flickering red lights of a radio station, the passage of clouds blown livid across.