[AKA: EC SIMULYANEOUS INTERPRETATION (英汉同声传译/张维为 著)]
Actually, this is the 2nd time I finished reading this book. During the summer vacation after the Collge-Entrance Examination, I was tasting this book breifly. However, I fimished it though, I didn’t know what the author mainly trying to tell us. Fortunately, what made me read it again is the book-list you, Mr. Fan, gave us. It is much appriciated I think.
In the preface of this book, the author told us there had been 3 Chinese Translation High Tide in China, and we are in the 4th one. The 4th is the most outstanding one according to the level of its influence, scope and theme. What lead to this tide is the boom of information, the boom of knowledge and the boom of translation. What’s more, this tide contains more information, more participation and more feilds. Besides the whole condition, they also introduced the history of Simultanous Interpretation. It is a very young profession. Dating back to the World War One, Franch was the official language of a majority of international organizations. After the war, English sprung up in all the international meetings and the name of ” EC Simultaneous Interpretation ” came into our view. However, while reading, I found a strange phenomenon; all the sinmultaneous interpretors are famous people or celebrities in their feilds, and they were not professional-trained translators. I don’t know what the author wanted to tell us. Maybe it is that ” Simultaneous Interpretation is a destination we can reach without training ” or ” Simultaneous Interpretation is a wonder land ordinary people cannot reach .”
When it comes to the definition to TRANSLATION, there exists one made by a famous U.S. linguistist ” Translation consists in producing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of the source language, first in terms of meaning and secongly in terms of style.” In my opinion, this definition got an idea across that” when translating, we should try our best to keep the natural equivalent of the recertor language, and besides this, we must find the best expression in the language we need to turn into”. Anyhow, in a words, the main standar of translation is and will be “信, 达, 雅” forever.
If one want to be a good interpretor, these items I list below will be the basic skill.
*A solid foundation of your own language.
*A well understanding of English.
*The ability of expressing orally and fluently.
*A better mental condition.
*A quick reaction.
*Knowledge of some specific feilds.
*Teamwork.
The reason why we say the knowledge of some specific feilds is a necessity is that a interpretor won’t translate for him/herself. He must work for a famous person or an organization. Therefore, he cannot avoid encountering some professional or expressions. If we lack them, we can only translate for ourselves or our parents.
Reading on the go, I found two new concepts of languages. “Hypotaxis and Parataxis.” However, unfortunately, this book didn’t do further explanation on it. Therefore, it made me turn to my 2nd book, I’ll talk about it later.
Here comes the most important part of it—-the model of changing the pattern between English and Chinese. Three models in total.
*Model One: Fully Equivalence (完全等值)
Examples: One plus one equals two. ==> 一加一等于二.
Like father, like son. ==> 有其父, 必有其子.
With the communication of the world, more and more language patters come to a close, and a common translation model is accepted by people around the world, just as the model one.
*Model Two: Patter Equivalence (形式等值)
Examples: to paint the lily ==> 画蛇添足.
as timid as a hare ==> 胆小如鼠.
As you can see, in this model, we use the Chinese idioms to express the meaning of English. We got the idea across in a better way.
*Model Three: Concept Equivalence (概念等值)
Example: sustainable development ==> 可持续发展 (直译)
Oxford ==> 牛津 (直译+意译)
This is a phenomenon that we could not avoid. When working between two different languages, we cannot reach the point of fully equivalence all the time. We need concept equivalence in order to comfort our spectators, ears.
Before finishing reading this book. I took a breif veiw on ” the main official languages of International Organization in the world.” The fact is that all the organizations, such as CICR, IAEA and NATO, regard English and French as their official languages. Therefore, as a Foreign Language Major in SWJTU-emei, we must pay more of our attention to French than Japanese, in order to orient our aim of occupation in the future.
After reading this book and learning some of the skill of training to be a Simultaneous Interpretor, I thought it is not suit for an undergraduate as me. For persuing my goal, I will try my best to get my further shaping to be a graduate and Simutaneous Interpretor.
What the main idea I’ve got is that Translation is one of the most dynamic and enthusiasm feilds. It is a kind of art form and interpretors are artists. Translation, no metter it is a cultural phenomenon, thoughts movement or a profession, has a very close relation with the 21-Century. The ideas, methods, styles, standers and models and everything about translation is moving forwards with the time.
Dec. 28th, 2008
Mr. YAO
