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对于一篇英文文章能做到理解,进而全面领会其精髓,除了在篇章、上下文、词汇、语法、文化背景以及语感几方面下功夫之外,还应在长难句这方面下点功夫,长句、难句虽然不可能是全部的帮助,但是也对我们翻译理解文章起到一定作用。下面就辑出若干例句和同行们共同学习探讨。
1. At Eton the boys stand in a clauster and lift their hats when their names are called.At Harrow they file past a Master in the schoolyard and answer one by one.
译:在伊顿,学生们站在一起,叫到名字就举举帽子。在哈罗,学生们则在校园里列队从一教师面前走过,一个一个地答到。
析:原文中有三个回指照应的人称代词:两个their,一个they. 翻译时应将两个their都略去不译而将they还原成“学生们”。
2. Remain deeply concerned ,however, by the overrall expansion and feminization of the pandemic and nearly and the fact that women now represent 50 percent of people living with HIV worldwide and nearly 60 percent of people living with HIV in Africa, and in this regard recognize that gender inequalities and all forms of violence against women and girls increase their vulnerablity to HIV/AIDS.
译:但是仍然深感关切的是,这一大流行的范围总体上有所扩大,女性患者比例日增,以致妇女现在已占全世界艾滋病毒感染者总数的50%、占非洲艾滋病毒感染者的60%,并在这方面认识到,两性不平等,和针对妇女和女孩的一切形式的暴力行为,使她们更加容易受到艾滋病毒/艾滋病感染。
析:汉语中经常使用范畴词来表示行为、现象、属性等概念所属的范畴。在以上句子中通过增加范畴词使英语中抽象的表达具体化:把“violence”译为“暴力行为”,增译了范畴词“行为”。
3. The human brain weighs three pounds, but in that three pounds are ten billion neurons and a hundred billion smallers cells.
译:人脑只有三磅重,但就在这三磅物质中,却包含着一百亿个神经细胞,以及一千亿个更小的细胞。
析:英语中可以说in that three pounds,但汉语却不宜说“在这三磅中”,而需要在“三磅”,这个数量词后加一个名词“物质”:在这三磅物质中,如果不加则导致译文生硬别扭。
4. Pearson has pieced togethre the work of hundreds of researchers around the
world to produce a unique millennium technology calendar that gives thr latest dates when we can expect hundreds of key breakthroughs and discoveries to take place.
译:皮尔森汇集了世界各地数百位研究人员的成果,制作出了一个独一无二的千年技术日历,这个日历提供了一些最迟的日期,通过这些日期我们就可以预测到数百个重大突破和发现的发生时间。
析:这是一个复合句。Pearson has pieced togetherthe work是主谓宾结构的主句,of hundreds of researchers是介词短语修饰名词work, around the world则是介词短语修饰名词researchers that引导定语从句修饰名词calendar. Piece together本来表示“拼凑”,由于这个词有贬义,应根据句意调整为褒义词“汇集”或“综合”。
5. I have been to Edinburgh just for two days ,any my brothers have followed in the train of my trip.
译:我到达爱丁堡刚刚两天,我的兄弟们就循着我的行踪到来了。
析:这个例子印证了一个重要的翻译原则,即“词无定义”。在英文中train不单单指“火车”还可指“一连串的事件”或“由一件事造成的一系列后果(a series of consequences created by an event)”,所以,follow in the train of my trip这句话所要表达的意思不是“我的兄弟们就乘坐我旅行的火车接踵而至”,而是“我的兄弟们就循着我的行踪到来了”。
6. There are only two things we can enjoy together, they are the cool breeze on the river and the bright moonlight among the hills. They serve as music to our ears, or as color to our eyes ;we can take them freely and enjoy them for ever; they are inexhaustible treasures supplied by the Creator.
译:唯江上之清风,与山间之明月,耳得之而为声,目遇之而成色,取之无禁,用之不竭,是造物者之无尽藏也,而吾与子之所共适。
析:有时一句话要翻译得恰当,符合汉语表达的思维逻辑,就必须做适当的词序调整或者是句际调整。上句就是明显的句际调整。
7、A 1989 report declared it “most unlikely” that Bovin Spongiform Eencephalopathy(BSE)-the fatal brain disorder that caused cows to stagger and forth at the mouth-could infect humans.
译:1989年的一份报告称,“牛海绵体脑病”(BSE),即导致牛行走摇晃、口吐白沫的致命脑紊乱病,传染给人的“可能性极小”。
析:英语对全球各种发展与事件有及时的报导,要不断积累出现的新词汇,保持对英语语言的敏感性。
8、When the lights came on again, hardly a person in the city can have turned on a switch without reflecting how great a servant he had at his fingertips.
译:电灯又亮了,该城的人们打开开关的时候,想必几乎人人都会想到,电灯是随时可供他们使用的多么有用的东西呀。
析:在这句话里, “hardly…without…”构成“双重否定”。虽然只有without在词形上具有明显的否定特征,但是hardly(以及scarcely,barely, few,little等)虽然没有明显的否定特征,却有否定的词义,因此在翻译时,既可以将原句按照两个否定的形式表述出来,亦可按否定的语气译出。
9、There can be no equality in the world when capitalist system still exists.
译:只要资本主义制度依然从在,世界上就没有平等可言。
析:这句话牵扯对状语从句的翻译,这里的when相当于as long as的概念,因此要译成“只要”。
10、The assumption that the issue of rights is solely a political concern effectively indifferent to cultural influences is altogether too native to permit responsible reflection.
译:权利问题仅关乎政治,与文化影响实不相干。这一假设完全是过于天真,不值得对其进行认真思索。
析:有些社科类文章,译文虽然勉强达义,但读起来不舒服,这就需要将英文句子适当拆解,抓住句子内在逻辑,把原来句序重排。