Abstract

The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald’s magnum opus, is widely considered to be one of the most significant works of Jazz Age. The Great Gatsby describes the so-called high society, which is the epitome of the American Jazz Age, at the same time it pointed out the theme: the disillusion of the American Dream . This theme is really meaningful and triggers a lot of thoughts. 

And now I pick two main Chinese versions of The Great Gatsby, Wu Ningkun’s version and Yao Naiqiang’s version to make a comparative study of their different translating styles, emphasis, characterization, descriptions of environment, symbolism and their own strengths and weaknesses ,which takes fidelity to original version and language fluency as main thread. And in this thesis, the whole thesis is based on domestication and foreignization. We will discuss the translating style of these two translators. And finally draw a conclusion about their different emphasis of the whole translation. 

Key words: free translation and literal translation; domestication; foreignization fluency; fidelity to original version; characterization; symbolism; overall situation

Contents

Abstract

摘要

Introduction-5

Chapter 1 Translation styles-6

1.1 Literal translation and liberal translation-6

1.2 Domestication and foreignization-8

Chapter 2 The comparison on environment descriptions-10

Chapter 3 The comparison on characterization-13

2.1 Characterization and character dialogue-13

2.2 Character actions and character appearance-15

Chapter 4 The comparison on the translation of symbols-19

4.1 Symbolism-19

4.2 The eyes of Doctor T.J. Eckleburg-20

Chapter 5 Conclusion-23

References-24