Abstract

It is known to all that a title of literature is an indispensable part of a novel, which highly generalizes a novel's deep meaning and reflects its content as well as creation intention of the author. What influences the readers' first impression is mostly the title of the works. However, it is not an easy task to translate novel titles. We may meet with some difficulties during the process of translation. Owing to some reasons, the novel titles translation is different from others. Many good translated novel titles can be widely accepted by people while some others cannot.

Therefore, different from the previous research, based on the problems in novel title translation, this paper is to discuss the effective methods of translating English novel titles from the skopos theory, aiming to improve translation skills.

Keywords: the skopos; novel titles translation; translation methods

Contents

Abstract

摘要

1. Introduction-1

2. About Novel Titles-2

2.1 Novel Titles-2

2.2 Functions of Novel Titles-2

2.3 Some Problems of Translation of Novel Titles-3

3. The Skopos Theory-4

3.1 Three Rules of the Skopos Theory-4

3.2 Significance of the Application of the Skopos Theory to Novel Titles Translation-5

4. Translation Methods-6

4.1 Literal Translation-7

4.2 The Combination of Literal Translation and Explanation-7

4.3 Liberal Translation-8

4.4 The Combination of Literal Translation and Liberal Translation-9

4.5 Two Wrong Translation Tendencies-11

5.Conclusion-12

Works Cited-14