Translation of Culture-Loaded Words in the Ci-Poem Turn of Zui Hua Yin From the Perspective of Meaning in Semantics

Abstract

Ci-poetry holds an important position in spreading Chinese literature and cross-cultural communication. It contains many culture-loaded words and because of this, the accurate translation of the meaning becomes a barrier during Ci-poetry rendering. This thesis is conducted from the perspective of the theory of meaning stated by Jeffery Leech in Semantics and selects Turn of Zui Hua Yin written by Li Qingzhao, a female poet in Song Dynasty, as a case study, placing its culture-loaded words into three categories according to the differences of their conceptual and associative meaning in Chinese and English cultures. Then, in each category, this thesis comparatively analyses the translation of the culture-loaded words in four English versions from Xu Yuan-zhong, Ding Zuxin, Kenneth Rexroth, and Gong Jinghao, and finally concludes proper translation methods and merits and demerits of each version at this point.