译者的任务中英版本.doc

In the appreciation of a work of art or an art form, consideration of the receiver never proves fruitful. Art, in the same way, posits mans physical and spiritual existence, but in none of its works is it concerned with his response. No poem is intended for the reader, no picture for the beholder, no symphony for listener.在欣赏艺术品或者艺术形式的时候，接受者的思考一般都是没有结果的。同理，艺术就是人生理和心理的存在，任何艺术作品都不会理会人的反应。任何诗歌都不是为了读者而作、任何美术都不是为了观赏者而作，任何交响乐也不是为了听者而作。Is a translation meant for readers who do not understand the original? For what does a literary work “say”? What does it communicate? It “tells” very little to those who understand it. Its essential quality is not statement or the imparting of information. Yet any translation which intends to perform a transmitting function cannot transmit anything but information-hence, something inessential. This is the hall mark of bad translations. But do we not generally regard as the essential substance of a literary work what it contains in addition to information-as even a poor translator will admit-the unfathomable, the mysterious, the “poetic,” something that a translator can reproduce only if he is also a poet? This, actually, is the cause of another characteristic of inferior translation, which consequently we may define as the (p. 15) inaccurate transmission of an inessential content. This will be true whenever a translation undertakes to serve the reader. However, if it were intended for the reader, the same would have to apply to the original. If the original does not exist for the readers sake, how could the translation he understood on the basis of this premise?那么翻译是为了那些不懂原文的读者所为么？一个文学作品又是为谁而作呢？对于那些理解他的人而言，他“讲”的很少。他的基本功能不是陈述、也不是传达信息。但是，任何试图履行传递功能的翻译除了信息以外，不能传达任何其他的东西而信息却是无关紧要的。这就是糟糕的翻译的一种标志。但是对于那种蕴含除了信息以外更多东西的文学作品，即便是一个蹩脚的译者也会承认，那种讳莫如深、那种深不可测、那种诗情画意，只有译者本人也是一位诗人，才可能予以复制，而这不才是文学作品最基本的东西么？实际上，这就是那些次等译作的又一特征，我们因此可以进将其定性为对非本质内容的错误表达。如果一个译者为了取悦读者而作的时候，这种情况尤其为甚。然而，如果翻译是为了读者，那么这一观点同样可以适用于原文本。假若原文本不是为读者而作，那么他所理解的翻译却为何要为读者而作呢？Translation is a mode. To comprehend it as mode one must go back to the original, for that contains the law governing the translation: its translatability. The question of whether a work is translatable has a dual meaning. Either: Will an adequate translator ever be found among the totality of its readers? Or, more pertinently: Does its nature lend itself to translation and, therefore, in view of the significance of the mode, call for it? Analogously, the translatability of linguistic creations ought to be considered even if men should prove unable to translate them. Given a strict concept of translation, would they not really be translatable to some degree? The question as to whether the translation of certain linguistic creations is called for ought to be posed in this sense. For this thought is valid here: If translation is a mode, translatability must be an essential feature of certain works.翻译是一种方式。要理解这种方式，就要回到原文考察。因为原文有约束翻译的规则：可译性。一篇作品是否可译有双重含义。一者：在所有的读者当中，是否有完全合格的译者？另者：这个作品本身是否需要翻译，也即，从这种方式内涵看，是否需要？或者可以这么说，即便是有人证实了不能翻译这些作品，但是这些言语产物的可译性仍需要斟酌。因为翻译有一个严谨的概念，所以他们是不是在某种程度上不可译？因此，一种言语产物是否需要翻译，必须提出这个问题。因为这种思路在此是合理的：如果翻译是一种方式，那么可译性就是某些作品的基本特征。Translatability is an essential quality of certain works, which is not to say that it is essential that they be translated; it means rather that a specific significance inherent in the original manifests itself in its translatability. It is plausible that no translation, however good it may, can have any significance as regards the original. Yet, by virtue of its translatability the original is closely connected with the translation; in fact, this connection is all the closer since it is no longer of importance to the original. Just as the manifestations of life are intimately connected with the phenomenon of life without being of importance to it, a translation issues from the original-not so much from its life as from its afterlife.可译性是某些作品的基本内在。这不是说这些作品应该被翻译，而是说在原文内核中天生了一种特别的意义，并表现为可译性。这样说起来比较绕口了，其实任何翻译不管它有多完美，都不可能和原文相媲美。但是，由于具有可译性，原文就和翻译密切相关；实际上，这种相关性非常密切，其重要性甚至胜于原文。生命表征对于生命现象没有那么重要，但二者却内在相关，翻译来源于原文就如生命表征来源于生命，而不是来源于后世。For a translation comes later than the original, and since the important works of world literature never find their chosen translators at the time of their origin, their translation marks their stage of continued life. The idea of life and afterlife in works of art should be regarded with an entirely unmetaphorical objectivity. Even in times of narrowly prejudiced thought there was an inkling that life was not limited to organic corporeality.因为译作晚于原作，因此从没有哪个世界文学在他们原创时期就已经选好了译者，译作标志着原作生命的延续。这种艺术作品中的生命与后世思想应该完全是一种非隐喻的客观存在。即便受那种极端狭隘的思维禁锢，也会有人会认为生命绝不仅是肉体的机理存在。The concept of life is given its due only if everything that has a history of its own, and is not merely the setting for history, is credited with life. In the final analysis, the range of life must (p. 16) be determined by history rather than by nature, least of all by such tenuous factors as sensation and soul. The philosophers task consists in comprehending all of natural life through the more encompassing life of history. And indeed, is not the continued life of works of art far easier to recognize than the continual life of animal species? Translations that are more than transmissions of subject matter come into being when in the course of its survival a work has reached the age of its fame. Contrary, therefore, to the claims of bad translators, such translations do not so much serve the work as owe their existence to it. The life of the originals attains in them to its ever-renewed latest and most abundant flowering.只有事物具备自身的历史，而不是作为历史的环境存在时，事物才具备了生命，真正具备了生命的概念。最后，生命的范围不是因为其生命的特征，更不是那些站不住脚的感知和心灵，生命是由历史决定的。哲学家有责任通过更具包容性的历史生命来理解自然生命。实际上，艺术品生命的延续不是比动物种群的生命延续更清晰么？当一部作品在大浪淘沙中存留下来，并具备一定声名之后，这些不单单是传递主观信息的翻译就该出现了。因此，对于那些水平低下的译者而言，这种翻译不是为了作品而作。原作在译作中获得新的声名，并得以发展。Being a special and high form of life, this flowering is governed by a special, high purposiveness. All purposeful manifestations of life, including their very purposivenesss, in the final analysis have their end not in life, but in the expression of its nature, in the representation of its significance. Translation thus ultimately serves the purpose of expressing the central reciprocal relationship between languages. It cannot possibly reveal or establish this hidden relationship itself; but it can represent it by realizing it in embryonic or intensive form. As for the posited central kinship of languages, it is marked by a distinctive convergence. Languages are not strangers to one another, but are, a priori and apart from all historical relationships, relationships, interrelated in what they want to express.正因为这是一种特殊的高级生命形式，其发展壮大自然必然具有特殊、高级的目的性。生命中所有有目的的表征，包括他们的目的性，都有目标，这些目标不是在生命中，而是表现在自然中，表现在他们意义的表达过程中。因此，翻译最终就要服务于语言之间的中心相互关系。翻译本身可能不会表露或者建立这种隐性关系；但是可以通那种初期的或者简约的形式来表达这种关系。语言间的那种明显的融合性质就可以看出那种核心的亲缘关系。不同的语言之间绝不是像陌生人之间的那种关系，而是在他们的表达中相互关联的的关系，这些关系具有历史性，但是又区分于历史中的其他关系。(back to traditional translation theory)If the kinship of languages is to be demonstrated by translations, how else can this be done but by conveying the form and meaning of the original as accurately as possible? To be sure, that theory would be hard put to define the nature of this accuracy and therefore could shed no light on what is important in a translation. Actually, however, this kinship of languages is brought out by a translation far more profoundly and clearly than in the superficial and indefinable similarity of two works of literature.（回到传统的翻译理论）如果语言之间的这种亲缘关系要通过翻译来表现，那么如果不能把原作的形式和意义精确的进行传递，又怎么能够表达这种亲缘关系呢？进一步而言，这种理论对于精确性的定义就很困难，因此对于翻译重要性的界定也就缺乏了依据。实际上，通过翻译而呈现的这种语言之间的亲缘关系意义深远而明确，绝对不是两种语言下的文学作品之间的那种表面的、无法定义的类同。To grasp the genuine relationship between an original and a translation requires an investigation analogous to the argumentation by which a critique of cognition would have to prove the impossibility of an image theory. There it is a matter of showing that in cognition there could be no objectivity, not even a claim to it, if it dealt with images of reality; there it can be demonstrated that no translation would be possible if in its ultimate essence it strove for likeness to the original. For in its afterlife, the original undergoes a change. Even words with fixed meaning can undergo a maturing process. The obvious tendency of a writers literary style may in time wither away. (p. 17)为了把握真正的原作和译作之间的关系，需要一个论证过程。这个论证类似于通过认知的批评来证明意象理论的不可能性。有一种情况表明，如果是要表达现实的意象，在认知过程中就不存在客观性，甚至不能表现出客观性。如果翻译的最终目的是努力做到与原作类同，那么翻译就是不可能的。因为在一个作品的来世中，原作发生了变化。即便意义固定的词语也需要成熟的过程。作家那些明显的写作风格也会随着时间而消逝。What sounded fresh once may sound hackneyed later; what was once current may someday sound quaint. And even if one tried turn an authors last stroke of the pen into the coup de grce of his work, this still would not save that dead theory of translation. For just as the tenor and the significance of the great works of literature undergo a complete transformation over the centuries, the mother tongue of the translator is transformed as well. While a poets words endure in his own language, even the greatest translation is destined to become part of the growth of its own language and eventually to be absorbed by its renewal. Translation is so far removed from being the sterile equation of two dead languages that of all literary forms, it is the one charged with the special mission of watching over the maturing process of the original language and the birth pangs of its own.那些曾经鲜活的东西总有一天会腐烂，那些曾经流行的东西也会过时。即便是作者刚刚收笔，就马上对其作品进行翻译，试图保持其作品的风姿，也不能拯救那种了无生机的翻译理论。随着岁月的流逝，那些伟大的文学作品的意义已经发生了完全的改变，译者的母语也在发生了同样的变化。即使最伟大的译作是为了把原作转化为译语语言，并最终获得新生，原作也只有在他母语中才能永生。翻译不是对文学形式上的两种已经没有生命的词汇进行无意义的对等操作，翻译的使命是观察源语的成熟发展过程、完成自身诞生之痛。If the kinship of languages manifests itself in translations, this in not accomplished through a vague alikeness between adaptation and original. It stands to reason that kinship does not necessarily involve likeness. Wherein resides the relatedness of two languages, apart from historical considerations? Certainly not in the similarity between works of literature or works. Rather, all suprahistorical kinship of languages rest in the intention underlying each language as a whole-an intention, however, which no single language can attain by itself but which is realized only by the totality of their intentions supplementing each other: pure language.如果翻译体现了两种语言之间的亲缘关系，而不是通过原作和改编本之间的模糊相似来实现，那么就有理由认为，亲缘关系不一定要相似。那么除了对两种语言的历史性思考，他们的相似性又在何处呢？肯定不是文学作品或者艺术作品上的相似。不同语言所有的超历史亲缘关系都在于每种语言整体上的指向性，这种指向性不是单一语言本身可以实现的，而是其语言各种要素指向性的相互补充形成一个整体：纯语言。While all individual elements of foreign languages-word, sentences, structure-are mutually exclusive, these languages supplement one another in their intentions. Without distinguishing the intended object from the mode of intention, no firm grasp of this basic law of a philosophy of language can be achieved. The words Brot and pain “intend” the same object, but the modes of this intention are not the same. It is owing to these modes that the word Brot means something different to a German than the word pain to a Frenchman, that these words are not interchangeable for them, that, in fact, they strive to exclude each other.各种外语中的个别要素，包括词汇、句子、结构等，都是相互独立的，这些语言在指向上相互补充。如果不能将指向方式和指向受体相互区分的话，那么就真正把握这个语言哲学的基本规律。词语“brot”和“pain”都指向相同的受体，但是他们的指向方式却不一样。由于指向方式的区分，德国人理解的Brot和法国人理解的pain指向是不一样的，因此他们之间也不能互换，实际上他们之间是互斥的。As to the intended object, however, the two words mean the very same thing. While the modes of intention in these two words are in conflict, intention and object of intention complement each of the two languages from which they are derived; there the object is complementary to the intention. In the individual, unsupplemented languages, meaning is never found in relative independence, as in individual words or sentences; rather, it is in a constant state of flux-until it is able to emerge as pure language from the harmony of all the various modes of intention. Until then, it remains hidden in the language. If, however, these languages continue to grow in this manner until the end of their (messianic) time, (译者漏译了messianic一词) it is translation which catches fire on the eternal life of the works and the perpetual renewal of language. Translation keeps putting the hallowed growth of (p. 19) languages to the text: How far removed is their hidden meaning from revelation, how close can it be brought by the knowledge of this remoteness?但是对于指向受体来说，这两个词语的意义却完全是一回事。尽管这两个词语的指向方式相互冲突，但是从两个词语的语言方面来看，他们的指向和指向受体是互补的，指向受体是指向行为的补充。而对于个体而言，没有补充的语言，在相对独立的状态下没有意义，就如个体的词语和句子一样。其实词语是一直处于变动状态的这种变动会持续到通过不同指向方式达到一种和谐状态，成为一种纯语言为止。至此，意义隐藏于语言当中。如果这些语言继续按照这种方式发展到他们的弥撒亚（救世主）时代，翻译就负责点燃作品的永恒之火，并使这种语言得到永远的复生。翻译始终支撑着文本中语言成长的神圣使命：公开语言的内在隐含意义还要多久，拉近这种知识的距离还有多难？ Although translation, unlike art, cannot claim permanence for its products, its goal is undeniably a final, conclusive, decisive stage of all linguistic creation. In translation the original rises into a higher and purer linguistic air, as it were, in a singularly impressive manner, at least it points the way to this region: the predestined, hitherto inaccessible realm of reconciliation and fulfillment of languages. This transfer can never be total, but what reaches this region is that element in a translation which goes beyond transmittal of subject matter.虽然翻译不能像艺术那样要求产品的永恒，但是他们的目的却是结论性的、决定性的语言作品。在翻译的过程中，原作被以一种非常特别的方式，或者努力做到，被提升到一个更高的高度、更纯净的境地：先验的，语言间无法调和和实现。这种转换永远都是不完全的，但是翻译中达到这个层次的是翻译中那些超越了主题转换的元素。Even when all the surface content has been extracted and transmitted, the primary concern of the genuine translator remains elusive. Unlike the words of the original, it is not translatable, because the relationship between content and language is quite different in the original and the translation. While content and language form a certain unity in the original, like a fruit and it skin, the language of the translation envelops its content like a royal robe with ample folds. For it signifies a more exalted language than its own and thus remains unsuited to its content, overpowering and alien. This disjunction prevents translation and at the same time makes it superfluous.即便是表层的所有内容都已经分解出来，并且进行了转换，真正的译者的主要困惑仍然会是不明确的。和原作中的词语不同，这些东西是不可译的，因为内容和语言之间的关系与原作和译作之间的关系大相径庭。在原作中，内容和语言实现了某种的统一，就想水果和皮一样，但是译作的语言对其内容的包装就想黄袍一样，层层叠加。这就是因为和原作相比，译作使用的语言总会画蛇添足，也就会让这种语言相对于内容言过其实，貌合神离。这种断裂就限制了翻译，使翻译显得多余。For any translation of a work originating in a specific stage of linguistic history represents, in regard to a specific aspect of its content, translation into all other languages. Thus translation, ironically, transplants the original into a more definitive linguistic realm since it can no longer be displaced by a secondary rendering. The original can only be raised there anew and at other points of time.对于语言史中某一阶段某一作品的翻译，特别是其内容的某一方面，都表明它可以被翻译成任何其他的语言。因此可笑的是，翻译就是把原作移植到一个冯家明确的语域中，但是次等翻译就做不到这样的移植。原作只有在另一个时间点可以提升到那个新的高度。The task of the translator consists in finding that intended effect Intention (p. 19) upon the language into which he is translating which produces in it the echo of the original. Unlike a work of literature, translation does not find itself in the center of the language forest but on the outside facing the wooded ridge; it calls into it without entering, aiming at that single spot where the echo is able to give, in its own language, the reverberation of the work in the alien one. The intention of the poet is spontaneous, primary, graphic; that of the translator is derivative, ultimate, ideational. If there is such a thing as a language of truth, the tensionless and even silent depository of the ultimate truth which all thought strives for, then this language of truth is-the true language. And this very language, whose divination and description is the only perfection a philosopher can hope for, is concealed in concentrated fashion in translations. There is no muse of philosophy, nor is there one of translation.译者的任务就是到达到这种指向效果，从而让他翻译的语言能够和原作产生共鸣。和文学不同的是，译作发现自己并不是处于语言森林的中心，而是在外面，面对着树林的边缘。文学翻译，但是不需要它进入到文学，其目的就是要让翻译处于某一独立的位置，能够用译入语产生共鸣就可以了，这种共鸣就是原作在一个外语环境下的混响。创作诗歌的目的是无意识的、原始的、绘画式的。译者的目的也是派生的，嗣后的，意念化的。如果有一种真理语言，所有的思想孜孜以求的终极真理都毫无压力、静置其中，那么这种真理语言就是纯语言。这种语言的预言与描述是一个哲学家所希望的唯一的一种完美叙述，这样的语言以一种聚合的方式存在于翻译当中。没有静思的哲学，也没有静思的翻译。Indeed, the problem of ripening the seed of pure language in a translation seems to be insoluble, determinable in no solution. The traditional concepts in any discussion of translations are fidelity and license-the freedom of faithful reproduction and, in its service, fidelity to the word. These ideas seem to be no longer serviceable to a theory that looks for other things in a translation than reproduction of meaning. To be sure, traditional usage makes these terms appear as if in constant conflict with each other. What can fidelity really do for the rendering of (p. 20) meaning?实际上，翻译中纯语言的种子成熟问题看起来是不可实现的，注定没有解决办法。传统上对翻译的讨论限定在忠实和自由忠实复制的自由，在其服务上，忠实于词语。如果某种理论中翻译不仅仅是对意义的复制，而是要追求其他东西，那么上述这些思路就不符合要求了。肯定的是，一直以来这些术语看起来好像一直是相互冲突的。如何在对意义的翻译中做到真正的忠实？Fidelity in the translation of individual words can almost never fully reproduce the meaning they have in the original. For sense in its poetic significance is not limited meaning, but derives from the connotations conveyed by the word chosen to express it. We say of words that they have the emotional connotations. A literal rendering of the syntax completely demolishes the theory of reproduction of meaning and is a direct threat to comprehensibility.对单个词语的翻译几乎不能实现对这个词在源语中意义的复制。诗词中的那种感觉绝不仅限于意义，这种感觉来自于用来表达这个感觉的那个词语的内在含义。我们说具有情感内涵。对句法的直译完全破坏了意义复制理论，而且是对可理解性的一种直接威胁。The nineteenth century consider Hlderlins translations of Sophocles as monstrous examples of such literalness. Finally, it is self-evident how greatly fidelity in reproducing the form impedes the rendering of the sense. Thus no case for literalness can be based on a desire to retain the meaning. Meaning is served far better-and literature and language far worse-by the unrestrained license of bad translators. Of necessity, therefore, the demand f