A Comparative Study of Two English Versions of Kong Yiji from the Perspective of Functional Equivalence Abstract Among various translation theories and principles, the theory of functional equivalence is one of the most famous and popular translation theories. It has well solved dispute between "literal translations" and "liberal translation" has been on for long. Nida His functional equivalence focuses on "the response of the receptor"， thinking that the function of language in translation much more important than merely perusing the form equivalence.60570

In light of Nida's theory of functional equivalence, this thesis makes a comparative study of the two English versions of Kong Yiji. Through analysis of a number of examples from three perspectives: word, sentence and discourse, the study tries to find out whether the closest natural equivalence has been achieved in the two versions and try to discuss the features in literal translation.

Keywords： functional equivalence; comparative study; literary translation

功能对等视角下《孔乙己》两英译本比较研究

摘  要在众多翻译理论中，功能对等理论无疑是最有知名度并且广受欢迎的理论之一。功能对等理论对于长久以来关于“直译”和“意译”的讨论作出了合理的解释。奈达的强调原文读者和译文读者对等的心里翻译，认为语言最重要的是要起到功能对等的作用，而非只追求形式上的对等

本文从奈达功能对等理论的视角，对于《孔乙己》两英译本进行对比分析。通过从词，句和语篇进行译文例子的分析译本是否实现了功能对等，是否达到了功能对等并且从中发现文学英译的特征。

毕业论文关键词：功能对等；对比分析；文学翻译

Contents

1. Introduction 1

2. literature review 2

2.2 Lu Xun and his novel Kong Yiji 4

2.2.1 About Lu Xun 4

2.2.2 About Kong Yiji 5

2.3 Researches on English version of Kong Yiji 5

3. A Comparative Study of Two English Versions of Kong Yiji 6

3.1 In the level of words 6

3.2 In the level of sentence 9

3.3 In the level of discourse 11

4. Conclusion 13

References 14

1. Introduction

1.1. Aims of the research

Among various translation theories and principles, the theory of functional equivalence is one of the most famous and popular translation theories. It has great significance and has been discussed constantly. As it known to all, the dispute between "literal translation" and "liberal translation" has been on for long. In China, people used to focus on traditional translation theories before the 1980s when Nida's functional equivalence theory was presented by scholars. 

Eugene A. Nida , one of the translation theorists with great impact on China, put forward a theory called "dynamic equivalence", which was changed into "functional equivalence" latter. In his representative work The Theory and Practice of Translation, Nida defines translation as “translating consists in reproducing in the receptor language the closest natural equivalent of source-language message, first in terms of meaning and secondly in terms of style” (Nida, 1969). He focuses on the response of the receptor rather than the form of the text (Taber&Nida, 2004). That means the translation criterion is according to the comparison between the understanding of the target readers and that of the original readers. Nida's theory of functional equivalence shifts from the form of the message to the response of the receptor, providing a completely new way to evaluate translation. The one that can arouse the same response from its target readers as the original readers is the closest natural equivalent translation.