Translation Features of Chinese Version of Emily Dickinson’s Poetry Selection Final Harvest

Abstract

Final Harvest(1996) is the first and only Chinese translation of Emily Dickinson’s poetry selection of 576 poems, Final Harvest(1961). Using Antconc software and program written in python language, a statistical analysis of relevant data of stanzas, lines, punctuation marks, transliterated words and conjunctions in translated version and original book is conducted, to reveal translation features of the translation. It is found that the translation deviates slightly from the original in terms of stanza, line and punctuation, yet there are obvious deviations from the original in translation of transliterated words and conjunctions in that a large number of transliterated words are not annotated with footnotes or given explanation, and original logical relation displayed by conjunctions are often distorted or missing in translation. In general, the faithfulness of the translation to the original is mainly manifested in poetic form rather than in content.