On Cultural Differences in Literary Translation

Abstract

Literary translation is a cross-cultural communication in the first place. Yet, a variety of problems arise from cultural differences in literary translation. The present paper will focus on the two major strategies: domesticating & foreignizing; and the concomitant methods free translation & literal translation for dealing with cultural problems in literary translation. Each strategy has its own merits and demerits which will be discussed respectively on the basis of the contrastive analysis of the two versions of Hongloumeng (《红楼梦》in the hope of a balance being stricken between them when we put them into practice.