《紅樓夢》의 색채어 번역 - 靑色을 중심으로

Abstract

The translation of color term is known to be extremely difficult, even impossible when it comes to a literal translation due to the inherent linguistic and cultural differences among ethnic groups. In the case of A Dream of Red Mansions, which contains a great number of color term, the difficulty of translation is aggravated. The following paper focuses particularly on the translation of ‘compound words of the Color Category Qing(靑) of Chinese Language’ as they are not only difficult to do rough translation of but are also often subject to mistranslation. ‘Qing(靑)’ is the most ambiguous color term and it expresses a diverse range of colors. Since ancient times, it expressed blue, navy, and black. Some scholars even contend that it expresses white and gray. Therefore, it is incredibly difficult to recognize exactly what kind of color is referred to by ‘Qing(靑)’ in context and then correctly translate the words. The difficulty the translator faced when translating the color term ‘Qing(靑)’ in A Dream of Red Mansions stems from both polysemy and ambiguity. In ordre to fully grasp the polysemy and ambiguity which ‘Qing(靑)’ entails, then present paper identified the essential meaning of ‘Qing(靑)’ and traced changes its meaning to different periods. In addition, the paper also attempts to identify compound words of the Color Category Qing(靑) and classify them into categories, which in turn would be compared and analyzed with different translations in English, Japanese, and Korean, as well as translations in Chinese Korean Language. In this way, mistranslation, translation with omission, and other limitation that the translator was unable to resolve are indicated. It is hoped that this discussion contributes to lay a foundation for the revision and modification of the translation of compound words of the Color Category Qing(靑) and provide some reference when resolving issues of the translation of color terms of A Dream of Red Mansions in the future.