A Study on the Translation Strategies of Beijing Opera’ s Songs from the Perspective of Stylistics—The Case of the English Version of Farewell My Lady

Abstract

Stylistics is a discipline that examines the characteristics and nature of text genres and their governing principles, closely related to various fields. While stylistics has a long research history in other countries, it has only gained traction in China over the past few decades. Despite the emergence of multiple schools of thought, research on the integration of stylistics with specific disciplines remains in its early stages. From a stylistic perspective, translating Beijing Opera songs and lyrics is a complex and challenging task. It requires translators to accurately convey linguistic information while considering factors such as musicality, cultural connotation, character features, and performance style of Beijing Opera. Therefore, in the process of translation, translators must employ various strategies, such as domestication and foreignization, to achieve optimal translation outcomes. This paper discusses the translation strategies of Beijing Opera lyrics, taking ‘English Translation Series of a Hundred Beijing Opera Classics (First Series) - Farewell My Lady’ as an example, examines the translation strategies of Beijing Opera lyrics from the vocabulary and syntax levels, and combines them with the characteristics of Beijing Opera songs and lyrics.