Research on the Reproduction of Original Text Style in the English Translation of Chinese Architectural Aesthetics

Abstract

Chinese architectural aesthetics, imbued with profound philosophical thought, cultural connotations, and artistic spirit, sees its English translation as a vital component of China's "going global" strategy for culture. However, the significant disparities between Chinese and Western thinking patterns, aesthetic systems, and linguistic structures pose a core challenge: how to accurately convey the aesthetic essence and unique style of the original text in the translation. This paper aims to systematically investigate the issue of style reproduction in the English translation of texts on Chinese architectural aesthetics. It focuses on the stylistic features of such texts at the lexical, syntactic, rhetorical, and textual levels, and the challenges encountered during cross-cultural transfer. By constructing an integrated analytical framework encompassing "Linguistic," "Cultural," and "Aesthetic" dimensions, this study selects English translations of classical and contemporary architectural texts, such as The Craft of Gardens and Chinese Architecture: Art and Artisanship, for detailed comparative case analysis. The findings reveal a trend in style reproduction strategies, shifting from a dominance of "domestication" towards a balance between "foreignization" and "compensation." Successful translations manage to preserve the poetic quality, ambiguity, and philosophical depth of the original texts within the acceptability limits of the target readers, through creative use of English lexicon and syntax, flexible handling of culture-specific terms, and skillful transplantation of rhetorical imagery. The study concludes that the reproduction of style in translating Chinese architectural aesthetics is a dynamic and creative process of "rewriting," whose ultimate goal is to achieve cultural fidelity and aesthetic equivalence, rather than mechanical word-for-word correspondence. This research holds theoretical and practical significance for enhancing the quality of translating Chinese architectural culture and deepening the dialogue between Chinese and Western architectural aesthetics.