Problems in the English Translation of Folk Classics from the Perspective of Cross-Cultural Communication and Possible Solutions

Abstract

Folk classics concentrate a nation's collective memory and aesthetic temperament, and their English translation is itself an important medium of cross-cultural communication. For cross-cultural communication, translating a folk classic is not a simple transfer between languages; it also involves conveying cultural meaning, reconstructing historical context and reconciling aesthetic form. This paper looks into the reasons why English translations of folk classics often fall short, examines how cultural difference, aesthetic disparity and contextual complexity affect the comprehension and reception of a translated text, and proposes remedies through translation strategy, translator competence and multimodal dissemination. It argues that a successful English translation of a folk classic should serve two goals at once, cultural preservation and effective communication, since only then can such a text travel into other cultures. Both the analysis and the proposed remedies are grounded in specific points of translation, namely culture-loaded words, rhetorical forms and historical context, so as to show how source-cultural information may be retained, explained and compensated for in English.