翻译漫谈：新闻翻译【1】

原文

The last two months have seen some astonishing bidding in auctions of Chinese treasures.

Record after record has fallen away as newly wealthy collectors from mainland China have piled into salerooms in London, New York and Hong Kong, anxious to bring home their imperial cultural patrimony.

The market for Chinese art works has strengthened considerably over the past five years, and the high prices have drawn out a number of masterpieces from old collections in Europe and America.

However, there is a danger of sellers becoming over-confident, even greedy.

A close examination of some of the lots that have achieved record prices since early October shows that success cannot be taken for granted.

译文及评析

The last two months have seen some astonishing bidding in auctions of Chinese treasures.

近两个月来，中国文物拍卖会上出现一些惊人的投标。

这里很好地处理了month see 的关系，英文中这类“无生物主语”是比较难翻译的。astonishing的意思不准确，只是“惊人”，而没有表达出“令人吃惊的高价”。另外bid翻译为“投标”不妥当，拍卖会上只有“出价”和“竞价”，没有“投标”。

Record after record has fallen away as newly wealthy collectors from mainland China have piled into salerooms in London, New York and Hong Kong, anxious to bring home their imperial cultural patrimony.

来自中国大陆的新富豪收藏家们急于把他们帝国的文化遗产带回家，在伦敦、纽约和香港的拍卖厅创造了一个又一个新记录。

原文强调的是“新记录不断产生”，意思是承接上文的“令人吃惊的高价”，将“一个又一个”放在句末，切断了这种承接关系；piled into的意思没有翻译出来，imperial cultural patrimony翻译为“帝国的文化遗产”不够准确，中文里较少用“帝国的”指中国，用“帝制”、“王朝”更多。

The market for Chinese art works has strengthened considerably over the past five years, and the high prices have drawn out a number of masterpieces from old collections in Europe and America.

近五年来，中国艺术品市场已经大大加强，高昂的价钱也吸引了欧美老收藏家们的一批杰作。

“加强”不准确的，而且搭配不当，没有“市场加强”的说法，strengthen可翻译为“巩固“、”繁荣“；“高昂”不能用来形容“价钱”，只能用来形容“成本”、“代价”；“吸引”来翻译drawn out不够准确，没有“引发现身”的意思；collections不是“收藏家”。

However, there is a danger of sellers becoming over-confident, even greedy.

然而，卖家有可能过于自信，甚至贪婪。

这里没弄懂原文的意思，danger完全没翻译出来，而且译文不通顺，要重新整理。

A close examination of some of the lots that have achieved record prices since early October shows that success cannot be taken for granted.

一份10月以来的记录调查显示，成功并不是理所当然的。

close examination的close没有翻译出来，archived record prices没翻译出来，“成功”的意思太空泛，读者不知道“成功”在这里指什么；另外，如果译文不是在当年发表，应注明“10月”为“xx年10月”。

总评

这是一篇典型的新闻报道，用语简单，意思明确。这类短文章一般不会有太高的翻译难度，只要译者能够足够耐心细致，都可以完成。

这篇译文有个很大的问题，就是采用了很多“中性”的词语来翻译，模糊了原文中明确的意思。比如“令人吃惊的高出价”就成了“令人吃惊的出价”，“（市场的）巩固和繁荣”变成了“加强”，“成功拍卖”变成了孤零零的“成功”。其结果就是，译文传递的信息远不如原文清楚鲜明。