Modern Social Science Research

This study employs a close reading method to examine the culture-loaded words translation style, narrative style, and annotation style related to the fox spirits in the five stories such as The painted Skin, Grace and Pine, The Merchant’s Son, The Laughing Girl, Lotus Fragrance from Chinese classic “Liao Zhai Zhiyi (Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio)” as translated by Herbert Giles and John Minford. The findings reveal that Giles’ translation predominantly adopts a foreignization strategy, retaining features of Chinese pinyin in the translation of culture-loaded words for fox spirits, which is conducive to the dissemination of Chinese. In contrast, Minford’s translation primarily utilizes a domestication strategy to dig deep into the Chinese elements behind the name of the foxes, presenting the deeper meanings embedded in the names to Western readers. Regarding narrative style, Giles’ version falls slightly short in character development due to less precise action descriptions when compared to Minford’s translation, finally impact the completeness of the narrative of fox stories in Giles’ version. In terms of annotations, Gile’s translation places greater emphasis on analyzing the cultural background and historical context of fox spirits due to the limitation of the conservative social morality of the Victorian Age, while Minford’s version, published in the 21st century, focuses more on the emotional and psychological changes of the fox spirits.

Liao Zhai Zhiyi; Fox story; Translator style; Culture-loaded words; Narrative; Annotation