Translation of Fairy Tales In “Children” from the Perspective of Translation Variation

Abstract

The essay analyzes the Chinese translation of fairy tales in the Children, a famous magazine in modern China, and tries to provide some suggestions for optimizing children’s reading materials translation. The fairy tales published in this magazine are highly readable for children and are equipped with strong sense of Chinese characteristics through applying the translation variation strategy. It can be revealed that this translation strategy is manifested in three aspects——title variation, structure variation and content variation which has imposed a great impact on children's reading experience. When it comes to children's books as well as fairy tales, the first impression of many children is Hans Christian Andersen's Fairy Tales rather than Chinese children’s books. Although excellent foreign cultures can broaden children's horizons, the translation without Chinese characteristics may not only create reading barriers for children but also weaken the presence of Chinese culture. Given that the innovative and localized Children was founded at a time when the East began to meet West and the content published in the magazine is of high quality with great influence on the literary enlightenment of children. Therefore, it’s worthwhile to study the Chinese translation of fairy tales in Children.