Syntax and Translatability.

This paper discusses the relationship between syntax and translatability, particularly in respect of literary texts. By translatability is meant the degree of ease with which one language lends itself to translation into another language. Through practice in the translation between Chinese and some of the major European languages, such as English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Latin, and Greek, as well as between the European languages themselves, it can be found that translating between the European languages is much easier than translating between Chinese and any one of the European languages. Of all the factors that determine whether a language translates more readily or less readily into another language, syntactic differences constitute one of the most decisive. This is because the translator is, during the translation process, constantly dealing with syntax in two directions: the syntax of the source language on the one hand and the syntax of the target language on the other. As a result, problems arising from the syntactic differences between the two languages are bound to figure more prominently than those arising from the differences between individual lexical items and phrases or between cultures. In this paper, syntax will be studied and analysed with reference to Chinese, English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Latin, and Greek texts. Finally, it will be shown that, mainly because of syntactic differences, there is a higher degree of translatability between any two of the above European languages (which are members of the Indo-European family) than between Chinese (which is a member of the Sino-Tibetan family) and any one of these European languages, and that the syntax of any one of these European languages can cope comfortably with Chinese syntax, but not the other way round. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]