On the Translation Strategies of Characters’ Nicknames—Taking The Iconography of the Decorated Writing-Paper of the Ten Bamboo Studio as an Example

Abstract

Up to now, The Iconography of the Decorated Writing-Paper of the Ten Bamboo Studio (shortened as Iconography ) is the first large-scale book to systematically study and interpret the notes and pictures of The Decorated Writing-Paper of the Ten Bamboo Studio (shortened as Ten Bamboo ). The Iconography explains the sources and interpretations of 123 paintings in 15 groups. The content covers the celebrities and historical allusions of Tessa in the past dynasties, in which there are many nicknames that are full of Chinese characteristics. This paper takes the English translation of characters’ nicknames in Iconography as the research object. Through the research, it is found that the translation of these characters’ nicknames mainly adopts the methods of transliteration, explanation, literal translation with annotations and free translation. Through the analysis of specific cases, this paper tries to make the translation meet the reading expectation of the target readers to the maximum extent, and provide reference for the English translation of related classical works.