英语流行歌曲翻译中的问题与处理

本科毕业论文
题目：英语流行歌曲翻译中的问题与处理
学院: 外国语学院
专业: 英语
学号: 200914118093
学生姓名: 张迪
指导教师: 朱明炬
日期: 2013年5月26日
摘要
因其独特的文学价值和音乐价值，歌曲被普遍认为是一种特殊的艺术形式，具有很高的审美价值，能够提供给观众以享受。

近年来,一大批优秀的英语流行歌曲已经涌入中国，然而巨大的语言障碍阻止许多中国歌迷欣赏这些音乐，也构成一种中西方之间文化交流的障碍，所以英语歌曲的汉译是极其重要的。

遗憾的是，在中国，歌曲翻译一直被忽略很久。

翻译理论和实践在这一领域发展非常不成熟。

歌曲都是在几乎没有任何理论或原则的指导下翻译的，因此，许多翻译歌曲的歌词旋律和节奏失去原始的审美价值，有些英语原创歌曲经翻译后甚至完全无法歌唱。

本文经过分析得出，英语流行歌曲汉译存在“文化差异”、“词义确定”、“特殊语气翻译”、“过度异化或归化”和“美感丧失”等翻译困难或难题，针对这些问题，文章提出了“合理处理韵律”、“保持句读一致”、“保持音节数一致”、“保持功能对等”四条翻译原则和“直译”、“意译”和“改译”等翻译方法。

关键词：翻译；英语流行歌曲；问题；处理
Abstract
With its unique literary value and musical value, song is widely acknowledged to be a special form of art, which possesses great aesthetic value and offers the sense of enjoyment to audience. In recent years, a great number of excellent English pop songs have been introduced into China; however, the existence of the huge language barrier prevents a great many Chinese fans from appreciating these songs and also constitutes an obstacle to the cultural exchanges between China and the west. So, the work of translating English songs into Chinese is extremely important. Regrettably speaking, in China, song translation has long been ignored and the translation theory and practices in this field are very immature. Songs tend to be translated almost without the guidance of any theory or principle, and as a result, many translated songs lose the original aesthetic value in lyrics, melody and rhythm; besides, still more are not even singable because they do not match the original music.
After careful analysis, this paper concludes that the problems of translation of pop songs from English into Chinese are mainly “cultural differences”, “identification of the meaning”, “translation of special tone”, “overforeignization or overdomestication” and “having no sense of beauty”. To solve these problems, it is suggested that the “reasonable processing of the rhythm”, “in accordance with the original structure”, “b eing polysyllabic”, and “functional equivalen ce”should be followed as translation principles and “literal translation”, “free translation”and “adapting translation” may be employed as translation methods.
Key words: translation; English pop songs; problem; solution
Contents
1 Introduction (1)
2 Problems in the Translation of Lyrics of English Pop Songs (2)
2.1 Understanding of the Lyrics (2)
2.1.1 Cultural Differences (2)
2.1.2 Identification of the Meaning (3)
2.2 Expression in Translation (5)
2.2.1 Translation of Special Tone (6)
2.2.2 Overforeignization or Overdomestication (6)
2.2.3 Having no Sense of Beauty (7)
3 Solutions for the Translation of Lyrics of English Pop Songs (9)
3.1 Principles for Song Lyrics Translation (11)
3.1.1 Reasonable Processing of the Rhythm (11)
3.1.2 In Accordance with the Original Structure (12)
3.1.3 Being Polysyllabic (13)
3.1.4 Functional Equivalence (13)
3.2 Common Methods (15)
3.2.1 Literal Translation (15)
3.2.2 Free Translation (15)
3.2.3 Adapting Translation (16)
4 Conclusion (16)
Bibliography (18)
Acknowledgements (20)
Problems in the Translation of Lyrics of English Pop
Songs and Solutions
1 Introduction
With its unique literary value and musical value, song is widely acknowledged to be a special form of art, which possesses great aesthetic value and offers the sense of enjoyment to audience. In recent years, a great number of excellent English pop songs have been introduced into China; however, the existence of the huge language barrier prevents a great many Chinese fans from appreciating these songs and also constitutes an obstacle to the cultural exchanges between China and the west. So, the work of translating into Chinese English songs is extremely important. Regrettably speaking, in China, song translation has long been ignored for and the translation theory and practices in this field are very immature. Songs tend to be translated almost without the guidance of any theory or principle, and as a result, many translated songs lose the original aesthetic value in lyrics, melody and rhythm; besides, still more are not even singable because they do not match the original music.（廖志阳，2008）In light of this situation, we should first identify what problems exist between English pop songs and listeners. Before that, we are supposed to know what English pop songs are and how they emerged and blossomed. Pop song, or definitely speaking, pop music, is a kind of music that often borrows elements from other music styles including urban, dance, rock, Latin and country and is professionally produced and packaged, the goal of which is to be pleasurable to listen to rather than to have much artistic depth. The term “pop song”is first recorded as being used in 1926, in the sense of a piece of music having popular appeal. Throughout its development, pop music has absorbed influences from most other genres of popular music. Early pop music drew on the sentimental ballad for its form, gained its use of vocal harmonies
from gospel and soul music, instrumentation from jazz, country, and rock music, orchestration from classical music, tempo from dance music, backing from electronic music, rhythmic elements from hip-hop music, and has recently appropriated spoken passages from rap.（佚名，2013）Now, wherever you are, you can easily see pop music (MTV), listen to pop music (voice of songs), think of a piece of pop music (melodies or lyrics) and sing up pop music (songs).(Nord, 2001)
Since reform and opening up, a great number of English pop songs have come into China to appeal to the Chinese youth. However, because of the differences of culture and language and the ability of translating English songs into Chinese, there are some problems in the translation of lyrics of English pop songs. (Nida, 2001)
2 Problems in the Translation of Lyrics of English Pop Songs
2.1Understanding of the Lyrics
Understanding is the premise of translation. The difficulty of understanding is mainly derived from the following aspects:
2.1.1 Cultural Differences
Translation is to render from one language into another. It is well-known that there is a very close relation between language and culture. People in different cultures have different ways of thinking. Sometimes the same thing in different cultures may have opposite associative meaning. Let us see some lyrics in Sting’s “Fields of Gold”:
See the West wind 看西风吹过
Move like a love song 像首爱的歌
Upon the fields of barely 轻抚广阔的原野
Feel her body rise when you kiss her mouth 当你吻她的双唇会感到她的渴望West wind in the Chinese’s eyes is cold and dry, and people always do not expect
its coming. But in this song Sting praises “her” with enthusiasm. If the translator is not familiar with British culture, he will feel confused and have difficulty in translating. Because of geographical location, west wind in Britain is warm and moist just like spring breeze in China, (Nida, 1993) always makes a person feel warm and cordial. Just like this verse, there are a lot of praising poetries of west wind in Britain. However, if “west wind” is literally translated into “西风”, which is more likely to keep its cultural connotations, the Chinese readers will not know that “west wind” in Britain is mild. For another example, in Andy Williams' “Moon River”: “Two d rifters, / off to see the world. / There is such a lot of world to see, /we’re after the same rainbow’s end.”“Rainbow’s end” literally means “the end of the rainbow”, but it has its cultural meaning. In western legend, the gold can be dug at the end of the rainbow. Combined with the background of this song, it is the episode of the film “Breakfast at Tiffany”, which is a rural girl’s story of striving for the life of high society. So the last sentence should be translated as “we look for treasure together”. If “the end of the rainbow”is literally translated, readers will not be able to understand its actual meaning. (周芳, 2009)
2.1.2 Identification of the Meaning
Word is the most active and most basic element in the language. Those who had some experience of lyrics translation often have such feeling: understanding of a certain word may be the key to the understanding of the whole text. What's more, the vocabulary and grammar of English language are totally different from those of Chinese, sometimes making identification of words’ meaning quite difficult. （罗慧，2005）
Firstly, there’s the extended meaning. Michael Baton sang: “Said I love you, /but I lied” in one of his songs. “L ie” is meant to cheat, but it would never mean this here, Baton is not to say that “love”. Having experienced the feeling of the singers, one will understand it as: I want to say I love you, but failed to express my love bravely and clearly. Therefore, that “lie” is translated as “S peech is not fluent” is more appropriate.
(Brown, 2004)
Joe Cocker sang a song named “Out of the Blue”, some lyrics of which are: “Out of the blue. / Out of this love for you”. “Blue” in English represents sad and depressed, and here “Out of the blue” should be translated as “forgetting sadness.” To translate well, the translator must be fully aware of the extended meanings of words or phrases. If the translator can’t see the implied meaning of words, the translation won’t be accurate and it can even be puzzling. （胡凤华，2007）
Secondly, there is the question of the existence of several meanings in a single word. English words often have multiple meanings, so in translation that which meaning should be selected sometimes is not clear. Michael Jackson sang a song called “Jam”. “Jam”has the meaning of “trouble”. The lyrics in songs say: “The Nation to Nation, /All the world, /Must last come together and Face the problems, /That we see, /Then maybe somehow we can work it out, / I asked my neighbor, / For a favor, /She said later, /What has last come of, /All the people”. “P roblems” is easy to make people think of trouble. If we translate like this, the “Jam”seems to be a negative song. But it looks like that Michael does not want to give a person this kind of feeling. In the MTV, many people of different skin colors are playing basketball in a warm atmosphere. From the context, it can be said that what Michael wants to express is: people all over the world through basketball get together to solve common problems. “Jam”in English also means “Slam Dunk”, so here it had better be translated as “Slam Dunk”. Thirdly, slang and colloquialism can be a problem. There are a lot of slang words in English, which are hard to be translated correctly without full and correct understanding. In “Seasons in the Sun”:“Goodbye Papa please pray for me, I was the black sheep of the family”. If “black sheep” is translated into “sheep in black”, how strange it will be. “Black” is the color of mourning. “Black sheep” has the meaning of “spendthrift”, so it should be translated as “败家子”.（何高大、陈水平，2009）Besides, frequently-used and non-standard expressions are also difficult to understand. There are some English words which are not standard but commonly used. Such as in Sinned O Connor's song called “Nothing Compares 2 U”, there are some
lyrics like this: “Since U took your love away”and“Cos Nothing Compares 2 U”. U = you here, or U=to you. Even though it is unreasonable, it is lively and interesting. “2 Bad” in “History” in Michael Jackson’s album had better not be translated into “two Bad guys”. In fact 2 Bad = Too Bad. This kind of lazy writing also reflects the characteristics of American black culture. “Bad” in American slang has the meaning of “great”. Here “2 Bad” should be “so great”. （陈历明，2010）
Last but not least, flexible syntax in English is also a problem. English has such flexible syntax. Attributive, for example, can be word, phrase, or clause, and it can be at the front or rear. For another example, in order to make the sentence concise or avoid repeating, parts of the sentence in English are often omitted or changed into a pronoun. Because of the melody, the need of cooperating with rhythm and the characteristics of spoken language in the English songs, the form of expression is more flexible and hard to identify.（吕锴，2011）Many years ago Celine Dion sang the theme song of “Titanic”---“My Heart Will Go On”. The first three sentences of lyrics are “Every night in my dreams, /I see you, / I feel you, /that is how I know you go on”. They were translated into “夜夜在我梦中，看见你，感受你，我的心仍为你悸动”. The first two sentences mean that Rose and Jack live in Rose’s dream every night, s howing that the first sentence: “Every night is in my dreams” is omitted. But from below “That is how I know you go on”, “Far across indicates the short, And Spaces betwee n us, you have to show you go on”, especially “Once more you open, /And feel you are here in my heart”, Rose is clearly to say: Jack travelled through time and space, came into Rose’s dream, opened the door, right here, in “my” heart. So “in my dreams” is the rear attributive for “Every night”, and in translation it should be put to the front. The three sentences are suggested to be translated as:“在我梦中的每个夜里，见到你，感受你，所以我知道你并未远离。

”（谢玲琍，2011）
2.2 Expression in Translation
Due to the differences between English and Chinese languages, although translators often understand the meaning of English words, it is not easy for them to
find the equivalent Chinese expressions. Difficulty exists in the following aspects:
2.2.1 Translation of Special Tone
Eric Clapton, after his son unfortunately died, with endless love, created a song named “Tears in Heaven”, which has such touching lyrics:
Would you know my name if I saw you in heaven?
Would it be the same if I saw you in heaven?
This is a subjunctive sentence pattern, showing the singer’s infinite thought of love to her son and helplessness for the death of his dead son. If the translation is:“如果我在天堂遇见你，你还记得我的名字吗? 如果我在天堂遇见你，我们还能像从前一样吗?”, then the effect of this deep meaning of the expression will greatly be reduced. So the translation can be like this: “如果我真的在天堂遇见你，你还会记得我的名字吗？如果我真的在天堂遇见你，我们还能像从前一样吗?”
2.2.2 Overforeignization or Overdomestication
Translation is the art of “choice”. The translator faces the choice of foreignization and domestication from beginning to end in the process of translation. Domestication and foreignization are translation methods complementing each other. To complete the task, the translator must make good use of foreignization and domestication. The translator should strive to maximize cultural foreignization, and use the method of domestication on the “pure language level”. Anyone wanting to translate successfully should learn to skillfully use these two methods. However, going too far is as bad as not going far enough and a balance should always be struck between the two methods. For example, “The tower of Babel” is an English idiom, which means “castle in the air”. If we translate this idiom into Chinese “巴别塔”，it will be regarded as “overforeignization”; on the other hand, when it comes to one of Adele’s song named “Someone like You”, some Chinese translators who are in favor of Chinese so much explain the name as “另寻沧海”，which is Greek to most of English people and some Chinese people. This gets stuck in over domestication.
Neither overforeignization nor overdomestication shows that translators are partial to one language which they love.
2.2.3 Having no Sense of Beauty
For any kind of music, its melody matters most. We cannot enjoy the beauty of a song from its lyrics alone. We need to feel the whole emotion in one song. In the process of translating English pop songs, it is very important for the translators to give full attention to the rhythm of the song. Even though a translator does not overforeignize or overdomesticate, if he simply conveys necessary information between two languages, his work will not be successful. Let us take a song named “Someone like you” for an example:
I heard, that you settled down.已闻君，诸事安康。

That you, found a girl and you married now.遇佳人，不久婚嫁。

I heard that your dreams came true.已闻君，得偿所想。

Guess she gave you things, I didn't give to you. 料得是，卿识君望。

Regardless of the effect of overdomestication, let us see how many Chinese words there are in the translation. “I heard, that you” is translated into “已闻君”, that is to say, four English words have been changed into three Chinese words. If listening to the same rhythm, we hardly sing up this song in Chinese lyrics. In general, Chinese language attaches importance to its meaning, while simplifying its form. But English language usually is supposed to be structured and organized simply on the basis of making it heard and understood. Meanwhile, every author writes an article or a book to express his thought sentence by sentence. That is to say,every translator should pay attention to formal beauty of the translation. Every translator should do his translating work to convey the author’s idea sentence by sentence. So, translators need to follow the structure and form of the original text where possible to exactly track the idea. As Tan Kai says, there should be three beauties in E-C song translation in light of translation aesthetics: formal beauty in TAO (translation aesthetic object), non-formal beauty in TAO (translation aesthetic object) and beauty from the TAS (translation
aesthetic subject).Aesthetic constituents in Translation Aesthetic Object (TAO) are divided into formal system and non-formal system. The former refers to the external beauty reflected in sound, lexis and syntax, etc. whereas the latter is the internal beauty embodied in the emotion, idea, image and symbol of the source text. As for Translation Aesthetic Subject (TAS), the translator suffers from passivity imposed by the restrictions of the source text，but he can also rely on his initiative of aesthetic feeling, knowledge, capacity and tenacity to overcome the difficulties and produce excellent translations. (谭凯, 2011)
Here is an example:
Going home, going home, 回故乡，回故乡，
I am going home我要回故乡，
Quiet like some still day, 风浪静，天晴朗
I am just going home我要回故乡
It is not far, just close by不遥远，在近旁
Thro' an open door. 道路已通畅。

In the lyr ics, it is better to translate “home”into “家”rathe r than “故乡”。

Because “going home”is a two-word phrase, but “回故乡”is a three-word phrase. And this could meet the demand of formal beauty in TAO.
Lastly, to a high degree, artistic conception is of great importance.The artistic conception deals with the artistic world engendered in the process of artist’s creation and reception. It shows a beautiful world where the artist wants to convey his idea. There are some views that artistic conception must be someplace where the artist describes his life or dream, but in more cases, artistic conception may be somewhere the artist’s life or dream lies. Easily speaking, artistic conception is not the result of adding the scene and emotion but the scene of the emotion. So in this sense, creating artistic conception is the art of combining scene and emotion. There are three types of expr essions in artistic conception. The first type is “scene hiding the emotion”. F or this type, the author hides his true emotion in the scene where he does not directly express his any feeling but describes a lifelike image, often making his emotion felt
rather stronger, like “Hotel California”:
On a dark desert highway 在漆黑荒凉的高速公路上
cool wind in my hair 凉风吹散了我的头发
Warm smell of colitis 科里塔斯温热的气息
rising up through the air 在空中袅袅上升
Up ahead in the distance 抬头极目远方
I saw a shimmering light 我看见微微闪烁的灯光
As we all can see from these sentences, the author lets his heart be felt by objective correlative (desert highway, cold wind, warm air and shimmering light).
The second type is “emotion hiding the scene”. F or this way of creating artistic conception, the author directly speaks his emotion and mind without describing the scene. Therefore, we can find the lifelike scene just within sight. Let us see this: Old friend and，why are you so shy都老朋友了，干嘛那么害羞
It aim’s like you to hold back or hide from the lie一点都不像你，好像你在掩饰谎言
l hate to turn up out of the blue uninvited我不想出其不意不请自来
But I couldn’t stay away, I couldn’t fight it但是我无法逃避，无法抗拒
I'd hoped you'd see my face我希望你能看到我的脸.
The translator expresses the true feeling in a succinct tone and shows us a world where history and reality intersect and universe and life blend. (彭晓寒, 2012) The third type is “emotion paralleling the scene”.In fact, this type is the integration of the above two ways. Now that we know what major problems are in the E-C translation of English pop songs, then we have to try to solve. Above all, the standard of translation matters most.
3 Solutions for the Translation of Lyrics of English Pop Songs
“Do Re - Mi”is a song from the musical play “The Sound of Music”. “The Sound of Music” is based on the autobiography Singers of the Top Family premiered
in New York in the United States in 1959, and won the 14th Tony Award for Best Musical Play in 1960.“Do Re - Mi” with its cheerful rhythm, beautiful melody and appealing lyrics became popular with people all over the world, especially children. The original lyrics are as follows:
Doe — a deer, a female deer
Ray — a drop of golden sun
Me — a name I call myself
Far — a long, long way to run
Sew — a needle pulling thread
La — a note to follow “sew”
Tea — a drink with jam and bread
And that will bring us back to [doe]
There are two popular translations in China:
Version One Version Two:
“哆”是一只小母鹿do 好朋友多呀多
“来”是一束儿阳光re 来来呀来唱歌
“咪”是称呼我自己mi 他脸上笑眯眯
“发”是路程远又长fa 要发出光和热
“嗦”是穿针又引线so 能栓住门和窗
“啦”就跟在“嗦”后面la 是用力往回拖
“梯”是茶点味道香xi 那太阳往西落
然后再把哆来唱回头我们又唱do
Supporters of the two translations cannot agree on which translation is better. Some people think that the first translation belongs to literal translation and is more faithful to the original text, showing respect for the original text, while some others think that the second one is better, because it is more loyal to Chinese readers and easily accepted by readers. Then how can we to evaluate the two translations objectively? Here we explore the principles and methods for translation of English songs.
3.1 Principles for Song Lyrics Translation
The standard of song’s translation is variable, and the quality of the translation has no fixed standard. Even so, the ways of translation should depend on the specific situation. In addition, the aesthetic level of the audience is restricted by the social environment. Translators should improve the second creation according to the characteristics of the audience and the songwriting. Although there are more variables of song’s translation, that doesn't mean there is no principle for song’s translation to observe. In general, these four principles should be followed in song’s translation: The first one is “fidelity”. T his is the basic principle of translation, and song’s translation is no exception. Translation should as far as possible keep the original style, structure and writing style. The second is naturalness: the translator in the translation should comprehensively consider the word order of the original song, the range of melody and other characteristics, to make the music sound natural. The third is “elegance”: due to the difference between songs and other music forms, the song’s translation should aim to show comprehensive beauty from the interaction of lyrics and melody and the aesthetic feeling conveyed by the song. The last is “vocalization”: In song's translation, it requires that the translators should do the translation in a way that the translated lyrics will match the melody of the original song. (廖志阳，2007)
3.1.1 Reasonable Processing of the Rhythm
Rhythm is vital for songs or translation, and almost every song lyric has its own rhythm. Rhyme can make the lyrics more attractive and bright. The rhyming pattern of English lyrics is roughly divided into “abab”, “aabb”, “aabccb”, “abba” and “abc abc”. The rhyming pattern of “Do Re - Mi” is basic “ababcdcd”. In addition, for this song, the writer usually adopts open sound as its rhythm, because open sound sounds loud and clear, and for the singer is better to express the feelings. Modal particles generally don’t have to rhyme, because light modal particles need to be read, and if they are stressed, they can lead to ambiguity. One of the main rhymes in “Do Re - Mi”
is accent {aη}. In terms of English song translation, generally speaking, those that can be translated according to the original rhyme should keep the original rhyme, maximally keeping the original style of the translated version. But if keeping the original rhyme is hazardous to emotional expression, some songs change frequently in rhyme. From this perspective; two translations did not use the original rhyme. The following is a translation with the original one of the main rhyme {aη}: “哆”是母鹿多欢畅，
“来”是一束儿阳光。

“咪”是称呼我自己，
“发”是路程远又长。

“嗦”是穿针引线忙，
“啦”就在“嗦”的后方。

“梯”是茶点味道香，
然后我们再把哆来唱。

（倪艳笑、王慧娟, 2010）
3.1.2 In Accordance with the Original Structure
Lyrics translation is basically a translation of sentence, meaning it is not only faithful to lyrics, but also the melody of the song. The first and the second translations given above reflect this point very well. But there are often long sentences in English lyrics or poetry: One line is more than one sentence and even sometimes a word can span several lines. However, for Chinese poetry a line is a relatively complete independent sentence. Therefore, we advocate for sentences translation, aiming to prevent incorrect expression of the original. If it does not interfere with the original idea, we can also make partial adjustment to the order of the sentence. The following is an example:
Life is old there, older than the trees.
生命成长如一阵清风，
Younger than the mountains, growing like a breeze.
比那树林古老，比那群山年轻。

According to the order of the original text, the translation should be: 生命比那树木古老，比那群山年轻，成长如一阵清风. Obviously, after adjusting the order, the expression accords with Chinese habit of expression more. (Cronin, 2003)
3.1.3 Being Polysyllabic
The words of Chinese translation should be consistent with the English original in the number of syllables. While a Chinese word has only one syllable (except for its special sound), English words can be made up of one or more than one syllable. English songs have syllables as the unit and a syllable corresponds to one or a few music notes. And in translation we should follow the pattern of English and the corresponding notes to determine the number of Chinese characters and words to keep the rhythm and style of the original text unchanged. The first and the second translation basically have followed the principle. For example:
Doe --, a deer, a female deer
“哆”是一只小母鹿，
We say, the number of words in Chinese translation, in principle, should be equal to that of syllables in English, but sometimes in some cases, we can make some adaptations. For example, such unstressed function words as“的”,“得”,“儿”, “了”, “将”, “把”, “也”, “又” and “着” can also be used to fill in the blank of a sentence, or to display a special flavor. For example:
Ray, a drop of golden sun
“来”是一束儿阳光。

3.1.4 Functional Equivalence
In the process of lyrics translation, sometimes we will meet the following situation: Because of the difference in habits, expression, thoughts, perspective, and habits between English and Chinese, after translating sentence by sentence, translation gets obscure. This situation requires the translator to do major changes to the narrative angle of view or even the central idea after understanding the original thought in the
translation of the original form of expression, which is proposed by Nada’s “functional equivalence” or “dynamic equivalence”, namely, the translation should be of the “closest natural equivalent of the original (刘重德, 2003:160). The first translation, though, is faithful to the original content, but Chinese readers who have not studied general English don't understand the relationship between “duo”and “mother deer”. Especially while being taught the song, children will feel puzzling, and lose interest. But the problem is solved in the second translation, and the form of expression has been changed. Although the content is very different from the original, the function is equivalent to the original songs. Of course, this does not mean that the first translation is poor. When readers translators face to have a good knowledge of English, such translation is preferable to them. To sum up, English songs translation should pay attention to the translation of oriented object, to make the translation reader’s response to the translation be the same as the original readers’ response to the original.
There are roughly two steps in the translation of songs. Lyrics’ translation is the first step, and the second is to make the well translated lyrics match the original melody of the song. The former aims to convey the meaning of the original song through the translation of the lyrics; the latter determines the quality of the translation of the song, the operating success of which largely depends on the translator’s literary accomplishment and music accomplishment. Therefore, in many newspapers and magazines, we can see that the lyrics translator is someone and the compiler is someone else. Usually, the translator of the lyrics knows how to convert primitive lyrics into the target lyrics, but he knows little about music; whereas, by contrast, the compilers know all about music, but they know little about translation. So, the translation of a song often needs two people to work together. In this way, a problem may come out: the translation of song largely depends on the quality of the compiler’s understanding of the translation of the lyrics. If he can according to the characteristics of the original songs make some necessary, flexible adjustments and match the translated lyrics with the original melody, then the foreign song’s translation can be。