英汉互译10-attributive clauses

Unit 10 Attributive Clauses
Of various English subordinate clauses, the attributive clause is perhaps the most complicated and therefore it always poses a hard nut for the translator to crack. This is either because of the disparity between English and Chinese syntax or because of their habitual modes of expressing the same idea in different ways. And here are some instances from the above Practical Translation Training:
▪The saga of the White Star Liner Titanic, which struck an iceberg and sank on its maiden voyage in 1912…
▪白星公司班轮泰坦尼克号在1912年的处女航中因撞上冰山而沉没的传闻轶事……▪… the railings where doomed passengers and crew members stood…
▪那些惨遭厄运的乘客和船员曾站过的栏杆旁……
▪…Marine Geologist Robert Ballard, 44, who led the teams from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution that found the Titanic last September…
▪……44岁的海洋地质学家罗伯特﹒巴拉德领导德伍兹霍尔海洋研究所科学探险队，该队于去年9月发现了泰坦尼克号……
▪… the 300-ft. gash that, according to legend, was torn in the Titanic’s hull
▪……传说中泰坦尼克船体上那条划破长达300英尺的裂缝
▪…the stern, which settled on the bottom almost 1,800 ft. from the bow, had swiveled 180 on its way down.
▪……船尾在下沉时旋转了180度，在海底距船首几乎有1800英尺远。

I．A Comparative Study of English and Chinese Attributive Structures
As some linguists have pointed out, an English sentence may be followed by an unlimited number of attributive clauses behind the word being modified, while a Chinese sentence allows only a limited amount of words preceding the word being modified. And eventually, there is no correspondence between their sentence structures. A comparative study of English and Chinese attributive structures helps us to bring this disparity to light.
1.This is the cat. 这就使那只猫。

2.This is the cat that killed the rat. 这就使那只捕杀了老鼠的猫。

3.This is the cat that killed the rat that ate the cake. ﹡这就是那只捕杀了偷吃了蛋糕的老
鼠的猫。

4.This is the cat that killed the rat that ate the cake that was put in the house. ﹡这就是那只捕
杀了偷吃了放在房间里的蛋糕的老鼠的猫。

5.This is the cat that killed the rat that ate the cake that was put in the house that Jack built. 这
﹡就是那只捕杀了偷吃了放在杰克修建的房间里的蛋糕的老鼠的猫。

Apparently, it’s impossible for a translator to put all the information into one Chinese sentence in the same sequence as in English. Thus, a readable Chinese version of the above English sentence 3, 4, 5 should be respectively like this:
3. 这就是那只捕杀了老鼠的猫。

老鼠偷吃了蛋糕。

4．这就是那只捕杀了老鼠的猫。

老鼠偷吃了放在屋里的蛋糕。

5．这就是那只捕杀了老鼠的猫。

老鼠偷吃了放在屋里的蛋糕。

屋子是杰克盖得。

Therefore, some specific methods are needed to tackle the problems in the translation of English attributive clauses.
II. Restrictive Attributive Clauses
Restrictive attributive clauses, which are characterized by the absence of a comma between the subordinate clauses and the principal clauses, are very closely related to the nouns or pronouns (also called antecedents) that they are modifying. The meaning of the complex sentence would not be complete unless the restrictive attributive clause is taken into consideration. Generally, the following three methods are used to translate restrictive attributive clauses.
1. Combination
This is the most common practice of translating English attributive clause that is not too long. In this case, an English restrictive attributive clause is embedded in the Chinese sentence with “…..的……”structure and directly placed before the words being modified (the antecedents). By combination, we have actually converted an English complex sentence into a Chinese simple sentence.
▪The people who worked for him lived in mortal fear of him.
▪在他手下工作的人对他怕得要死。

▪Pollution is a pressing problem which we must deal with.
▪污染是我们必须解决的一个迫切问题。

▪July and August are the months when the weather is hot.
▪七八月是天气很热的月份。

▪In the room where the electronic computer is kept, there must be no dust at all.
在存放电子计算机的房间里，不能有一点灰尘。

2. Division
Sometimes, an English sentence with a restrictive attributive clause is not too long or too complicated for the translator to take as a single sentence. In this case, we may divide it into two or several parts, placing the attributive clause after the principal clause to conform to the Chinese usage, repeating the antecedent being modified.
▪They are striving for the ideal which is close to the heart of every Chinese and for which, in the past, many Chinese have laid down their lives.他们正在为实现一个理想而努力，这个理想是每个中国人所珍爱的，在过去，许多中国人为了这个理想而牺牲了自己的生命。

▪Between these two particles, the proton and the electron, there is a powerful attraction that is always present between negative and positive electric charges. 在质子和电子这两种微粒之间有一个很大的吸引力，而这个吸引力总是存在于正、负电荷之间。

▪Newton invented a paper lantern illuminated by a candle which he carried with him to light his way to school on dark winter mornings. 牛顿发明了一只点蜡烛的纸灯笼，在昏暗朦胧的冬天早晨上学时带着灯笼照路。

Sometimes, however, we may translate a restrictive attributive clause without repeating the antecedent.
▪He managed to raise a crop of 200 miracle tomatoes that weighed up to two pounds each. 他种出了200个大得惊人的西红柿，每个重达两磅。

▪ A fuel is a material which will burn at a reasonable temperature and produce heat. 燃料时一种物质，在适当温度下等够燃烧并放出热量。

▪They worked out a new method by which production has now been rapidly increased.他们制定出一种新方法，采用之后已迅速提高了生产。

3. Mixture
By mixture here we mean combining the principal clause and the attributive clause into a single
Chinese sentence without any distinction. This method is usually adopted in translating English “there be…” structure.
▪There were men in that crowd who had stood there every day for a month. 在那人群中，有些人每天站在那里站了一个月。

▪There is a man downstairs who wants to see you. 楼下有人要见你。

▪Fortunately, there are some chemical fuels that are clean and smokeless.幸好有些化学燃料是洁净无烟的。

▪There are some metals which possess the power to conduct electricity and the ability to be magnetized.某些金属既能导电，又能被磁化。

Besides, there are some English complex sentences with a very simple principal clause, laying their emphasis on the attributive clauses. In this case, the principal clause may be condensed into the subject of a simple sentence, with the attributive clause as its predicate.
▪“We are a nation t hat must beg to stay alive,” said a foreign economist. 一位外国经济学家曾说过，“我们这个国家不讨饭就活不下去。

”
▪We used a plane of which almost every part carried some identification of national identity.
我们驾驶的飞机几乎每一个部件都有国籍的某些标志。

▪Good clocks have pendulums which are automatically compensated for temperature changes.
好的钟摆可以自动补偿温度变化造成的误差。

III. Non-Restrictive Attributive Clauses
Non-restrictive attributive clauses are characterized by a comma between the principal and the attributive clause. In comparison with restrictive attributive clauses, non-restrictive attributive clauses hold a loose relationship with the antecedents, functioning as a supplementary part in the sentence. In terms of translation techniques, there is no significant difference between these two kinds of attributive clauses. However, the method of division is adopted more frequently in translating non-restrictive attributive clauses than in translating restrictive attributive clauses, while the method of combination is just the other way around.
1. Division
Several methods of division are adopted in the translation of non-restrictive attributive clauses. Translating into Compound Sentence by Repeating the Antecedents
▪I told the story to John, who told it to his brother. 我把这件事告诉了约翰，约翰又告诉了他的兄弟。

▪Fine grains of dust can reflect blue light, which coarse grains of dust can not.微粒灰尘能反射蓝光，但粗粒灰尘却不能。

▪The process of combining with oxygen is oxidation, of which burning is one type. 与氧结合的过程就是氧化，燃烧就是其中的一种。

▪This is a college of science and technology, the students of which are trained to be engineers or scientists.这是一所科技大学，该校学生将被培养成工程师或科学工作者。

▪Translating into Compound Sentence by Omitting the Antecedents
▪After dinner, the four key negotiators resumed their talks, which continued well into the night.
饭后，四个主要谈判人物继续进行会谈，一直谈到深夜。

▪He saw in front that haggard white-haired old man, whose eyes flashed red with fury. 他看见前面那个憔悴的白发老人眼里闪耀着愤怒的目光。

▪This type of meter is called a multimeter, which is used to measure electricity.这种仪表称
为万用表，用来测电。

▪Electrons also flow in a television, where they are made to hit the screen, causing a flash of light.电子也涌入电视显像管，撞击荧光屏，产生闪电。

2. Translating into Independent Sentences
▪One time there was a violent thunderstorm, the worst I had ever seen, which obscured my objective.有一次是暴风骤雨，猛烈的程度实为我平生所仅见。

这场暴风雨遮住了我的目标。

▪Nevertheless the problem was solved successfully, which showed that the computations were accurate. 不过，问题还是圆满地解决了，这说明计算很准确。

▪One of the greatest promoters of structural organic chemistry around the turn of the century was Emil Fisher, who, as early as 1893, had already the structure of cellulose as a polysaccharide in mind. 在19世纪末和20世纪初之间，埃米尔﹒费希尔是结构有机化学方面最伟大的推动者之一。

早在1893年，他就认为纤维素的结构是聚糖。

3. Combination
Non-restrictive attributive clauses can also be translated by using the method of combination. This is the usual case when we try to avoid a loose structure and take coherence into consideration.
▪The sun, which had hidden all day, now came out in all its splendor. 整天躲在云层里的太阳，现在又光芒四射地露面了。

▪He liked his sister, who was warm and pleasant, but he did not like his brother, who was aloof and arrogant.他喜欢热情洋溢的妹妹，而不喜欢冷漠高傲的哥哥。

▪Prisms, which are made of glass, may be used to break up a beam of incoherent light. 用玻璃制的棱镜就可以分离非相干光束。

▪Transistors, which are small in size, can make previously large and bulky radios light and small. 采用体积较小的晶体管可以使先前那种大而笨重的收音机变得又轻又小。

IV. Attributive Clauses Functioning as Adverbials
Some attributive clauses (both restrictive and non-restrictive) function as the adverbial in the complex sentence, having a very close logic relationship with the principal clause and indicating the cause, result, purpose, time, condition, concession, etc.
1. Translating into Adverbial Clauses of Cause
▪You must grasp the concept of “work”which is very important in physics.你必须掌握“功”
的概念，因为它在物理学中很重要。

▪ A solid fuel, like coal or wood, can only burn at the surface, where it comes into contact with the air.煤或木材之类的固体燃料只能在外层表面燃烧，因为表面可以接触空气。

▪We know that a cat, whose eyes can take in many more rays than our eyes, can see clearly in the night. 我们知道，由于猫的眼睛比人眼能吸收更多的光线，所以猫在黑夜也能看得很清楚。

2. Translating into Adverbial Clauses of Results
▪Copper, which is used so widely for carrying electricity, offers very little resistance. 铜的电阻很小，所以被广泛地用来传输电力。

▪There was something original, independent, and heroic about the plan t hat pleased all of them.
这个方案富于创造性，独具一格，且很有魅力，因此他们都很喜欢。

▪The diode is coated with a thin layer of hard glass which eliminates the need for a hermetically sealed package. 二极管表面有一层薄薄的硬玻璃，故无需使用密封的管壳。

3. Translating into Adverbial Clauses of Concession
▪He insisted on building another house, which he had no use for. 他坚持要再造一幢房子，尽管他并无此需要。

▪The scientist, who was dog-tired, went on with the experiment. 那位科学家虽已筋疲力尽，但还是继续进行实验。

▪Electronic computers, which have many advantages, cannot carry out creative work and replace man. 尽管电子计算机有许多优点，但它们不能进行创造性工作，也不能代替人。

4. Translating into Adverbial Clauses of Condition
▪Men become desperate for work, any work, w hich will help them to keep alive their families.
人们拼命想得到工作，不管什么工作，只要能维持一家人的生活就行。

▪Any body that contains only atoms with the same general properties is called an element. 物质如果包含的原子性质都相同，则称之为元素。

▪For any machine w hose input and output forces are known, its mechanical advantage can be calculated. 对于任何机器来说，如果知其输入力和输出力，就能求出其机械效率。

5. Translating into Adverbial Clauses of Purpose
▪They have built up a new college here, where students will be trained to be engineers and scientists.他们在这里建了一所学院，以培养工程师和科学家。

▪I’ll try to get an illustrated dictionary dealing with technical terms, which will enable me to translate scientific literature more exactly.我要设法弄一本有插图的技术名词词典，以便把科学文献翻译得更准确。

▪We have to oil the moving parts of the machine, the friction of which may thus be greatly reduced.我们必须给机器的运动部件加润滑油，以使摩擦大大减少。

Reflections
Discuss the following questions:
1.What is the difference in structure between English and Chinese attributive clause?
2.What are the major methods of translating English restrictive attributive clauses?
3.What are the major methods of translating English non-restrictive attributive clauses?
4.What are the usual ways to translate English restrictive attributive clauses which function as
adverbials?
Put the following attributive clauses into Chinese.
1.For example, one function of friendship seems to fulfill is that it supports the image we have
of ourselves, and confirms the value of the attitudes we hold.
2.The first two must be equal for all who are being compared, if any comparison in terms of
intelligence is to be made.
3.Behaviorists, in contrast, say that difference in scores are due to the fact that blacks are often
deprived of many of the educational and other environmental advantages that whites enjoy. 4.They are striving for the ideal which is close to the heart of every Chinese and for which, in
the past, many Chinese have laid down their lives.
5.“In short”, a leader of the new school attends, “the scientific revolution, as we call it, was
largely the improvement and invention and use of a series of instruments that expanded the reach of science in innumerable directions.”
6.Anyone who thinks that rational knowledge need not be derived from perceptual knowledge
is an idealist.。