On the English Translation of Song Ci-Poetry under the “Three-Level Poetry Translation Criteria” – A Case Study of “Green Jade Table: Lantern Festival”

As one of the quintessences of Chinese literature and culture, Song ci-poetry has unique artistic appreciation values. Taking Dr. Wang Feng’s “Three-Level Poetry Translation Criteria” as the theoretical basis, the article analyzed eight English translations of “Green Jade Table: Lantern Festival” by Michael Farman, Xu Yuanchong, Chu Dagao, Xu Zhongjie, Yang Xianyi and Gladys Yang, Liu Guoshan, Zhang Bingxing, and Gong Jinghao, regarding their linguistic, cultural and poetic reproduction of the original ci-poem. The analysis showed that the English translation of Song ci-poetry should take the “Three-Level Poetry Translation Criteria” as a guiding principle to ensure the reproduction of the poetic conception and artistic beauty of the Chinese ci-poetry to help the Chinese traditional literature and culture to go global.

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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The datasets used in this study are openly available at [repository link] and the source code is available on GitHub at [GitHub link].