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1. The Concept of Comprehension
Whenever you get an article to translate， you’d better read it through to the end， so as to get a general idea of the whole piece----this is the process of comprehension. Comprehension is the critical prerequisite of translation. To native Chinese people， the difficulty in comprehending English language and representing it into Chinese language can not be mentioned in the same breath. These two languages not only have differences on the aspects of morphology and syntax， but also in the ways of thinking， culture and custom etc. So it has tremendous trouble of understanding thoroughly every word， phrase， sentence and paragraph， let alone the gist of the whole text. Good dictionaries are absolutely needed， including not only English-Chinese dictionaries， but also English-English dictionaries. New words have to be looked up in dictionaries； words which are new to you may have new meanings in a certain context. When you begin translating the piece， the sentence structure must be made clear to you， that is to say， make a clear grammatical analysis of each sentence， long sentence in particular. However， a thorough understanding of the sentence structure is not enough. You are also required to make sure of the exact meaning of the words. No context， no text. Sometimes from the context， the meaning of a word may be figured out.
2. The Concept of Representation
Representation is the crucial process of the successful transformation from the original text to the target language， which calls for appropriate and fluent expression. The representation is good or bad， faithful and expressive or not， mainly depending on four factors： the first is the depth of the translator’s understanding to the original text； the second is his level of Chinese language； the third is his accurate grasp of the two cultures， histories and local customs； the fourth rests on whether he can actually discard the bondage of the original text to organize his words and sentences closely to it and facilely carry on translation according to Chinese rules and patterns. Some people hold the viewpoint that translation is much easier than writing， which is totally wrong. ③Mr. Lu Xun ever said， “我向来总以为翻译比创作容易，因为至少是无须构思。但到真的一译，就会遇到疑点，譬如一个名词或动词，写不出，创作时候可以回避，翻译上可不成，也还想，一直弄到头昏眼花。好像在脑子里摸一个急于要开箱子的钥匙，却没有”（摘自《题未定》草）④Yan Fu also pointed out ， “一名之立，旬月踯躅”. So it is clearly that the representation is really hard. Jia Dao ，a well-known poet in Tang Dynasty， had ever deliberated on the comparison between “僧推月下门” and “僧敲月下门”，which spent a lot of time and energy of him. I think we can learn something from him. What’s more， the representation should be faithful to the content， coherent in the style and precise in the collocation， without any ambiguity.
Whenever you get an article to translate， you’d better read it through to the end， so as to get a general idea of the whole piece----this is the process of comprehension. Comprehension is the critical prerequisite of translation. To native Chinese people， the difficulty in comprehending English language and representing it into Chinese language can not be mentioned in the same breath. These two languages not only have differences on the aspects of morphology and syntax， but also in the ways of thinking， culture and custom etc. So it has tremendous trouble of understanding thoroughly every word， phrase， sentence and paragraph， let alone the gist of the whole text. Good dictionaries are absolutely needed， including not only English-Chinese dictionaries， but also English-English dictionaries. New words have to be looked up in dictionaries； words which are new to you may have new meanings in a certain context. When you begin translating the piece， the sentence structure must be made clear to you， that is to say， make a clear grammatical analysis of each sentence， long sentence in particular. However， a thorough understanding of the sentence structure is not enough. You are also required to make sure of the exact meaning of the words. No context， no text. Sometimes from the context， the meaning of a word may be figured out.
2. The Concept of Representation
Representation is the crucial process of the successful transformation from the original text to the target language， which calls for appropriate and fluent expression. The representation is good or bad， faithful and expressive or not， mainly depending on four factors： the first is the depth of the translator’s understanding to the original text； the second is his level of Chinese language； the third is his accurate grasp of the two cultures， histories and local customs； the fourth rests on whether he can actually discard the bondage of the original text to organize his words and sentences closely to it and facilely carry on translation according to Chinese rules and patterns. Some people hold the viewpoint that translation is much easier than writing， which is totally wrong. ③Mr. Lu Xun ever said， “我向来总以为翻译比创作容易，因为至少是无须构思。但到真的一译，就会遇到疑点，譬如一个名词或动词，写不出，创作时候可以回避，翻译上可不成，也还想，一直弄到头昏眼花。好像在脑子里摸一个急于要开箱子的钥匙，却没有”（摘自《题未定》草）④Yan Fu also pointed out ， “一名之立，旬月踯躅”. So it is clearly that the representation is really hard. Jia Dao ，a well-known poet in Tang Dynasty， had ever deliberated on the comparison between “僧推月下门” and “僧敲月下门”，which spent a lot of time and energy of him. I think we can learn something from him. What’s more， the representation should be faithful to the content， coherent in the style and precise in the collocation， without any ambiguity.