Abstract:
In recent years, China’s cultural and entertainment industry has been thriving, and many works of mystery themes have charmed many in the audience. Affected by this, the publishing industry has paid more attention on mystery novels.
Leonardo Sciascia is a famous Italian novelist, essayist, and politician. He was born in a small town on Sicily in 1921. Sciascia gathers materials from surroundings to depict Sicilian customs, uses acute words to expose the crime of the Mafia, satirizes the incompetence of the government and ugly ethos of the society.
Therefore, I choose to translate Sciascia’s short mystery novel A Simple Story into Chinese. The story starts with a phone call received by the police at the night, and then a seemingly simple case of “suicide”, an unfinished sentence, a famous painting that has been missing for many years and reappeared... The novel is inspired by real stories and is short in length, very fluid, easy to understand, while the plot is fascinating. These can attract more readers.
This thesis is divided into three parts: the first part introduces the author’s life, works and writing style, and analyzes the writing background of the novel; the second part is the translation of A Simple Story; the last part is a detailed analysis of the novel, the strategies used in the translation process and reasons, as well as the difficulties encountered.
This thesis aims to broaden the knowledge of translation theory and improve literary translation ability in practice by completing the translation of the novel. At the same time, it tries to make Chinese readers notice Sciascia and his works, thereby triggering their interest in Italian mystery novels and literature.
