From the language barrier to artistic unity: A systematic approach to translating Anton Chekhov’s “Th e Chameleon” into Chinese

Abstract

The artistic features of Anton Chekhov’s literary language — imagery, conciseness, humor, satire, and comic effects — serve as essential tools for creating artistic images. In the theory and practice of literary translation, a particularly complex challenge lies in overcoming linguistic and cultural barriers to authentically convey these aesthetic characteristics. As noted by French translation theorist Antoine Berman, deformation is a universal feature of all translations, reflecting the resistance of the target language and culture to elements of the source text. To address this challenge, while acknowledging the relative autonomy of translation, the translator must undertake systematic reconstruction at the lexical, syntactic, and cultural levels, thereby preserving the artistic qualities of the original work and achieving comparable aesthetic resonance in the target culture. Based on Chinese translations of Chekhov’s short story “The Chameleon”, the study demonstrates how micro-level translation strategies interact within a unified artistic system.