Natural language processing-based translating style research of two representative translating versions from data-driven methodology

As one of Chinese famous classical works, Hongloumeng has been translated by different languages and accepted by most scholars in the world. At present, there are two famous translating versions which are broadly accepted since their translations are loyal and closely related to source text, and translators are married couple of Yang Hsien-yi, Gladys and British translator Hawks. In order to comprehensively study characteristics of these two translating versions, this paper applies corpus search software Antconc 3.2.1w to study translating characteristics of vocabulary, syntax and context so as to make comparative analysis and deeply understand their translating characteristics. Based on above analysis, this paper discovers that Yang Hsien-yi and Gladys prefer literal language and their translation is more loyal to source text but it is difficult for western readers to deeply understand the content. However, in terms of Hawks’ translation, it is widely accepted by western readers because of its colloquial language but the content is less loyal to source text than Yang Hsien-yi and Gladys’ translation.