An Analysis of the Chinese Version of Lin Hua’s “From Dawn to Decadence” from the Perspective of Contextual Adaptation Theory

Based on the perspective of contextual adaptation theory, this paper studies the Chinese translated book “From Dawn to Decadence” by American writer Jacques Barzun, translated by Lin Hua. With the framework of contextual cohesion, intertextuality, and sequencing under the linguistic contextual adaptation, and adaptation in the physical world, social world, and mental world under the communicative contextual adaptation, this paper analyzes the original text and the translated text comparatively, to give an explanation how the theory works in each aspect and thus the merits and problems of Lin’s translated version. Then this paper probes into how to use contextual adaptation theory to guide the translation of social science culture and literature and provide some suggestions. This article argues that Lin Hua’s translation in the above six aspects still has improvement in adapting and coordinating the cultural differences between Chinese and English. Translation should conform and adapt to the original language and the original culture, as well as the target culture and the reader’s perception.