九、英语多省略,汉语多补充
英语一方面十分注重句子结构,另一方面又喜欢使用省略。英语省略的类型很多,有名词的省略,动词的省略,有句法方面的省略,也有情景方面的省略。在并列结构中,英语往往省略前面已出现过的词语,而汉语则往往重复这些省略了的词。
例如:①Ambition is the mother of destruction as well as of evil.
野心不仅是罪恶的根源,同时也是毁灭的根源。
②Reading exercises one’s eyes; Speaking, one’s tongue; while writing, one’s mind.
阅读训练人的眼睛,说话训练人的口齿,写作训练人的思维。
④One boy is a boy, two boys half a boy, three boys no boy.
在考研英译汉中,省略是一种很常见现象。例如:
Whether to use tests, other kinds of information, or both in a particular situation depends, therefore, upon the evidence from experience concerning comparative validity and upon such factors as cost and availability.
译文:因此,究竟是使用测试,其它种类的信息,还是在特定的情况下两者都使用,取决于关于相对效度的来自经验的证据,同时还取决于成本和可获得性这样的因素。
whether...or...是并列连词,or前面省略了不定式to use, and upon中间省了动词depends。
十、英语多前重心,汉语多后重心
在表达多逻辑思维时,英语往往是判断或结论等在前,事实或描写等在后,即重心在前;汉语则是由因到果、由假设到推论、由事实到结论,即重心在后。
比较:I was all the more delighted when, as a result of the initiative of your Government it proved possible to reinstate the visit so quickly.
译文:由于贵国政府的提议,才得以这样快地重新实现访问。这使我感到特别高兴。
The assertion that it was difficult, if not impossible, for a people to enjoy its basic rights unless it was able to determine freely its political status and to ensure freely its economic, social and cultural development was now scarcely (不足地,不充分地;一定不,绝不)contested (斗争;比赛).
译文:如果一个民族不能自由地决定其政治地位,不能自由地保证其经济、社会和文化的发展,要享受其基本权利,即使不是不可能,也是不容易的。这一论断几乎是无可置辩的了。