TRANSLATION OF ‘CULTURE-SPECIFIC CONCEPTS’ IN CONTEXT OF INDIRECT TRANSLATION

Abstract

Contact between Portuguese and Chinese began as early as the 16th century. As the relations between China and the Portuguese-speaking countries developed, translations between the two languages have flourished, particularly in literature. It is important to note that, in this domain, direct translation as well as indirect translation has been active options. Translation via a third language has been a frequent method used by Portuguese-Chinese translators – not only in the early days of their burgeoning contact but also well into the twentieth-first century. This paper analyses the translation of the novella O Assassino, which fictions the assassination of the Portuguese Governor Ferreira do Amaral in Macau. The story was originally written in Chinese, then translated into English and then into Portuguese. It happens that the Portuguese version was translated via the English. The aim of this article is to analyze both versions from a comparative perspective and to discuss the translation of culture-specific concepts in the indirect translation context.