Language through Translation: Exploring Alice in Chao Yuen-ren’s Chinese ‘Wonderland’

Characterization is a vital issue in creative and imaginative writing for children. Within a communicative framework of systemic functional linguistics, this book reveals how the fantasy characterization is construed in the SL text, and how it is constructed and distorted in the Chinese translation, based on a description and interpretation of the translation shifts, before an explanation is given of the semiotic relationship between those shifts and the characterization. As a work of descriptive translation studies, this book provides approaches to transitivity construal of the characterization of fantasy in both the SL and TL texts. It can also provide empirical evidence for comparative text studies as well as critical discourse analysis. In addition, it will serve to provide implications for the creative writing of fantasy stories, as well as insightful implications for very practical purposes, such as the evaluation of clinical discourse.