Throughout the ages, poets from all over the world have created many excellent works in the field of poetry. China's outstanding poets such as Li Bai and Du Fu are self-evident, while foreign poets such as British poets Byron and Shelley; French poets Hugo and Baudelaire; German poets Goethe and Heine; Russian poets Pushkin, lermontov, etc. They gave full play to their language ability, combined with the language characteristics of their respective countries, blended into their own local culture, and created many excellent poems. However, due to the limited understanding of language, readers from all over the world come into contact with other countries' poems mostly through translation. At this time, a question will arise. Since poetry is a special literary genre, how should a translator translate it perfectly?
Poetry translation is not an easy task. It requires not only that the translated version can make readers "know what it is, be good at what it is and be happy with it", but also that the translated version is as beautiful as the original in sound, meaning and form as possible. However, due to the particularity of poetry in form and the differences of language and culture in different countries, many scholars subjectively believe that poetry is untranslatable. Bao Si, an English poet, said, "Translating poetry can only be a poor imitation." Zhou Zuoren, a famous essayist, poet and translator in China, said: "Poetry is untranslatable, only it is a poem, and any other translation is just the interpretation of Tang poetry by a private school teacher." Wang, a famous translator, said in On the Untranslatability of Poetry: "I think the reason why poetry is untranslatable is very simple, that is, the charm and artistic conception of poetry, or more generally speaking, the taste of poetry, that is, the reason why poetry is poetry, is to a great extent organically integrated into the poet's language of writing poetry, which cannot be expressed by another language (dialect)."
What the above scholars have said has to be considered. As poets and translators who have translated many languages and national works, they put forward such rhetoric. Is poetry really untranslatable?
As we all know, translation is a process of copying the physical structure and connotation of one language in another language, and it can also be said that it is a process of expressing what one language expresses in another language. The most ideal translation state is the literal translation of the translation method that maintains both the original content and the original form. However, due to objective factors such as imperfect languages in different countries and subjective factors such as the translator's own cultural background, literary skills and experience, 100% equivalent translation is not so easy to occur. So sometimes free translation is needed. Free translation is a translation method that only preserves the original content but not the original form. In this way, I am afraid it will destroy the basic realm of "information equivalent transmission". Therefore, some people will think that poetry, a special literary form, cannot be included in the ranks of translatability. The person who produces this argument must have summed up some truths according to the problems encountered in his own practice. However, because many foreign poetry works, such as petofi's Freedom and Love, have been handed down to this day, it cannot be said that poetry is completely untranslatable, and its translation process is difficult, but there must be translatability factors.