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Abstract
Because of profound linguistic and cultural differences, literary translation from Vietnamese into English remains challenging, as expressive nuances, metaphorical imagery, and culture-bound elements are difficult to render fully and adequately. In this context, this study employs contrastive, descriptive, statistical, and qualitative methods to examine loss and gain in the English translation of the novel Số đỏ by Vũ Trọng Phụng. It adopts Baker’s (2011) categorization of equivalence to classify loss and gain across three linguistic levels and Newmark’s (1988) translation procedures to account for their occurrence. The findings indicate that loss is mainly associated with functional equivalence, reduction, and transposition, whereas gain primarily arises through expansion and paraphrase. The results further show that loss and gain often coexist within a single translation unit. This helps maintain naturalness in the target language and clarify implicit meanings, while still preserving the content and communicative effect of the source text. The study provides a basis for literary translation training and practice.
Keywords: literary translation; equivalence; loss; gain; linguistic levels.
Biography
Nguyen Manh Tuong is an English lecturer at Dong A University. He is expected to receive an MA in Comparative and Contrastive Linguistics in July 2026 and has over six years of English language teaching experience. Throughout his career, he has worked with diverse groups of learners, ranging from English majors to non-English majors, and has developed a strong interest in improving learners’ communicative competence, critical thinking skills and exam readiness.
His research interests include translation studies, equivalence, and meaning shifts across linguistic levels, particularly in literary texts. He is also interested in how translation choices affect readers’ interpretation and cultural understanding.
At VietTESOL International Convention, he is presenting a study on gain and loss in the English translation of a Vietnamese literary work. This research explores how meaning is preserved, added, or reduced at lexical, structural, and pragmatic levels. Through this study, he aims to contribute to a deeper understanding of translation quality and cross-cultural meaning transfer.
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