The study of metaphor has a long history, and it has gradually been taken seriously from the very beginning of Aristotle of ancient Greek. In 1980, American scholars George Lakoff and Mark Johnson published the book Metaphor We Lived By jointly, from which metaphor began to be known as a way of cognition. The differences in languages and cultures, together with the complicated working mechanism of metaphor, post a great challenge in translating metaphor in literary work. This paper analyzes example sentences taken from Chinese classical works. By comparing these sentences with their English translations, we can have a glimpse of the translation strategies often used in rendering metaphor.

With the implementation of China’s national strategy of “Culture Going-out”, it is important to translate Qingdao folk culture well in order to promote the effective communication of Qingdao folk culture worldwide. However, the uniqueness of folk culture poses certain difficulties for translation. Skopos theory can effectively guide the translation of Qingdao folk culture. From the perspective of this theory, the author analyzes the principles and strategies of English translation of Qingdao folk culture and proposes four translation methods, such as literal translation with notes, equivalent translation, phonetic translation with notes and free translation. Translators can choose the appropriate translation methods according to specific translation purposes.