TY - JOUR
T1 - Machine translation of Chinese classical poetry
T2 - a comparison among ChatGPT, Google Translate, and DeepL Translator
AU - Gao, Ruiyao
AU - Lin, Yumeng
AU - Zhao, Nan
AU - Cai, Zhenguang G.
N1 - Publisher copyright:
© The Author(s) 2024
PY - 2024/6/26
Y1 - 2024/6/26
N2 - Recent studies have highlighted ChatGPT’s remarkable capabilities in machine translation. However, little attention has been paid to its application in literary translation, particularly within the realm of Chinese classical poetry. To explore the potential of ChatGPT’s abilities in poetry translation, we conducted a comparative analysis of poetry translation quality, contrasting ChatGPT (with two different prompts) with Google Translate and DeepL Translator regarding fidelity, fluency, language style, and machine translation style. The results revealed that ChatGPT outperformed Google Translate and DeepL Translator in all evaluation criteria, suggesting its exceptional ability in poetry translation. Furthermore, when employing a prompt that instructs ChatGPT to preserve the rhythm and rhyme of poems, ChatGPT demonstrated a remarkable ability to retain the beauty of the original poetic language, setting itself apart from conventional machine translation systems. Our analysis further elucidated ChatGPT’s proficiency in comprehending and translating some common symbols, imagery, and underlined semantic components which contributes to coherent and fluent translations. Our research opens up ChatGPT’s new possibilities in translating ancient literary texts into foreign languages.
AB - Recent studies have highlighted ChatGPT’s remarkable capabilities in machine translation. However, little attention has been paid to its application in literary translation, particularly within the realm of Chinese classical poetry. To explore the potential of ChatGPT’s abilities in poetry translation, we conducted a comparative analysis of poetry translation quality, contrasting ChatGPT (with two different prompts) with Google Translate and DeepL Translator regarding fidelity, fluency, language style, and machine translation style. The results revealed that ChatGPT outperformed Google Translate and DeepL Translator in all evaluation criteria, suggesting its exceptional ability in poetry translation. Furthermore, when employing a prompt that instructs ChatGPT to preserve the rhythm and rhyme of poems, ChatGPT demonstrated a remarkable ability to retain the beauty of the original poetic language, setting itself apart from conventional machine translation systems. Our analysis further elucidated ChatGPT’s proficiency in comprehending and translating some common symbols, imagery, and underlined semantic components which contributes to coherent and fluent translations. Our research opens up ChatGPT’s new possibilities in translating ancient literary texts into foreign languages.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85197283909&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1057/s41599-024-03363-0
DO - 10.1057/s41599-024-03363-0
M3 - Journal article
SN - 2662-9992
VL - 11
JO - Humanities and Social Sciences Communications
JF - Humanities and Social Sciences Communications
IS - 1
M1 - 835
ER -
