在长句翻译方面，汉译英与英译汉有所不同。汉语长句从形式上看大多是并列结构，但实际上汉语句子各成分之间存在着不同的关系，所以译者在动笔翻译之前需要首先确定原句各成分之间的实际关系。另外，汉语长句很少有连词连接，一般是从意思出发安排成句。因此，翻译汉语长句的时候，需要顺从英语的行文习惯，注意长短句结合，既要避免过多的“一逗(点)到底”的英文句子（run-on sentence)，又要避免一味的并列结构。

一般说来，汉语长句英译主要有以下三种方法顺译法、断句法和综合法。

1. 顺译法

所谓顺译法，指的是译者将一个汉语长句看作一个大的意群，按照句子之间的内在逻辑关系确定主次，判断出哪个成分应作主句、哪个成分应作从句，然后将其译成英语长句。该译法的优点是能够保持原句的句势，给人一气呵成的感觉。例如：

（1）(他一生仕途坎坷，几度遭贬。)他的朋友滕子京被贬岳州 (今湖南岳阳)，重修岳阳楼，写信请他为岳阳楼写篇记，尽管那时范仲淹在政治上遭受很大的打击，被贬在邓州，身体欠佳，但他还是答应了滕子京的要求，在邓州的花州书院挥毫撰写了著名的《岳阳楼记》。

译文：When Teng Zijing，his friend relegated to Yuezhou (where Yueyang in Hunan Province stands today)，decided to renovate the Yueyang Tower and wrote to him asking him to write a memorial note of the renovation, Fan Zhongyan, though in poor health, composed the famous“Note of the Yueyang Tower”at Huazhou Academy in Dengzhou where he himself had been relegatd following a series of set-backs in his political career.

（2）当时街坊上家家箫管，户户弦歌，当头一轮明月，飞彩凝辉，二人越添豪兴，酒到杯干。雨村此时已有七八分酒意，狂兴不禁，对月寓怀，口号一绝云……

译文：The sounds of music and singing which could now be heard from every house in the neighbourhood and the full moon shone with cold brilliance overhead seemed to increase their elation，so that the cups were emptied almost they touched their lips, and Yun-cun, who was also a sheet or so in the wind, was seized with an irrepressible excitement to which he presently gave expression in the form of a quat-rain, ostensibly on the subject of the moon , but really about the ambition he had hitherto been at some pains to conceal...