This research aims to analyze forms and strategies in translating titles of 215 German literary works into Thai. The selected translations were published between 1979 and 2012. Preliminary findings revealed that Thai translators opted for 6 strategies in translating literary titles, which are, in order of occurrence: 1) literal translation, 2) renaming, 3) keeping part of the original title and adding words related to the plot or characters, 4) transliterating, 5) deleting part of the title, and 6) translating the German title into English and transliterating it into Thai. With Christiane Nord’s functional approach and Vermeer’s Skopos Theory as analytical frameworks, it was found that the strategies that are most effective in maintaining the communicative function of the ST, as they are faithful to the original and the author’s intention, and show creativity and artistic flair of the Thai translators are: renaming, keeping part of the original title and adding words relevant to the plot or characters, and translating the German title into English and transliterating it into Thai. On the other hand, literal translation, transliterating, and deletion of part of the title, were found to have failed to fulfill the communicative function of the original German titles. It can be concluded that had the translator applied the Skopos Theory and Nord’s functional approach in text analysis and identification of the communicative function of the source text before translating, the translated versions would have been of better quality, achieving the effect intended by the author and meeting the needs of the target readers.
