The visible translator

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It is easy to imagine how such resources could take advantage of the opportunities afforded by digital technology to develop, for example, databases with embedded discussion forums, or even ones that incorporate social translation platforms. (For example, The Social Translating Project, (73) by the Goethe Institute is testing a new social practice for literary translation. Translators from Asia are translating a Germanlanguage novel into their native languages. Translators meet in a closed digital forum and work on their translations by interacting with one another and engaging in a close discourse with the author.)

The Bologna Children’s Book Fair, together with the Index Translationum of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), has launched a world directory of children’s book translators.(74) The directory lists professional translators specialising in children’s literature, and currently represents 55 countries. Anyone who has translated at least two books may register, unless their language is ‘minority or seldom-translated’, in which case the requirement is only one book. This is a useful search engine with a particularly extensive database, dedicated to a very important, but often particularly under-represented, genre.

See Annex IV, ‘Translators Associations and Translator Databases’, for more information.

TRANSLATORS SHOULD BE ACKNOWLEDGED AND PROMOTED AS CRUCIAL MEDIATORS AND AMBASSADORS BETWEEN CULTURES AND LANGUAGES

More general awareness about the role of translators is needed – the issue of crediting. Translators are authors who deserve to have their creative and cultural achievements recognised. Publishing companies, newspapers and other institutions in general should commit themselves to naming translators in books and digital media, as well as in advertising for books, in book reviews, in library catalogues and in the book trade. Translators should be named – if they wish to be – in every place that the author is named, and for instance on the cover of a translated book.(75) Innovative publishing companies have started to place biographical information about the translator next to the author’s details.

Prizes for translators is one of the more obvious forms of public recognition for translators’ achievements. The idea of adding a translation prize to already existing, highly regarded literary awards is particularly attractive. For instance, the Leipzig Book Fair Prize, which is awarded for the belles-lettres, non-fiction and translation categories, shows that translators can gain visibility in association with authors. Other prizes, such as the International Booker Prize, the International Dublin Literary Award, the Dutch Europese Literatuurprijs (76) and the Latvian International Jānis Baltvilks’ Prize in Children’s Literature and Book Art, co-award the translator and the original writer. The ‘Tour of Translator’s Happiness’ (Vertalersgeluktournee) (77) brings the translators of the literary works on the longlist of the Europese Literatuurprijs to bookshops all over the country, where they can interact with audiences about the books they translated. See Annex V, ‘Prizes and Recognition in Translation’, for a more comprehensive list of prizes in the literary and audiovisual translation sectors.

The visible translator

Literary translators are active ambassadors between cultures and languages, and they are very often engaged in politically volatile cultural interactions, for example when literature from particular countries or regions is banned or

73 https://www.goethe.de/ins/kr/de/kul/sup/sct.html 74 http://www.bolognachildrensbookfair.com/en/the-fair/translators-centre/world-directory-of-childrens-book-translators/world-directorysearch/1079.html 75 https://www2.societyofauthors.org/translators-on-the-cover/ 76 https://www.europeseliteratuurprijs.nl/ 77 https://www.europeseliteratuurprijs.nl/vertalersgeluk/2020/

censored. They should be encouraged to share their experiences, observations and knowledge about the processes of successful, and even unsuccessful, cultural understanding. The initial question ‘who translates?’ must be extended to include additional factors: who translates how and why, under what circumstances, and with what consequence and effect ? Projects and initiatives such as this show the relevance of translation as a field of social debate.

TOLEDO-Programm

A new initiative to increase the visibility of literary translators and to support their work as active ambassadors between cultures and languages is the TOLEDO-Programm, (78) started in 2018 by the Deutscher Übersetzerfonds. The TOLEDO-Journale (79) provides ‘[g]limpses into the engine rooms of literature’. Translators are invited to document their work and to publish this, accompanied by reflections, in journal form on the TOLEDO website. These very different manifestations invite readers into the world of translators and allow us to discover the materials that accumulate around, and enrich, a translated text. More than simply a look behind the scenes, these translation diaries offer insights into the hidden associations and imagery of a text. A new space to share experiences and inspire discussions of current issues in the international translation community is the TOLEDO TALKS series. The emergence of postcolonial discourses that critique translation as a form of cultural appropriation has given more grounds for nervousness about ‘touching’ certain texts. In addition to expertise and language skills, does a translator now require personal ‘touchpoints’ with a text? Many translators have contributed to a collection of essays about these questions of legitimacy, revealing both translation’s close involvement in social debates and how fraught with tension cultural exchange has become.

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In this context, translators should also be supported in their attempts to develop new forms of events. The annual translators’ meetings in Arles (Assises de la traduction littéraire) (80) and the Wolfenbütteler Gespräch (81) (Germany) have built a bridge to an audience that experiences the translators’ discussions and questions as debates about the present. In recent years, there have emerged literary festivals dedicated to the art of translation, such as Found in Translation in Gdańsk, (82) Le festival VO-VF – Traduire le Monde (see below for more information) in France, the annual FILIT, (83) an international festival of translation in Iași (Romania), and the Translationale Berlin (84)– inspiring examples of a self-confident translation scene.

Le festival VO-VF – Traduire le Monde (85)

Since 2012, the VO-VF Festival, held each autumn in Gif-sur-Yvette (Ile de France), invites the public to explore different trends in world literature through the voice of translators.

While most literature festivals invite mainly authors (with translators generally serving as their intermediaries), VO-VF’s originality consists in putting translators in the spotlight and inviting them to speak about the works they have translated. This is based on the premise that the translator is undoubtedly the best reader – ‘an ideal reader’, according to Alberto Manguel – and therefore particularly able to attract a new readership to works that are still little known.

VO-VF has thus contributed to making the profession of literary translator better known and valued by a wider audience, and to providing an international outlet for contemporary literary concerns, by echoing the geopolitical upheavals and major issues of our time.

Book fairs can also be an arena for the visible translator or in which translators can increase their visibility, beyond their role in interpreting panel discussions. Several European book fairs (London, Paris, Turin, Bologna and others) have set up ‘translation centres’. These centres act not only as meeting places for attendees interested in translation, but also as visible reminders of translators’ relevance as actors in the book market.

Generally speaking, translators and publishers share a mutual interest in promoting the visibility of translators. The popularity and visibility of certain translators can have a broader positive effect on book promotion in general. For example, one of the largest publishers in Latvia published a book entitled Diary Notes by its long-term translator Silvija Brice, compiled from daily Facebook posts covering her everyday life and the problems she faces as a professional translator. It went on to reach the top 10 in the bookselling charts and is now on its fourth reprint.