Chapter 4. Talks with translators
Translator initiates project Translator is commissioned
Alan Carl Bruce
Ellen DerekFigure 15. Initiation-Commission Continuum
Various people were named as commissioners: the source poet, an editor, festival
organizer, member of official funding body, publisher, and a receptor-language
singer. But even translators who initiated their own projects could do so on other
people’s advice: thus Alan said “I’m primarily dependent upon other writers or
critics, scholars to tell me about writers they like or know of ”.
Where a poet had already been translated, interviewees reported a sense of
collegiality with fellow poetry translators from that language – whom they often
knew personally, echoing Chapter 4’s claims. Thus, in Derek’s words, though “some
poets can bear a lot of translators”, one would avoid translating “poets who you
regard as territory of other translators”. When overlaps did occur, Alan claimed
that these were usually handled amicably.
With translator-initiated projects, getting published was a key concern. Some
advocated first publishing extracts in journals and anthologies, thus alerting edi-
tors, readers and potential publishers to the source poet – but also, in a wider
sense, “remind[ing] the editors that poetry in translation is vital” (Derek). How-
ever, two interviewees felt, like Flynn’s English → Dutch translators (2004: 279),
that translators – especially at the beginning of their career – needed an estab-
lished reputation or working contacts in order to approach a publisher directly;
then, journal publications, or a recommendation from a ‘patron’ (an established
poet or translator), could give translators such capital.
When approaching publishers, interviewees advocated a staged approach: for
instance, first offering to send the publisher some sample translated poems – be-
cause, if nothing else, a project needs to fit in with a publisher’s plans. Publishers
could be slow to respond to proposals or samples; here, Ellen advocated setting
publishers a deadline, telling them “that after that I would be sending it elsewhere”.4.3.2.2 Selection criteria and expertise
‘Selection’ as an action has two stages: firstly deciding to initiate or join a project,
and then (with anthologies or selected works) deciding which of a poet’s poems to
translate. As with general reasons for translating poetry, affective factors weigh
heavily at both stages. All translators mentioned a need to like the source work or
poem, with the minimum condition being a sense of “empathy” or “compatibility”
with a poem or its contents (cf. Wilbur, in Honig 1985: 83; Flynn 2004: 276).