An issue translators often face

[Kyriakos]

There is a nicely comedic comment, by h.l. borges, regarding nice translated versions of not so nice originals: "[...] That text is not faithful to its translation".
Indeed, when the original has very notable issues, the translator has to decide what to do. Often the response is to minorly alter the original.
I took that road with my latest Lovecraft text: the shadow over innsmouth. Cause he never submitted it, and likely never edited it either, so there are many glaring repetitions and a few soloicisms too (well, more than his usual ones...).
So i dont have the analogous 50 times written term for "furtive", or 30 times for croaking or whatever.
Still, the story isnt good. But at least it is a bit more readable.

-do you think that a translation has to sacrifice elegance/readability for faithfulness?

 

[MaryKB]

My feeling is your translation style may depend a lot on what type of work you're translating, right?

Like say you're translating something for reference, instruction, or education, my thought would be you'd want to be as faithful as you can, because your original author had an intention, and if you alter things in your translation then you could corrupt knowledge, especially if your work is later translated again and the next person does the same thing, you know what I mean?

But say you're translating poetry, well I think you're going to want to keep certain structures and effects, and you may not be able to do that if you translate literally. Like you might want to keep lines rhyming, or syllable counts and such, so you'll need to change words or entire lines, so you say the same thing and also keep other parts intact.

And for fiction, I'd think you'd want to make it pleasurable to read, so if you're translating literally no one may want to read it if your book doesn't flow well. I've read books translated from French (mostly authors like Alexandre Dumas and Victor Hugo), and I don't know if those are translated for faithfulness or elegance, but those versions I've read were easy for me to read and enjoy, and if they'd been unpleasant because of overall faithfulness and sacrificing readability, I may not have enjoyed them, right?

I also have a feeling whoever's reading your translation for approval at your publisher may not be completely double-checking your work, but if she or he is reading your translation and feels miserable because you've faithfully translated a terrible story literally, she might blame you for doing a poor job and think errors are your doing and not Lovecraft's, but your book might be more popular if your meaning is the same but you've made it a better reading experience.

I'm sorry, I'm not in publishing translation business, so please consider my thoughts only as a reader

 

[Gori the Grey]

I knew a guy who knew a guy who translated some minor classical poet [dearly wish I could remember which one]. The guy I knew asked the translator, "did you choose that poet because you think he's someone whose worth hasn't been properly recognized by critics?" "No," the translator is reported to have said, "If I chose to translate Homer, my translation would be worse than the original. But in the case of this guy, my translation could improve on the original."

 

[Live trash can]

I mostly agree with Mary. And the final product seems to me to be important.

Have you consulted your superiors?

 

[Kyriakos]

I take orders from yog-sothoth himself!

Ps: actually the publisher's editor already made it clear they prefer readability to absolute faithfulness.