Archives for September 2010

Happy International Translation Day

Saint Jerome and a skull, by Lucas van Leyden.

Saint Jerome and a skull (purportedly a late-paying client), by Lucas van Leyden.

St Jerome: a man as relevant to translators today as he was in 420AD!

International Translation Day has been promoted since 1991 by the FIT. The day coincides with St Jerome’s Day, who was recognised by the Catholic Church as the patron saint of translators, scholars and editors, as well as libraries and librarians.

Check out this post for a full run-down on the man who was “no admirer of moderation, whether in virtue or against evil”.

Incidentally, this year’s theme for the day is translation quality for a variety of voices. (And no, I’m not entirely sure what it means either.)

So without further ado, let me point you to some special posts in honour of International Translation Day’s past:

Jill Sommer has a great post on St Jerome here.
Corinne McKay encourages us to thank a terminologist here.
Aquí un artículo sobre San Jerónimo para mis amigos hispanohablantes.
Julia James discusses some interesting challenges facing the field of translation here.
Finally, English PEN have released an anthology with extracts from some of the best international writers of our time in translation, so get your free download here.

Celebrate in style, colleagues and friends. I know I will.

Guerrilla marketing and one-page marketing plans

by Sarah Dillon

Guerrilla marketing involves taking a non-traditional approach to conventional marketing goals. Best of all, it’s a way for us small fry to successfully compete with the big players by applying a toolbox of tricks that no self-respecting freelance translator should be without.

The best thing about a guerrilla approach to marketing is that the question of whether to use [insert preferred web 2.0 tool here] is no longer relevant. Instead the question becomes what exactly do these online tools offer, and how can you apply them to meet your offline goals.

Here are two great resources to help focus the mind of the most marketing-allergic translators:

Guy Kawasaki makes available a free one-page template here, which he calls The World’s Shortest Marketing Plan (although when completed it comes in longer).
If you want to read a little bit more about guerrilla marketing, I recommend downloading this free pdf called Guide to Guerrilla Marketing for Consultants (not least because it advocates a 7-sentence marketing plan)

Enjoy.

Revisiting pricing

by Sarah Dillon

Here’s a tip from a previous post that’s worth another airing:

“There are companies out there who are willing and able to pay for excellent professional services. So put a price on your time, and stick to it – it will pay off.”

Two years and one GFC after writing these words I’m pleased to report that, based on my experiences at least, this still holds true.

There are lots of fantastic clients out there, direct clients and translation companies alike, who are desperately seeking mutually beneficial, long-term relationships with good, reliable professionals. As a freelancer, you need only 2 – 3 of these to make good living. No, they’re not always easy to find but you will find each other. The real challenge lies in staying in the game until that happens – so keep on keeping on!

Read here for more: 4 tips on pricing to attract clients you’ll want to keep

The most fun translation job of 2010?

by Sarah Dillon

This book gets my vote as what I imagine must have been the most fun translation job of 2010. It’s called Schnittmengen, and is the German version of Jessica Hagy’s English-language book Indexed, based on her blog of the same name.

I’ve been a big fan of Jessica Hagy for a couple of years now, and featured her work on my blog as far back as 2007. So I was pretty excited to see her book translated into German, with a nifty little set of cultural notes for the German reader here.

Some careful sleuthing revealed the translator was Vivian Cullis (*I think*?)… but it’s a shame she doesn’t get a listing on Amazon, or even on the copyright pages of the book itself. So sadly, it’s a boo hiss on that score for the publisher, Goldmann Verlag (Random House).

But that aside: Can you imagine being tasked with this translation job? Cultural references abound, and as the very nature of this work involves comparing random things and finding an unexpected common point, the context wouldn’t offer very many clues to meaning either. Plus, it’s surprising and insightful in itself. Could this be the most fun translation job of 2010?