28 Thursday Jun 2018
Posted in Announcements
Hi everyone,
This is just a quick PSA to tell you that new translation slots will open in the next few weeks. This is a great opportunity for self-published authors looking to branch into a foreign market that already welcomed several bestselling indie authors. If you’re interested, or you have any questions, feel free to contact me!
19 Sunday Mar 2017
Posted in Announcements
Tags
Amber Kell, book translations, Brenda Hiatt, Cynthia Wright, Glynnis Campbell, italian translations, suzan tisdale, Tanya Anne Crosby
(psst: yeah, I know it’s March already, but I’ve been busy)
2016 was an incredible year for me. I translated 29 books, and no, that’s not a typo. That’s one less than 30. That’s the fruit of long hours of work and an infinite amount of passion. That’s what happens when you love your job. 🙂
Seven authors chose to trust me with their work; among them were both old acquaintances – such as Tanya Anne Crosby, Amber Kell, and Suzan Tisdale – and new friends – including Glynnis Campbell, Brenda Hiatt and Cynthia Wright. There was not one person among all of them with whom I’d not be happy to work again in the future. I know I’m lucky among my fellow translators to have found such people.
I don’t really know what to say about these numbers. They’re amazing. I got to work on a quantity of books from a number of incredibly talented and award-winning authors. It’s an honor and a privilege that I’d never thought I’d manage to earn. And yet I did, and for that, I’m grateful.
There’s one sadly low number among all these, and it’s the number of posts I published: only five. There’s a couple reasons for that: first, as you may have noticed, I’ve been extremely busy, and wasn’t able to update the blog section of this website too often. Second, I’ve come to realize that said blog section is only a minor part of my business. I’m not a blogger and I don’t aspire to be one. I will try to publish more often and to bring you more useful information, but I don’t expect my blog page to become some kind of reference point on the Internet. Why should I work in that direction instead of striving to become an even better translator?
Overall, 2016 has been the best year in my translator career so far. I can only hope that 2017 would be equally fruitful. 🙂
13 Wednesday Jan 2016
Posted in Translation Diaries
When I read on the Internet about translations, the words “hefty sums”, “expensive” and synonyms pop up quite often. While it’s true that the price of translations may look high (and some of them are, indeed, overpriced), there are reasons behind every translator’s fees. I understand, however, that not everyone might know what these reasons are, so I decided to write this post in order to give you an idea.
The first – and most important – factor behind a translation’s price is time. A translator has to work for weeks, maybe months to turn your manuscript into another language, and during that time they have to keep the lights on, the house warm and the dogs fed (tip: you don’t want to be in the same house with a hungry Springer Spaniel. They are noisy little buggers). Normally, translators don’t charge by the hour, simply because we have no way to prove to the client how many hours we spent on a project. But time is definitely a factor when we have to determine our price for a translation.
Woe to those who fail to feed the Beast
Then there are expenses. Yes, translators have expenses. For example, I employ a proofreader to make sure that everything I produce is up to the highest publishing standards; her services alone cost me about 25% of what I charge. Then there’s translation software and its updates, the cost of continuing education, and so on. It’s easy to forget how much money one has to spend in order to be able to perform their job properly. That, in turn, is reflected on what a translator charges. Chances are the little money will get you little quality.
Finally, don’t forget that translators are self-employed, meaning that all the money we earn from our work still has to be taxed. Depending on where in the world a translator lives, taxes can eat a substantial amount of their income, and what remains has to be enough to justify the time spent translating. Otherwise, our activity risks to shift from a laborious job to a laborious hobby, and we can’t afford that.
I hope I managed to help you understand why a translator has to charge certain amounts of money for their work. There may be other reasons, of course, but generally speaking, time, expenses and taxes are the three main reasons behind a translator’s rates.
