the voices

 Joey Potter

I don't really have much to say because I feel like translators talking about translation gets kind of repetitive. "A perfectly direct and good translation is impossible, it's all about making the least bad choices, you have to keep who your audience is in mind, replicate the original audience's experience not the words they read, and here's some specific examples from my personal experience," etc.

I wonder what Howard Hibbett meant when he said "Finally, then, I should say something about the theory of translation. I agree with Mr. Seidensticker that it is not helpful, on the whole, but it's something that people do these days, and it illustrates generic problems of the craft." I wonder if that means he agrees with me, or if he has something specific in mind. 

Rebecca Copeland's experience was interesting: "The voices in the text, the perceived voice of the author, mingle by necessity with the voices in the translator’s head and eventually find their way to the page, where they are met by the multitude of readers’ voices." I don't find this relatable as I haven't done any long-form translating before but I thought it was a good strategy (even though she presents it like something that happens naturally) for giving a character a consistent voice throughout a text: index them to someone similar in your memory.