what kind of professional can rewrite a book?

May 22, 2023 3:45 PM

I thought this question was super complicated but maybe it isn't. My relative wrote and published a book in another language, and now wants to publish in the USA. They paid for a translation, and the translated draft is clunky. Can someone be paid to make it easy to read?

A close relative wrote a book, more or less in the self help/ pop psych genre, in their native language. They paid out of pocket for a professional translation into American English. They have now asked me to take a look at the translator's work and give my opinion on whether it's ready for the market.

I don't think this translated document is ready for the commercial market. It's clunky; some of the ideas don't translate gracefully (like the translator probably used the word most literally equivalent to the original, but in English it has a different gloss that makes it not the right word to use); and... it's just not easy to read. It's off-putting. I think the reception will be negative or nonexistent.

That said, it is, I think, an accurate translation of the original text. I imagine the translator was asked not to change the author's meaning, and I guess they did the best they could with it... I don't know the reasonable "stylishness" expectation for a private translation job like this, where the translator is hired by the author, not the publisher. (I am not clear on how the book was originally published.)

Anyway, the book has actually done ok in its original market, and I'd hate to see its US reception hamstrung by translation alone. I think if it were rewritten, paragraph by paragraph, into easy-reading, stylish prose, it might do well. Or even if not, it wouldn't be the fault of the language.

I thought of offering to take a crack at a rewrite myself, but I don't really have the bandwidth or experience to do it.

So -- are there freelance (editors? rewriters?) who have the skill set to do this? What are they called? Where can we find one? What do they charge?

This book is my relative's precious baby: the whole second act of their life is tied up in their new identity as an author. I want to help them make it as good as it can be.

posted by fingersandtoes to Writing & Language (15 answers total)

What you're describing is editing, so you need an editor. (To be clear, many people can edit who don't have that title. But you want to describe the work as editing, not rewriting.)
posted by zompist at 3:58 PM on May 22, 2023 [3 favorites]

Yes, you need an editor, but, really, a better translater who can keep the meaning intact and still write well. It might help to say what the original language is.
posted by theora55 at 4:14 PM on May 22, 2023 [5 favorites]

Yes, this would be a copyeditor. Copyeditors often work with people for whom English isn't their first language - so an experienced one will be used to taking someone's clunky English and polishing it - I'd try to make sure you hire someone whose worked with people like that.
posted by coffeecat at 4:15 PM on May 22, 2023

> Yes, you need an editor, but, really, a better translater who can keep the meaning intact and still write well

I've seen an account that for translators, "cleaning up" a clunky machine-translated text and doing a good translation means having to do a new one from scratch.
posted by sebastienbailard at 4:27 PM on May 22, 2023 [3 favorites]

It sounds like you speak both languages and believe that the translation is substantively accurate. It would probably be much cheaper to have it edited than retranslated. However, you would run the risk of the meaning of some phrases being changed. Whether you want to invest in a retranslation really defends on how worried you are about that possibility and whether you are capable and willing to check the edit for accuracy. However, the consequences of an inaccurate phrase seem less in the self-help genre than, say. nuclear engineering.
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 4:34 PM on May 22, 2023

This level of work might require a book doctor (real term.)
posted by kapers at 4:39 PM on May 22, 2023

My recent experience is that the translation service providers would not get involved in cleaning up/editing another service's translation. They would proof for language but that is not the same and would still leave you with clunky text. It's basically start over with a new translation or use an editor.

We.ended up getting some native speakers to do the tidying, which was bullshit but at least they were invested in getting a good output.
posted by biffa at 4:41 PM on May 22, 2023

I think you could get by with a good copyeditor who has some working knowledge of the language, so they could refer back to the original in cases where the English is unclear, and at least flag passages where they need to follow up by consulting a more fluent speaker. Obviously, the feasibility of finding such an editor depends on what the language is.
posted by staggernation at 4:49 PM on May 22, 2023

I've done both translating and editing work and I agree that it may be worth having another translator look at it.

Translators vary in their approaches so some provide more "native" polishing--they translate the culture as well as the language. Did your relative hire a translator in the original country? I would search for a translator in the US who understands the original language, understands both cultures, AND write well in American English.

(If the original language is Japanese, I can be your one-stop shop--feel free to DM.)
posted by Sockin'inthefreeworld at 4:50 PM on May 22, 2023

There are lots of editors and copy editors who are bilingual or trilingual. That's who i'd be looking for--somebody who can read the original, understand who it was translated (and why some of the clunky word choices were made) and get it into shape for an American audience.
posted by sardonyx at 5:03 PM on May 22, 2023

Best answer: You might want a line editor. Here's a discussion about line editing vs. copyediting.
posted by mochapickle at 5:19 PM on May 22, 2023 [2 favorites]

Response by poster: Ok, according to the article mochapickle posted, what's needed is a "line editor." Anyone know how to find a "line editor"?
posted by fingersandtoes at 6:02 PM on May 22, 2023

See your MeMail.
posted by sardonyx at 6:05 PM on May 22, 2023

Let me just clarify the reason for what Biffa reported, upthread: the reason many translation professionals avoid work presented as editing previously-translated work is that this description often means they are being asked to handle has been machine translated - and computerized translation is of terrible quality, worse than clunky. Retranslation is often the only way out of working with machine translated output.

In order to get people to consider doing what you want (an edit rather than a retranslation), it is helpful to tell the editors whom you ask for quotes and samples from that the issue is "clunky human translation" and not "machine translation post edit".

And also: if your translator was accurate but clunky, there are advantages to working with an editor who does NOT hear the source language when reading the translation. That may be helpful in declunkifying. If you have doubts about the accuracy, having someone who can check out the source while working on the target text is useful.
(Based on: I've been a freelance translator for about 35 years, translated more books than I can carry.)
posted by Shunra at 6:40 PM on May 22, 2023 [13 favorites]

I disagree with others that you necessarily need to retranslate. If you get someone who is a more talented English prose stylist to re-jigger the manuscript, their output will be an adaptation of the original work rather than a translation, but for the genre you're talking about that may be absolutely fine. I would say it depends a lot on whether the value that your relative is bringing to the table is strictly informational content, or whether they also have a distinctive authorial voice that would be disappointing to lose.
posted by dusty potato at 4:43 PM on May 23, 2023 [1 favorite]