A Quote by Peter Menzel
To me a translator is very, very important. If the fixer is also the translator, so much the better. I have known photographers who didn't speak the language and would work in a place for weeks without one, getting by on common sense and smiles. But how many situations did they miss because they couldn't talk to someone and get the back story on details, small daily life things, etc.
Related Quotes
The translator has to be a good writer. The translator has to hear music too. And it might not be exactly your music because the translator needs to translate the music. And so, that is what you are hoping for: a translator who gets what you are doing but who also gets all the ways in which it won't work in the new language.
When a translator translates my book, it is no longer just my book. It is the translator's book, too. So the book in another language is almost the work of two people. And that is quite interesting to me.
I remember what it was like when my parents couldn't help me with my homework because they couldn't speak the language, or being a translator for my parents. I did that a lot.
It's important to get a translator who will ask the questions in a sensitive and thoughtful way. Knowing the ethnicity issues, the tribal issues in some places...who your translator is can mean a lot.
I think that being an editor, someone who works with words, is very good training for being a translator because it trains you to be attentive to words in a very specific, very concrete, very literal way.
I've become very interested in the ways things can change even with someone you've known for many years and you've committed to for life. How drastic can you damage things in the way you speak to someone?
Without translation, I would be limited to the borders of my own country. The translator is my most important ally. He introduces me to the world.
The translator of prose is the slave of the author, and the translator of poetry is his rival.
The elements of a good story are most definitely details, little bitty details. That does it, especially when you're describing, when you're setting the scene and everything. It's like you're painting a picture, so details are very important. Also, the music gotta be right. The music can really set the tone for the story and let you know what the story is gonna be about, but definitely, it's the vibe in the place where you at and the detail.
I've translated a lot of American literature into Japanese, and I think that what makes a good translator is, above all, a feel for language and also a great affection for the work you're translating. If one of those elements is missing the translation won't be worth much.
A translator is essentially a reader and we all read differently, except that a translator's reading remains in unchanging print
In some sense the text and the translator are locked in struggle - 'I attacked that sentence, it resisted me, I attacked another, it eluded me' - a struggle in which, curiously, when the translator wins, the text wins too.
I think it's very valuable as an actor to throw yourself back into having that direct connection with an audience on-stage and work that muscle. It is a very different type of work and equally fascinating. I mean, I've very much in love with filmmaking because I really love the way you can tell stories with a camera and how music and everything contributes to the story in a very direct way. But I also think it's very valuable to come back to theatre, so if the right script came along I would love to come back to London and do some more.
The barrier of communication is terrible if you don't speak the language. You cannot reach a player with a translator.
I think every translator would tell you that when they look back at a poem they have translated, they want to pencil in changes. I know I do - though sometimes I also then remember all the reasons I made that choice in the first place.
Of course it was a terrible thing, and the world would be a much better place without someone in it who could do that, but did that mean we had to miss lunch?
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