August 5, 2009
Taking stock a year on
Although we try not to count our chickens before they’ve hatched, over the course of the previous year the above Pamphlet has produced positive results, both nationally and internationally, giving the Dutch Foundation for Literature, the Flemish Literature Fund, the Foundation for the Production and Translation of Dutch Literature, the Dutch Language Union and the Expertise Centre for Literary Translation grounds for optimism about the future. Continued...
* Great translation by the way
It is with off-hand comments like these that book reviewers typically dismiss the work of a translator - assuming, that is, that they mention the translator at all. Such cursory treatment makes painfully clear where translators stand in the literary pecking order: right at the bottom. This pamphlet is a plea to set matters right and to give a central place to literary translation as a profession. This is a matter of some urgency, as the quality of translations from and into Dutch is under threat and a huge shortage of translators is looming.