The Translator as Rapporteur: A Concept for Training and Self-improvement

Abstract

In my experience as both trainee and trainer, the on job training and development of translators tends to divorce the question "How do I translate?" from the question "What am I doing when I translate?". The emphasis is on the first question-on technique rather than on purpose. Training centres on re-vision : source text and translation are compared and weak points in technique are brought out. But is it enough to point out weaknesses in retrospect, after the translation is done? The important question, it seems to me, is why errors were committed in the first place. And to my mind, the principal cause of error is not mere technical incapacity, a failure to have mastered a certain repertoire of translation techniques. Rather the main problem is that translators are not always in the right frame of mind while translating, and this is so because they have not always sufficiently reflected on just exactly what it is they are doing when they are translating.