Literary translators tend to be backroom boys and girls, and to a certain extent this is just. We are not the original creators of the texts we translate, so we are indeed nearer to musicians, actors or anyone else who transforms and interprets the work of others. Nevertheless, many people who enjoy the fruits of our labours do not realise what makes a literary translator tick. You see the actor or musician on stage and in the newspapers; the life of a literary translator, hidden behind his or her typewriter or PC, is mostly shrouded in mystery.
The translator Thomas Warburton (born 1918) has lifted the tip of the veil regarding literary translation in his little book Efter 30 000 sidor (After 30,000 Pages; 2003). This book was published in a joint edition by Söderström & Co in Finland and Atlantis in Sweden. It has now appeared in Finnish translation by Eila Kostamo, an appropriate fate for a book of memoirs dealing with the skill of translation. The 30,000 pages of the title are what Warburton himself estimates to have translated during his long career.
I am myself translating this book into English, thanks to a grant from Svenska kulturfonden, Helsinki. (Publisher, as yet unknown!) I am very happy to do so, not least because I recognise some of the good and bad things that can happen to a literary translator. But Thomas Warburton has translated a vastly larger amount of books than I have. Hence the title of his 140-page book of translator's memoirs. The reason this book is suitable for an English-speaking audience is that Warburton has translated important works of literature from Finnish and English into his mother-tongue, Swedish.
Thomas Warburton was born in Vasa, Ostrobothnia, and during the 1940s he ended up in Helsinki. It was in the 1940s that his career as a literary translator took off, after he had finally given up his forestry studies. Most curiously, one side of his family is English, as can clearly be seen from his name which has the traits of neither a typical Finland-Swedish name, nor a Finnish one.
While working part-time for the Schildts Swedish-language publishing house in Helsinki, he managed to translate important novels and poetry from English and Finnish. English-language works include Sterne's Tristram Shandy, Joyce's Ulysses, Henry Green's Loving, the Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters, Nightwood by Djuna Barnes, plus works by Faulkner, E.E. Cummings and George Orwell. Also plays for stage and radio by, among others, Dorothy L. Sayers, Peter Ustinov, Dylan Thomas, Tom Stoppard and Sean O'Casey. From Finnish, Warburton translated, for instance, poetry by Uuno Kailas, Eeva-Liisa Manner, Paavo Haavikko and Leena Krohn, plus prose by Mika Waltari, Pentti Holappa, Antti Tuuri, and others.
One of his major achievements, alongside Joyce's Ulysses and Sterne's Tristram Shandy, is the two-volume novel by someone that Finland regards as their own Joyce or Proust, Volter Kilpi (1874-1939). The stream of conscious novel is called Alastalon salissa (i.e. I salen på Alastalo / In the Hall at Alastalo). This novel combines sea stories with narration that involves very slow takes on a group of shipowners, and experiments with vocabulary and point of view. It is not surprising that Warburton devotes a whole chapter of his memoirs to the course of this translation. The English translation was started a couple of decades ago by a British translator, but I believe that he gave up, daunted no doubt by the sheer complexity of the task. I do hope that one day, another translator from Finnish will have a try.
But Warburton also touches on a number of practical matters such as payment, working hours and making a living out of translation. One of the first financial risks he took early on in his career was to give up his forestry studies in order to translate Ulysses for Bonniers publishers in Stockholm. After that he never looked back, but was always thankful of his part-time publishing job to help him, his wife and their small daughter make ends meet.
The translator Thomas Warburton (born 1918) has lifted the tip of the veil regarding literary translation in his little book Efter 30 000 sidor (After 30,000 Pages; 2003). This book was published in a joint edition by Söderström & Co in Finland and Atlantis in Sweden. It has now appeared in Finnish translation by Eila Kostamo, an appropriate fate for a book of memoirs dealing with the skill of translation. The 30,000 pages of the title are what Warburton himself estimates to have translated during his long career.
I am myself translating this book into English, thanks to a grant from Svenska kulturfonden, Helsinki. (Publisher, as yet unknown!) I am very happy to do so, not least because I recognise some of the good and bad things that can happen to a literary translator. But Thomas Warburton has translated a vastly larger amount of books than I have. Hence the title of his 140-page book of translator's memoirs. The reason this book is suitable for an English-speaking audience is that Warburton has translated important works of literature from Finnish and English into his mother-tongue, Swedish.
Thomas Warburton was born in Vasa, Ostrobothnia, and during the 1940s he ended up in Helsinki. It was in the 1940s that his career as a literary translator took off, after he had finally given up his forestry studies. Most curiously, one side of his family is English, as can clearly be seen from his name which has the traits of neither a typical Finland-Swedish name, nor a Finnish one.
While working part-time for the Schildts Swedish-language publishing house in Helsinki, he managed to translate important novels and poetry from English and Finnish. English-language works include Sterne's Tristram Shandy, Joyce's Ulysses, Henry Green's Loving, the Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters, Nightwood by Djuna Barnes, plus works by Faulkner, E.E. Cummings and George Orwell. Also plays for stage and radio by, among others, Dorothy L. Sayers, Peter Ustinov, Dylan Thomas, Tom Stoppard and Sean O'Casey. From Finnish, Warburton translated, for instance, poetry by Uuno Kailas, Eeva-Liisa Manner, Paavo Haavikko and Leena Krohn, plus prose by Mika Waltari, Pentti Holappa, Antti Tuuri, and others.
One of his major achievements, alongside Joyce's Ulysses and Sterne's Tristram Shandy, is the two-volume novel by someone that Finland regards as their own Joyce or Proust, Volter Kilpi (1874-1939). The stream of conscious novel is called Alastalon salissa (i.e. I salen på Alastalo / In the Hall at Alastalo). This novel combines sea stories with narration that involves very slow takes on a group of shipowners, and experiments with vocabulary and point of view. It is not surprising that Warburton devotes a whole chapter of his memoirs to the course of this translation. The English translation was started a couple of decades ago by a British translator, but I believe that he gave up, daunted no doubt by the sheer complexity of the task. I do hope that one day, another translator from Finnish will have a try.
But Warburton also touches on a number of practical matters such as payment, working hours and making a living out of translation. One of the first financial risks he took early on in his career was to give up his forestry studies in order to translate Ulysses for Bonniers publishers in Stockholm. After that he never looked back, but was always thankful of his part-time publishing job to help him, his wife and their small daughter make ends meet.
