Blog Series

A Cuppa with Andrea

Our Hungarian Linguist of the Month

September 2026

Meet Andrea Denby: Hungarian–English Linguist

4 min read

Each month, we explore languages and connect with the people who bring them to life. This month, we're diving into Hungarian with Andrea Denby, one of TIL's most senior linguists. Andrea has been working between Hungarian and English for nearly 30 years, and handles some of our most sensitive legal and court material. We sat down with her to talk about what almost three decades in the profession has taught her.

Q: How did you end up working between Hungarian and English?

I read English and Hungarian at the Faculty of Arts in Budapest, though I didn’t set foot in an English-speaking country until I was twenty-one — everything up to that point came from home, school, the International House Language School, and sheer persistence. I married at twenty-three and had my children while still finishing my dissertation. I’d been offered a PhD place in Budapest but couldn’t take it up, so I went to Cambridge instead, and it was there that the Home Office recruited me — that’s really where it all began. Before that, translation was just something I fitted around young children whenever I could. Once Hungary joined the EU, the work grew steadily, and I completed my PhD at UCL in 2006. I’ve been adding qualifications and experience ever since.

Q: What's the biggest misconception people have about translating Hungarian?

Hungarian isn’t Germanic, Slavic or Latinate — it’s a Finno-Ugric language, and that kinship is far less visible than it is between, say, Latin-based or Slavic languages. You have to trace it back to the oldest layers of vocabulary: body parts, the essentials of life, flora and fauna, and certain quirks of grammar. It’s an agglutinating language governed by vowel harmony, its spelling is phonetic, and word order isn’t fixed. I’d say its syntax and that flexible word order are the real challenges.

Q: Is there anything that just doesn't translate cleanly into English?

Yes — you come across the odd untranslatable word every so often, and with experience you learn to watch for them and see how colleagues handle them. ‘Desperate’ is one; ‘compulsion’ another. I don’t think we ever render ‘skills’ precisely either — we tend to reach for a word implying an inherent aptitude instead. ‘Encroach’ is one I’ve struggled with lately; I can’t find even a close equivalent. And I don’t think ‘devastated’ quite lands either, nor do the names of courts translate cleanly. Sometimes the solution arrives sideways — I’ll be reading in Hungarian and a word will suddenly click, one I’d been hunting for in English for years. I visit Budapest regularly, which helps — my mother still lives there, so I get out, read the signs, look at the papers, and keep learning.

Q: What's it like being responsible for court and legal certificates?

It’s a huge responsibility. At my stage, with my experience, you rarely miss anything — you build a very sound grasp of legal vocabulary and usage. But occasionally something slips through, which is really a form of misreading. Even senior judges complain about it sometimes; for me it happens less than once every six months, and it terrifies me. I think it comes down to mental discipline, and it’s something I’m still working to sharpen.

Q: Where do you start with a tricky legal or technical document?

I start by looking it over and gauging the difficulty and the time it will take. If it sits in a specific legal context, I’ll go looking for comparable documents in Hungarian, and check how law firms, courts and solicitors handle that kind of language on their own websites. Rushing is the one thing I always regret — you eventually hit a point where something doesn’t feel quite right, and then you’re back-tracking to work out why, sometimes amending several terms as a result. Good preparation is essential, especially under time pressure, and because usage shifts over time, it’s important to keep checking live literature in the target language even when you think you know it all.

Q: What do you wish clients understood about a "simple" translation?

A good translation draws on far more skill than people realise. When I post-edit or proofread — in our sense of the word, which differs from its meaning in publishing — I’ll find things to correct, for good reason, while a great deal still deserves credit. That’s especially true of legal translations involving procedure: I might amend phrases, terms and words, and the translation will still reflect real competence underneath. You never stop learning, and a genuinely professional translation demands a complex mix of skill, attention and discipline.

Q: Any advice for someone wanting to specialise in Hungarian translation today?

Read widely, in both languages, and keep sharpening your skills — never let yourself get bored. When you’re out and about, pay attention to what’s happening linguistically around you. We’re all up against Google and AI now, and it will outpace us on the everyday, functional end of translation. Don’t be discouraged by that. Sometimes you’re up against real cultural gulfs, so keep an open mind, stay honest about your own work, and that will serve you well in any career you take seriously.

A Postcard From Budapest

Andrea visits Budapest regularly — her mother still lives there — and on her most recent trip she sent us a few photos, along with some notes of her own.

“The picture of the open half-dome with a tiny view of the other side of the Danube is from the reconstructed Renaissance Garden of the castle. I loved it.” — Andrea. The garden path (right), and Ottoman Iznik ceramics and Chinese porcelain at the Budapest History Museum (below) — a reminder of how many hands and languages have passed through the castle over the centuries.

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