Over the year, creative translation has been the subject of many debates among scholars. Whether it was over the fact that it is more a reproduction than a production in itself, or over if all translations aren’t already creative translations, it was a very ambiguous field that was widely explored as a theorical concept. At least, if there was one point all scholars could agree on, it was that the creative process is a very demanding one with a complexity that always requires the involvement of a third party to judge of its accuracy.

Implying a conscious and meticulous manipulation of the target language, creative translating is drastically different from the standard practice that we should here call “mechanical”. Not only does it call for the language service provider’s creativity, but it also requires the translator to be compatible with the author and have a certain artistic education in order to be able to preserve the ideo-aesthetic aspects of the source text. All of these necessities represent the reasons why hiring a transcreation team is the safest way to get a creative translation. Our professionals have the skills to identify a situation and the characters involved in it to produce a final translation reaching beyond the text as opposed to perceiving and translating the text mechanically.

Now, to get a better understanding of this “demanding process” creative translators and our transcreation team go through, we can dissect it in three stages.

A peek at the process of creative translation

First, it is essential to identify the problem which acts as a starting point in the creative translation since that issue makes a mechanical translation with automatic choices impossible. A skilled linguist can craftly turn the problem into an opportunity to make the text resonate with the target audience; this process is not immediate and requires some brainstorming.

Then comes the writing of something considered “new” or “novel”. It can be a confusing notion; however it is important to keep in mind that it needs to be novel not compared to the source text but compared to the standard translation that could’ve been made by a mechanical translator. Thus, a creative translation needs to be novel by using linguistic forms that vary from the predictable ones, that are different from the ones that’d usually be seen in mechanical translations.

Examples can be used in order to get a better understanding of this notion of novelty in creative translations.

Here are a few comparisons between non-creative and creative translations listed by Newmark in 1993:

There is a strong possibility you’ve recognized the creative translation on the right every single time without needing to question it first. Each time, the excerpt coming from a creative piece has a wording that feels a bit peculiar when it stands next to the standard translation. It’s that exact peculiarity that makes it fall under the “novel” criteria, it varies from predictable linguistic forms by moving away from formulations a mechanical translation would use.

Finally, the creative translation needs to be reviewed by an expert, a third party that will judge of its accuracy and of the appropriate nature of the modifications. These modifications can vary from subtle to considerable ones with alterations such as additions, explicitations, implications and omissions, and it is up to the expert to adopt a macro-level perspective in order to judge of their relevance. A published translation of a novel by George Simenon can help give a better insight on the importance of involving a third party in the creative process:

Many details have been added in the published translation, such as the pad on his desk, the fact that the protagonist went back to his office, the messages left for him… This is where the limits of creativity come into question. There is a line not to overstep as a translator, and it’s up to the experts reviewing the creative work to decide of what’s appropriate and what’s not.

The limits of creative translating

Usually, examples of bad creative translations come from marketing strategies gone wrong with the translations of short slogans coming off clumsy or downright absurd, however cases of creative translations missing the mark can also be found in other media.

Take the line “He can pick any card from a pack”.

For the musical Cats in German, it was translated into “Seine Kartentricks sind sehr gefragt” which roughly translates to “His card tricks are very popular”.

The method employed here is called framing a scene – zooming out of the source text to reach a frame including the whole scene in the picture. The term “card tricks” here include many things and cover many elements, it is new and varies from predictable linguistic forms, however it’s debatable whether it is adequate to the source text or not. It has been argued that the visual conveyed is not as vivid as it is with the original line, the feeling conveyed is simply not the same.

This is why “Er zieht auf Wunsch jede Karte aus dem Päckchen heraus”, which means “At the audience’s wish he draws any card from a pack”, is considered more creative by experts.

This comparison only reinforces how demanding the process of creative translating is. Being novel isn’t enough, the translation still needs to be adequate and convey the exact same visual as the original line, which is why a third party’s point of view is so necessary.

This is also why TranslationsInLondon has a meticulous quality reviewing process that assures our clients to always get high-quality end products when working with our transcreation team. Reach out to us now to get your own novel and adequate creative translating!