I’ve always been fascinated by the choices that happen off the page: the tiny compromises, the deliberate risks, the moments when a translator decides that something must change so the story can live in another language. Interviewing a living translator is one of the best ways to glimpse that hidden workmanship. Over the years, I’ve interviewed novelists, poets and translators for Storyscoutes Co, and I’ve learned that the conversation can be both a gentle excavation and a delightful discovery—if you ask the right questions and listen for the decisions rather than just the facts.

Prepare like a detective, not a judge

Before you pick up the phone or step into a café, do the reading and the homework. That means:

  • Read the translation closely and, if possible, parts of the source text (even machine-translated snippets can help).
  • Read other work by the translator and by the original author to get a sense of recurring strategies and tonal preferences.
  • Check interviews, forewords, acknowledgements and translator notes—these often hide candid reflections you can use as a springboard.

    • Don’t go in armed with accusations about “betrayal” or “loss.” The point isn’t to trap the translator but to help them tell the story behind each choice. Translators are used to being asked whether they “lost” something; instead ask how they negotiated a specific problem. That kind of prompt yields craft, not defensiveness.

    Start with context, then zoom into specifics

    I like to begin interviews by setting a generous frame: their relationship to the author, the editorial process, deadlines, and any institutional constraints (publisher requests, editorial notes, series briefs). Once that groundwork is in place, you can home in on tangible lines or passages.

    Specificity is your friend. Ask about a single, striking sentence or a character name. Give the translator the line. Ask: what were your options and why did you choose this one? Open-ended questions of this sort compel the translator to outline their practical reasoning—lexical choices, rhythm, register, cultural references—rather than defaulting to theoretical answers.

    Questions that reveal craft

    Here are the kinds of questions that have produced the richest answers for me. Use them, adapt them, or write your own based on the book.

  • “Can you talk me through the moment you changed X?” (substitute X for a character name, joke, idiom, or title)
  • “What were your actual options when you reached that sentence?”
  • “Were there moments you left literal strangeness intact on purpose?”
  • “How did you approach register for Y character?”
  • “Did the author give you notes or preferences? How did that shape decisions?”
  • “Were there editorial demands or market considerations you had to factor in?”
  • “Can you show us a passage where you tried more than one strategy?”

    • When a translator answers, follow up: “Why that verb rather than this near-equivalent?” or “What did you worry about losing if you kept the original structure?” Those micro-level probes are where you often unearth the real craftsmanship.

    Use parallel examples and short readings

    I sometimes bring a small “text dossier” to an interview: the original sentence, the published translation, and one or two alternative renderings either from earlier drafts or my own quick attempts. Reading these aloud together helps the translator hear contrasts and articulate why one version felt right. This technique is especially useful for rendering of humour, idiom, or syntactic peculiarities.

    Ask about the invisible constraints

    Publishing rarely happens in a vacuum. Deadlines, word counts, the need for a snappy jacket copy, and marketing briefs all shape translation. Ask about:

  • Deadlines: “Did you translate under pressure? Did you have to cut anything?”
  • Editing process: “How much editorial change was suggested? Were you given freedom to contest it?”
  • Series or imprint norms: “Was there a house style the publisher wanted?”

    • These questions often lead to fascinating stories—a translator recutting a sentence to fit a column, negotiating a cultural reference for a market, or preserving a dialect within a publisher’s expectations of readability.

    On untranslatability: pry at the edges, not the abyss

    “Untranslatable” is a seductive term. My experience is that it’s rarely absolute. Instead of asking whether something is untranslatable, invite the translator to map the compromises.

  • “Which words or lines felt most resistant, and how did you address them?”
  • “Did you deliberately create an effect that approximated the original but does not mimic it perfectly?”
  • “Are there places where you preferred to signal ‘difference’ rather than erase it?”

    • Translators will often describe strategies: compensation (moving a pun elsewhere), explicitation (adding a hint to preserve meaning), or recreation (writing a new joke that occupies a similar cultural space). These terms give readers an honest vocabulary for what happens in translation.

    Make space for ethics and visibility

    Translation is also an ethical practice. I ask translators about representation, voice and authorial intent—especially if the source text engages with race, gender, class or trauma. Questions I find useful include:

  • “How did you navigate culturally-specific representation?”
  • “Were there choices made to preserve authorial otherness, or to domesticate it for readers?”
  • “Did you feel an obligation to the source-language community, the target readership, or the author?”

    • These conversations can be tender. Approach them with curiosity rather than certainty. Translators often balance competing ethical claims; letting them articulate that balancing act gives readers a richer sense of the work involved.

    Practical matters: permissions, language, and publishing a long excerpt

    If you want to publish extended examples or side-by-side comparisons, talk permissions early. Translators will often need the author’s or publisher’s consent for public comparison pages. Also clarify language use: are you and the translator comfortable with technical terms, or will you need to explain strategies like “domestication,” “foreignisation” or “compensation” for your audience?

    What to askWhy it matters
    “Which passage took you the longest?”Reveals practical sticking points and methods used to resolve them.
    “Did you consider multiple voices for a character?”Shows how register and dialect are negotiated.
    “Can we read an unpublished earlier draft?”Provides concrete evidence of revision and choice.

    Make it a conversation, not an interrogation

    Finally, keep things human. Translators are writers and interpreters with emotional investments in texts. I like to begin with something personal—what made them excited about the project—then move into the minutiae. Celebrate clever solutions they’re proud of, and let them teach you terms you didn’t know. Your curiosity should feel like an invitation to open a workshop door.

    When interviews go well, readers come away not just knowing that choices were made, but understanding how and why—why a pun became an image, why rhythm was preserved at the expense of literalness, why a culturally-specific joke was moved or remade. Those stories are the treasures Storyscoutes Co loves to unearth, because they change the way we read the translated book itself.