Translator as "Bookfinder"

Translator as "Bookfinder"
(This article has been published in Japanese in the March 2003 issue of "e-Trans" and posted as a "contribution" at "www.gotranslators.com")
 
Not to far in the past there was time, when the military used scouts, sometimes also called "pathfinders" (Merriam Webster: path.find.er n (1840): one that discovers a way; esp: one that explores untraversed regions to mark out a new route -- path.find.ing n or adj.), to find their way through unknown country. Literally, these were people that could find a path not visible to anybody else. During a recent conference on translation, a certain question appeared in several different sessions: what actually is the job and/or function of a translator?
The answer to this question appears on first sight very simple and obvious, but many of the attending translators and agencies presented widely varying definitions and concepts. This motivated me to write this little article and express an idea, I did have for quite a while now, but that so far failed to find any resonance. I.e., translators should also (or maybe predominantly) be "bookfinders" in analogy to the above mentioned pathfinders. Below I will try to explain why.
          
I have been a translator for about 18 years and during this time spent nearly 100% of my time with activities, involving rendition of a certain meaning in one language into another. At times, in particular when the source text is of rather poor quality and/or ambiguous, this also involves a more less significant portion of re-writing or copy writing. Nevertheless, the basic idea is always the same: change A into B. In my memory very few, if any, people I happened to work with have ever questioned or even challenged this view. This is simply the job and function of a translator.
Yet, if you are a translator in any specialized field, show a professional interest in extending your horizons, or conduct a little research in your own or other fields of expertise, then you will certainly do some reading.
This puts the translator in a unique position. He or she is not only capable of professionally handle and evaluate two or more languages, but will be reading reference books on certain topics in these languages. Sometimes there are equivalents or even translations of certain valuable references, but most often not. Under these circumstances the translator is put in a position where he or she can evaluate several books that might be worth translating from both a linguistic and a technical point of view.
I believe that a look at the currently available selection of translated books shows clearly, that the choices are certainly not always professional. They are made by publishers based on information and recommendations of not always certain origin. This provides the general population with a selection of translated books influenced by a possibly one-sided and - naturally - profit orientated choice made by the publishers. But this could also mean, that the average man has access only to a distorted view of the world.
Today, the internet provides the so-called information highway, which offers users so much information with an incredibly short turnover time that nobody can ever handle. Yet, fast access to a terrifying amount of information could also block the view for the more distinct, practical, comprehensive and interesting information a book can provide. After all, reading should also be fun.
Often access to the information highway is highly appreciated, but who would like to live in a house with the front door opening right onto the highway? I would prefer a little distance from it and like the quiet small back roads. This is, where books come in. It takes much longer to publish a book than to publish and then update a web site. Naturally this means, that books are always somewhat "behind their time", but that does not reduce their value.
For example, I am a native German living in Japan. I know of literally "uncountable" translations of German literature, science etc. available in Japanese bookstores. Yet, conversely, whenever I visit Germany and look through large bookstores, I can find at best a handful translations of Japanese books. A very illustrative little episode happened, when I visited the annual Tokyo International Book Fair a few years ago. There I asked a German publisher if they might be interested in the publication of translated Japanese books. The representative at that booth said: "No, why? Publisher XXX already has published two books." Of course, this is hardly any kind of representation of a nation that publishes several tens of thousands of new books every year!
Thus, in spite of the information highway and Japan being an economic superpower with a major impact on the entire world, it still remains largely uncharted territory (a sort of a black hole), because there is so little real information about it available.
 
Now, here is a field, in which the translator can offer a real contribution to international understanding: by selecting and recommending books worth of translation. The translator who recommends certain books might even do the entire translation. In many cases this would be not only be good for the translator, but also the translation itself and the final reader.