Careers: English to Japanese Translations

I… I think you’re just adding to @Kumirei’s argument.

So lemme just address this question directly:

No. There’s noone.

12 Likes

@saibaneko so… I wasn’t clear? hmm…

My opening… “Any longtime Wanikani users using Wanikani to keep fresh while working as a translator? Okay. Well who here is hoping to translate novels, manga, or even video games as a career after completing Wanikani and JLPT N1?”

My middle game "For a long time I searched high and low …Japanese.

My end game “I thought we were out of time…
But maybe just maybe we aren’t done yet”

@Kumirei you just keep making my point.

No, she’s really not.

Unless your point is that nobody wants to work with uncooperative people.

13 Likes

Translating between English and Japanese is one of the most difficult jobs a translator can put on themselves and should only be left to known professionals if the work to be translated is intended to be sold. You should instead be asking for resources to find proper, professional translators rather than to find translators here, especially since the first basic trait you’ll need for an E->J translator is for them to be able to speak Japanese natively, which very few people here have. Most people here are learners.

8 Likes

I have to agree that it wasn’t particularly clear. It’s true that the original post started with this:

which suggests it was addressed to translators on the forums. That was followed by this:

which suggests the sort of qualities desired in the translator being sought. Finally, we had this bit:

which offered a suggestion for an adaptation and indicated the purpose of launching a Japanese version, simultaneously if possible. However, it wasn’t clear that all this precluded the possibility of suggesting how to find translators outside this forum or that no other information would be of interest. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if many of the people who responded read the first two questions and went, ‘Nope, not a translator. Might not want to do that as a career either. However, let’s see what this is about and see if I can provide anything useful.’

@Lswan I say this with no intention to wound or to criticise how you choose to express yourself. It’s clear from your original post that So Blu embodies a vision that is dear to you. However, I’d just like to propose that the reason you’re getting replies that include suggestions on publishing or finding translations is that very few people on these forums see themselves in your words. I think there aren’t many people on WK who work as English-Japanese translators – particularly because I doubt anyone at that level would use WK for any reason other than the forums and nostalgia – or who hope to one day translate creative works, and even among those who do belong to that group, even fewer of them see themselves as writers and translators, particularly since some translators aim to reproduce what writers say as accurately as possible, with as little input on their part as possible. As such, even if such people exist on these forums, they’re a minute subset of the users here. That’s the reason why most replies have taken the form of advice that was generally polite and sometimes overbearing. I think everyone understands from your first post that you’re looking for such writer-translators to take on your work, but since none of us sees himself/herself as a candidate, we just end up suggesting how you might find someone suitable.

6 Likes

to you, this made it clear, but not to the rest of us otherwise you would not have been asked repeatedly to clarify.

Your post was fairly long, meaning it looked like there was room to discuss things.

Instead, you wanted a native speaker who is passionate about climate change to come forward and express their desire to collaborate with you. what are the chances of this on a forum like this one?

in addition, the fact people are still posting here keeps your thread on the first page, you should be grateful in a way because if only that golden nugget of a person was allowed to reply to you, chances of them existing here and being on the forum when you posted are now going from very low to nearly inexistent.

This is a forum: you post something, people will talk back to you.

There is still a chance to salvage this thread by allowing it to be a conversation about translation and - i would personally enjoy that - your thoughts and idea about climate change, especially in a book written for younger audiences.

i’ve only meant to help this thread become a good conversation, is this not possible?

6 Likes

I would say don’t poke the narcissist.

Engaging just to make them angry or poke fun at them shows poor character. You aren’t going to teach this person anything. They will walk away self-righteous and more convinced than ever that they are right.

Certainly you don’t need to give them free reign and let them walk all over you. But, by far the best way to shut down aggressive narcissists like this one is ignore them.

7 Likes

Based on the last half of the thread plus the flagged posts, this thread doesn’t look like it’s going to become helpful to anyone even if we leave this open for longer.

@Lswan This might not be the best place to look for a translator as most people are still learning, and I think your post and title has confused a few users. I don’t think you’ll get the answer you’re looking for here especially if you’re also trying to look for native Japanese speakers. It might make it easier next time if you highlight the question you want answers about.

It looks like there’s an email address on one of the posts so if you still want to reach out to Lswan about their book, that may be a better way. I’ll be closing the thread now. Sorry to those who wanted to get some last comments in.

25 Likes