I’m sure you are all aware that I’m not a traditionally published author with million sales to my name. I write when I can and when I feel like it, I sell a handful of books a year, probably not enough to go grocery shopping… once. But you write because you want to. Because you feel you have something to say. Because there are characters in your head that want to get out and do things. Not because you want to be rich and famous. There are better ways to achieve that.
Difference between writing novels and… say… making music, is that the consumer needs to be able to read the language you write in. My chosen language in English, a language understood by a pretty big chunk of humans. But not everyone can read English, or read it comfortably. That’s where translations come in.
The first translation of any of my novels was my own. I translated Under the Black Sand into Icelandic. It seemed like an obvious project to undertake. The story is set in Iceland, it is my native language and there are certain things about the Icelandic reality that sound better in Icelandic.
I left it at that. Didn’t feel like translating my other novels to Icelandic and while I speak Dutch fluently, I don’t feel confident enough to write in the language. I have a very basic understanding of German and Spanish, but no way near enough to write a short story, let alone a novel.
A few years ago, I uploaded my first two novels to Babelcube. It’s a hub service where authors hook up with translators. No money changes hands, but you share the royalties. Sounded like an interesting thing to experiment with. There have been a couple of failures, translations not completed, either because the translator stopped communicating, or – as happened in one instance – the translator decided she didn’t like my book enough after diving into it. No worries, can happen.
For whatever reason, Blood and Rain has been the biggest taker. It has now been translated into Portuguese, Italian and German by three different translators. I am obviously grateful and honoured that they took the time and effort. As for sales… I’m not famous. Sales are low, but they’re there. I’m writing to get ideas out. They are mostly translating to hone their skills. It’s all good.
As I was updating the website just now, I noticed one of the translations, Sangue e Chuva or the Portuguese version of Blood and Rain had received a four star rating on Amazon. No review, but somebody bought it, read it and liked it. That’s awesome!
Because here’s the thing. I have no way of knowing if the translation is good or not. I can ensure the original version is as good as it can be, but a translation to a language I have no grasp on is something I have no power over. I don’t have friends that speak all languages and can check the text. I have to trust that the translators are doing their best.
There have been times when I thought about removing the books from Babelcube, even removing the original books from vendors. But then I see this. A four star rating for a translation, a five star rating for the original, very positive reviews when Mont Noir came out last year. Why would I stop?
Even if not many are reading the novels, there are a few and if I managed to make their lives a little bit better, more enjoyable or interesting, if I touched them in any way, then it’s all worth it.
A list of all translations can be found here.