#transl8

Translation is awesome! I’m really passionate about it, and I enjoy creating foreign texts for local readers.

From the questions you asked, I think you need to do more research about becoming a translator. If you’re in university, can you take a translation class to try it out? Or if you’re not in university, do you know someone who does translation and you can see what it’s like to do a translation project? It’s also different between each language pair (usually, you translate from the foreign language to your native language), with what kind of industries are in demand and how much money you can make doing it.

I don’t know about too many practical books about translation…I know more translation theory books from my university classes, but I don’t think they would be helpful to you at this point. You might like to take a translation certification class, or an industry specific class for your language pair. You can see what your country’s translation association (if they have one) might offer, and proz.com is a good website to get started with too (you can find classes to take, see what other translators are like, see what kinds of projects are in demand, etc).

I would suggest you find a Brazilian Portuguese/English translator to ask about that. I don’t know much about the Pr/En translation market. Literary translation is a very difficult field to get into- it’s a smaller market and it’s very difficult work. The reason why agencies (and anyone really) prefer to hire native speakers of the target language (the language that you’re translating into), is because they usually have a better command of the language.

How is the translation market in Brazil? It may be easier to find work translating English into Brazilian Portuguese, and there may be more in-house work (like full-time with a company or agency) located in Brazil. There isn’t a lot of in-house work in the US, unfortunately literary translation and translation in general is a small industry.

Hi anon, it’s cool! Being a translator does require advanced language skills (in both languages, ex. Spanish & English) and being able to write well. Depending on the languages you’re translating, the job market can be very different. It also depends on what kind of texts you want to translate. So I would recommend asking a Spanish into English translator about their advice!

If you’re in college, can you take a translation course to try it out? I was able to take a French into English translation course when I was in university, and I really enjoyed it. I went on to get a degree in translation (which you don’t need, but it helped me get the skills), and now I do freelance translation. A fair amount of translators are able to make it full-time work, but I do want to be honest & say it can be hard and I only translate part-time. I have a day job in an office (doing something unrelated to translation/languages) and that pays my bills. But I really do like translation and working with French :)