7. Battling for money and better status for translators across Europe: CEATL meeting in Warsaw

Seven highly accomplished translators from different countries met in Warsaw to discuss problems of money, success and self-esteem - and it kind of worked! We all came away richer in brilliant ideas and inspiration, shared by the CEATL delegates who met in Poland's capital on 9 October 2018.

This episode is in English.

Thank you Elisa Comito (Italy), Bjørn Herrman (Norway), Heikki Karjalainen (Finland), Gertrud Maes (the Netherlands), Kevin Quirk (GB/Norway), Morten Visby (Denmark), and Rafał Lisowski (host, Poland).

 

A note to our listeners: No, you're not going mad - the ghostly apocalyptic chanting you think you're occasionally hearing in the background is real. As luck would have it, an actual choir was rehearsing upstairs from us throughout the meeting.

Topics:

00:00 Introduction (in Polish) on CEATL and our guests

04:18 Morten Visby on the relevance of CEATL, and the proposed EU Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market

08:22 Kevin Quirk on the role and relevance of FIT (Fédération Internationale des Traducteurs / International Federation of Translators)

11:59 Elisa Comito on CEATL’s contract guidelines, and why translators fail to negotiate good contracts

19:25 Morten Visby on potential advantages to translators from the EU Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market

30:31 Bjørn Herrman on being a translator in Norway, and how the Norwegian translators played hardball to achieve good rates

34:11 Heikki Karjalainen on the situation of literary translators in Finland

35:10 Gertrud Maes on the situation of literary translators in the Netherlands, and on shaming publishers into offering better rates

36:09 Elisa Comito on literary translators in Italy

39:10 Different formats of translator organizations

47:10 Social and technological challenges facing translators in the 21st century

54:49 Success stories from European translator associations

60:41 Q&A time: How to ensure high standards of quality in translation; membership figures; notable achievements; raising awareness about legal issues.