do the original work they’ve been putting off all these years. Or they don’t have the energy to do translation on the side anymore. In any event, they tend to produce fewer translations.
One final thing that makes excellent young translators so rare is the fact that there aren’t any child prodigies, any adolescents with a natural aptitude for translation. Alexander Pope, who started his translation of the Iliad at the age of twenty-seven, is about as close as anyone has come. Even the best of translators look back at their early work with scorn or embarrassment. This isn’t the case with musicians and actors, or even with writers much of the time. It’s more like literary critics, who need some seasoning before they start doing their best work. But even critics don’t need to develop the sort of instincts that allow them to work at a rate of a zillion decisions per hour.
In summation, it takes a lot to be a first-rate translator. It requires knowledge of a foreign language and a foreign culture, a wide-ranging knowledge of life, a wide-ranging knowledge of English and of English-language literature, excellent judgment and interpretive abilities, a good ear for language and thought, the ability to write not only very well but in a range of styles, and a mature view of writing as something more than self-expression. Add to this attention to details, patience and persistence, self-discipline, a dislike of limelight, money, camaraderie, and a willingness to subordinate yourself to another’s creative work, and you have yourself a damn good translator.
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