What’s the appeal of book translation if it rarely pays as well as commercial translation?

So, the question is: ‘What’s the appeal of book translation if it rarely pays as well as commercial translation?’ Part of the appeal is that translating books is really interesting work. In addition, book translations are not so deadline driven as most commercial translations: a book translation can take anywhere up to 6 months, plus you have the freedom to work at your own schedule. Another bonus is that, once the contract has been signed, it’s not normally necessary to be in daily contact with the publisher or the author, so this type of work is great for translators who want to be location-independent.

A Few Points to Remember with Book Translations

Make sure you always get a deposit once you’ve signed up for a book translation. You don’t want to risk not being paid for your work because, even though you’ll probably be working at a lower rate than your commercial translation work, your book translation will still be worth a large amount of money.

Make sure you get credit for your work. The gold standard is that your name should be on the cover in the same font as the author’s name. Perhaps your name will end up being on the copyright page, or somewhere else, but it must be there somewhere. This also applies for the Amazon page – your name should be there!

In normal commercial translation work the client owns all rights to the translation once they’ve paid your invoice. This is something you want to avoid in book translations. Let’s say, for example, that they never publish the translation; the translation may go out of print, or they may go out of business: this still leaves you with the opportunity of doing something else with the translation. For example, you may shop it around to another publisher, or you may choose to publish it yourself.

Negotiate a long deadline, because this is the key to making book translations financially viable. Most translators wouldn’t be able to live off book translations alone, meaning that you shouldn’t have to turn down work from commercial translation customers. Negotiate a deadline that gives you time to work on the book translation in your own schedule, thus allowing you time to also work for your high-paying customers. You can’t expect them to sit around for months waiting for you while you work on your book translation.