Proofreading grumble

[redbird]

I'm reading Kalpa Imperial by Angélica Gorodischer, translated by Ursula Le Guin.

As far as I can tell, Small Beer Press doesn't proofread.

Yes, it's a small press. I know that. That doesn't make it any easier to read books that have words in the wrong order. Especially at the point when I realize that maybe the reason I can't get a coherent translation for the French quote at the beginning of this chapter is that it's not good French. (Babelfish has enough trouble if you give it things that are grammatical.)

I like the book so far (two chapters in), and as far as I can tell (not having the original) Le Guin is doing a good job of producing clear English without overriding the Gorodischer's style and voice (no surprise there, but I know her work as writer, not as translator), but with all the effort earlier in the production, actual proofreading would have been well worth it.

And this is not just the grumble of an unemployed copyeditor/proofreader--at the moment it's the grumble of someone who's not sure how to be fair to authors when their publishers hand them a handicap.

Comments

[rainliver.livejournal.com]

Ursula Le Guin is a great writer; I'm surprised that she would be sloppy in translation. Perhaps she's having a problem with French Creol versus proper French versus Quebecois?

[redbird]

If she'd translated the French, I wouldn't have blinked. She left the French epigraph in French, probably on the theory that the writer had done so when writing in (Argentine) Spanish.

[pantryslut.livejournal.com]

I've seen books that went through the publishing process with no proofreading whatsoever. Kalpa Imperial is not one of them.