Question How do you decide on which novel to translate?

Discussion in 'Translator's Corner' started by Little Potato, Jan 28, 2020.

?

My decision lies in

  1. reading the entire raw first then deciding

    24.0%
  2. reading part of the raw then deciding

    42.0%
  3. MTL-ing the entire raw first then deciding

    10.0%
  4. MTL-ing part of the raw then deciding

    6.0%
  5. how enticing the title and/or summary is

    26.0%
  6. the ranking/views/comments of the novel on the raw site

    16.0%
  7. Random selection and pray for the best

    10.0%
  8. NU Pickup Request

    30.0%
  9. Novel Recommendations from other sources

    20.0%
  10. How easy it is to translate from raw

    22.0%
  11. How easy it is to MTL from raw

    14.0%
  12. if I like the story or not

    68.0%
  13. if the genre is in demand or not

    6.0%
Multiple votes are allowed.
  1. Little Potato

    Little Potato Sexiest Potato Alive [SpaceBar's Master]

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    I don't think I've seen a thread with this question before so I wanted to raise it~ I'm just curious on how other translators decide which novel to translate. Which factors do you use? Do you look at how easy to MTL it is? or if you like the story? or is the genre in demand?

    In my case, although I can read the language, it's only my secondary language so I find it exhausting to read extensive amounts of chapters. I could read anything that's less than 100 chapters and decide from there but for novels with 100+ chapters, I find it much quicker to read reviews. I also sometimes check out other people's blogs about which novels they recommend despite knowing that reviews can be subjective and I pick them up without reading the raws.

    PS. Is there a way to know for sure you aren't picking up a blatant shit novel without having to read the entire story?
    PPS. For easy to MTL novels, do you copy the MTL-ed version and compare it side by side with the raw then edit and proofread it from there or do you insist on doing it entirely with just a plain old handy dictionary? Because I'm assuming that doing the former will save time in translating, editing and proofreading, unless you have a team to do that.

    There are so many novels out there that it's hard to filter out the gems from the trash so it would be nice to get some insights on these questions. If there is also a more efficient way to translate and cut down on time used, it would be amazing. Just some shower thoughts I've been having.
     
  2. TouchMeLikeASpaceBar

    TouchMeLikeASpaceBar [Innocent]

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    If you like + if you think others will like it
     
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  3. Frozen ink

    Frozen ink Legally had harem『Cathulu』Power of Love & Evil』

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    reading the title , seeing the cover, reading the description , then saying fk it and read~
     
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  4. Gitami

    Gitami Well-Known Member

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    You have to read it, with chinese novels the summary don't matter. At all. Reading user reviews can be exhausting if there's no sorting system since they could very well be unhappy with the current plot and tank the ratings. You can also consider how many the author has written before, if they have a few then it might be worth checking out since they have a modicum of success to motivate them to continue writing.

    If you are doing it as som sort of income generator then chasing genre demand with top rating may be the way to go but it might sap your motivation to translate so at the least pick one that you feel happy to do.
     
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  5. Little Potato

    Little Potato Sexiest Potato Alive [SpaceBar's Master]

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    Oh hey, that's one I've never thought of before. I just wish I had the will to go through the entire raw or even go through MTL-ing in worst case scenario to help me decide.
     
  6. Feng Tian

    Feng Tian Well-Known Member

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    It takes less than 5 chapters to judge a novels quality. Our friends at WW recently botched that one tho. Else Dungeon Predator would never have gotten a quality translation. Then again, given how rampant ignorance on basic writing techniques is among proofreaders and editors there its not really a surprise.

    If basic requirements in style and writing skill are met I consider story, characters and world building and read further than a few chaps. Maybe 100. By then you can hope the author didn't mess up.
     
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  7. xiazixin

    xiazixin Well-Known Member

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    @Little Potato I recommend you joining an random group and pick up an random novel on their group.

    But it's hard to look for a group with mtl.
     
  8. ludagad

    ludagad Addicted to escapist novels

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    Oh, I've done the mistake of reading part of the raw, liking it and jumping into translation. And suddenly learning that 40 chapters later ML rapes the MC... Now I'm not so courageous anymore. Titles and summaries are the first thing to grab me. If I see quick wear or apocalypse in the title, I'm half-sold. The rest depends on the summary and first few chapters xD.
     
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  9. Fuyuneko

    Fuyuneko winter cat

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    It's safer to read the entire novel before deciding because many (most?) Chinese webnovels have poorly written endings and/or get draggy in the second half of the novel. You can also try asking spoilers for the novel.

    My current criteria for novels I translate: I like the novel, I think other people will like it too, I have lots of ramblings thoughts when I was reading the novel, and I'm curious what the readers will think about the novel.

    I feel it would take more time to use MTL as a starting point? Because then your brain has to keep track of two versions, and one of those versions is partially wrong.

    The only shortcut I can think of is, I notice that my translation speed increases when I visit family in Taiwan because that's the only time when I frequently switch back and forth between Mandarin and English for extended period of time. As a shortcut to that, maybe watch more Chinese dramas and/or talk in Mandarin/Cantonese as much as possible in daily life?

    I don't think there's a shortcut. For every fifteen or so novels I read, there's only one novel that I think is good enough to consider translating.
     
  10. nachte

    nachte Well-Known Member

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    Yeah, too many times I've read promising stories for them to peter out or go off the rails completely. I only want to spend my time translating novels that I fully enjoy, so yeah, I will read the story in full before making my decision.

    I understand the exhaustion of reading in a secondary language, but if I'm really enjoying the story, I find that I want to keep reading despite it.

    I'm actually trying to decide on my next translation project after I finish my current one, and nothing's quite jumping out at me to say "translate this!" The one that's currently on the top of my list is nice, but I fear that people won't read it... :blobcry:
     
  11. Fuyuneko

    Fuyuneko winter cat

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    This happens so oftens. There are these two memorable novels that were sooo good
    异世流放 by 易人北 and 自欢 by 袖侧
    , but then they took a very different turn, to the point that I feel those novels were finished by other authors.
     
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  12. nachte

    nachte Well-Known Member

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    It is so tragic and frustrating when that happens! My trauma (I joke with love):
    I read one volume of a cute and funny BL rom-com with hijinks and misunderstandings. The second volume? I get surprise mpreg in a non-mpreg premised world. The twist at the end is that it's a play that the characters are rehearsing, but it was so incongruous it threw me out of the story completely. And I'm someone who doesn't mind mpreg if I'm expecting it.
    I still rue that story and series. :notlikeblob:
     
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  13. Snowbun

    Snowbun

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    Since I'm not completely fluent in Japanese, I do MTL with the WN raw side to side and I'm only involved in 2 projects in which I have access to the hard copies I bought back in Japan. The LN is a lot easier to understand. Sometimes when I have doubts about the meaning of certain passages, reading the edited/rephrased copy really helps me a lot. I'm not confident enough to translate directly from the paper copy because I take a lot of time to read it and going back and forth is not as easy as just changing tabs >A<)
     
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  14. Little Potato

    Little Potato Sexiest Potato Alive [SpaceBar's Master]

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    Exactly my case when I first started to translate a novel. I picked a random novel from the top ranks and since it had an interesting title and an interesting summary. I translated it, I never even stockpiled it too cuz it didn't occur to me at that time. Lo and behold just when I got onto chapter 5, I get depictions of ML raping the FL in his drunk stupor. That's when I knew.....I fucked up... :facepalm: 10-15 hours of work gone and I was pretty sure it was gonna get a lot of 1 stars...which it did to no surprise:blobjoy::blobjoy:
    Thanks for the advice! Though I might opt for the language learning route again. Force myself to read a minimum of 5 chapters a day. In that case, at least I can finish a 100+ chapter book in 3 weeks or so.
    Also, I wanted to ask how fast can you finish a book? I assume there would be a constant standard? Just so I can try to improve my reading speed as well. Wow, I feel like I've been asking for a lot of shortcuts lately :blobflag:
     
  15. Fuyuneko

    Fuyuneko winter cat

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    Finish reading a book? Or translate a book?

    As an example, it took me 2 days to finish reading The Dreamer in the Spring Boudoir (historical novel) and a year and a half to finish translating it. It's about 740k chinese characters long. My reading and translating speed is about the same for historical and modern-day novels.
     
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  16. Little Potato

    Little Potato Sexiest Potato Alive [SpaceBar's Master]

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    Reading. Wow. 2 days for 206 chapters? I was reading this easy to read 48 chapter novel yesterday and it took me 4 hours to finish....
     
  17. Fuyuneko

    Fuyuneko winter cat

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    I have no self-control. I stayed up all night and the next morning to finish reading it ^^;;
     
  18. Tea Fragrance

    Tea Fragrance Well-Known Member

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    If you're purely doing this as a hobby, it's best to translate a novel that you actually like instead of just one that's popular. One thing they never tell you is how tedious it gets to translate the mundane details that aren't exciting at all but necessary to build up the plot. You know, the kind of details that you yourself as a reader would only skim through. I can translate large chunks of witty banter really quickly and get stuck for hours or even days at a few short sentences of filler info.

    If you like the novel, it's easier to continue cause you can look forward to certain scenes and plot points.

    Edit: oh wait you do already translate. I need to stop replying to things before I finish reading everything LOL
     
    Last edited: Jan 30, 2020
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  19. Kuro_0ni

    Kuro_0ni Cocooned in a Life transition

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    Its best to translate content that suits your tastes. It'll be easier on your motivation, because you are just sharing your understanding of the story with the rest of the internet.
     
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  20. MadraRua

    MadraRua :: ˓(ᑊᘩᑊ⁎) :: Divorcee

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    I have to be inherently interested in the plot. Otherwise it would seem like too much work.
     
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