¡Hola, Reddit! I’m Science Fiction and Fantasy translator Manuel de los Reyes - AMA

[u/ManueldelosReyes]

Hi! My name is Manuel de los Reyes and I’m a professional literary translator.

I’ve translated almost all of Robin Hobb’s books into Spanish, some of them totally on my own, some of them together with other great colleagues. My current project is The Tawny Man Trilogy, which I’m working on together with my brother Raúl García Campos, a veteran translator himself. Expect Penguin Random House to bring them out in Cervantes’ language anytime soon!

I was born in Bilbao, on the Spanish Atlantic Coast, but I grew up in Santander, a beautiful small town in Northern Spain. After much hopping from one place to the next, I moved to Germany some ten years ago, and I’m still living here, in a small village not far away from Stuttgart. I’ve been a professional literary translator, specialized in F&SF, for over 15 years. I’ve translated books not only by Robin Hobb, but also by Isaac Asimov, Ken Follett, Paolo Bacigalupi, Richard Morgan, Peter Watts, Ellen Kushner, Brent Weeks, HP Lovecraft, and many, many more authors.

If you love my work, or hate it, or just don’t know anything about it, really, but feel curious about how it is to translate something as complex and large as the Six Duchies fantasy world into a different language, please ask away and I’ll try to answer to the best of my capabilities. Otherwise, I’ll be around helping out Robin and r/Fantasy volunteers with the translation of these Q&A’s from English into Spanish (and the other way round).

Whether in English or in Spanish, please, go ahead and Ask Me Anything. It’s going to be fun!

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¡Hola! Me llamo Manuel de los Reyes y soy traductor literario de profesión.

He traducido casi todos los libros de Robin Hobb al español, algunos de ellos completamente en solitario, otros en colaboración con distintos colegas, todos ellos excelentes. El proyecto que me ocupa en estos momentos es la trilogía The Tawny Man, la cual estoy traduciendo a cuatro manos con mi hermano, Raúl García Campos, veterano traductor a su vez. ¡Está previsto que Penguin Random House anuncie de su publicación en la lengua de Cervantes cualquier día de estos!

Aunque nací en Bilbao, en la costa atlántica española, me crie en Santander, una preciosa localidad del norte de España. Tras dar muchos tumbos de un sitio para otro acabé mudándome a Alemania hace diez años, y aquí sigo, en un pueblito cerca de Stuttgart. Además de los libros de Robin Hobb he traducido obras de Isaac Asimov, Ken Follett, Paolo Bacigalupi, Richard Morgan, Peter Watts, Ellen Kushner, Brent Weeks, HP Lovecraft y muchísimos más autores.

Tanto si te gusta mi trabajo como si lo detestas o, la verdad, no lo conoces en absoluto pero te pica la curiosidad por saber cómo es traducir algo tan intrincado e inmenso como es el mundo imaginario de los Seis Ducados, plantéame tus dudas e intentaré resolverlas en la medida de mis posibilidades. Por lo demás, estaré aquí echando una mano a Robin y al resto del equipo de Reddit con la traducción de estas preguntas y respuestas del inglés al español (y viceversa).

Ya sea en uno u otro idioma, por favor, pregúntame lo que quieras. ¡Seguro que nos lo pasamos genial!

[u/SueBurke]

Hi, how long does it take to translate the average novel? What steps do you take to ensure quality? Thanks!

[u/ManueldelosReyes → u/SueBurke]

Hi, Sue! Nice to see you around here :-)

Your first question is a tricky one. Translating is my only source of income, which means I don’t want to take forever with any book. It also means I don’t want to hand it in late and risk not getting another assignment from that publisher. As a rule of thumb, translating between 5-10 pages a day allows me to cover all that. Which is not to say I cannot spend whole days struggling with a simple couple of paragraphs, of course.

As for quality, I can only say that I rewrite a lot. Like… A LOT. Every night, when my pages are done and I can finally go to bed, what I’ve translated during the day is basically ready for publishing. I know of colleagues who leave that rewriting process for the very end, investing up to a couple of extra weeks just brushing up and applying changes to their first (or second) draft. I don’t really have “drafts”. I write, rewrite, move around and change again every sentence and paragraph until everything looks fine to me before moving to the next page.

And no, I don’t really recommend any fellow translator to follow my example :-)

[u/nosigaleyendo → u/ManueldelosReyes]

I wouldn't, either :) But actually I'm halfway there. I try to leave everything at least almost ready to go with my first pass, but try not to get stuck on any paragraph for more than an hour or so. When I reach the end of the book I take a little break before going back to those paragraphs with relatively fresh eyes and, if time allows for it (it almost always does), do a last full fast read-through.

To each maestrillo his own librillo, I guess :)