Ynze Bakker (translator)

(3)

QS-Tracon Co.,Ltd.
Translation experience since early 2002, and now getting more experience with book translation..

I am a native Dutch translator and have been active as a professional translator since early 2002. I see this forum as a new challenge in my translation carreer. I dodn't have a lot of experience in book translation, but that is now changing quite rapidly. I have read a huge amount of mainly fiction books, both in their native (mainly English) language and their Dutch translations. My main interest is in Science Fiction and Fantasy, but I am also interested in other fiction books, like historic fiction or classical novels. Because of my ongoing interest, I am convinced that I can offer translations that will not only be correct, but that have a style that will appeal the reader.

Currently I am flooded with requests to translate books into Dutch. Although I would like to honour all these requests, I also have my regular (paid) jobs, so my possibilities are limited. I will do my best to keep in touch with everybody as good as I can, but I hope you will be patient with me.

One other thing has come up. Babelcube forces translators to give up their legal and moral right to the copyrights of the translated books. I do not agree with this. Therefore, I will finish the translations that I am currently working on, and after that I will not accept any new book translations until this issue is resolved. Authors invest time and effort in creating books. It is logical that they own the rigths to their creation. This also counts for translators, certainly in the case of Babelcube, where they invest time and effort to create a great translation. However, the standard agreement of Babelcube indicates that translators shall transfer these rights to the original authors. There is jurisprudence about this subject, in which even the US Supreme Court has judged that the copyright of a translation belongs to the translator, not the original author.

If I translate a book and not many copies are sold, I end up empty handed, and the original author ends up with the rights to my work, which should legally be mine. Please authors, address this issue with Babelcube, so that they will change this. Babelcube doesn't lose anything by changing this, but will only create a situation where translators get what is rightfully theirs.

Native language: Dutch
Translates from: English
Translates into: Dutch





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