Naked Translations was not quite as exciting as I’d hoped it would be, yet the title is accurate: it is the weblog of an interpreter and translator from France who has lived and worked in the U.K. for the past nine years translating, not surprisingly, French into English and vice versa. A quick glance at the contents of the uncluttered main page provides enough information for the reader to decide then and there if the blog is worth reading. It’s undoubtedly a specialized, niche blog – the latest entry is titled ‘Synecdoche’, a word with which I have no familiarity but through reading the entry I believe it means something similar to ‘using a singular noun/pronoun to represent a group.’ In the entry the author gives us the example of ‘school’ used to represent ‘schoolchildren.’ The point is, this blog isn’t always light reading.
But Naked Translations isn’t dry or academic either. Scanning through the archives, I came to realize that the life of a translator is, if anything, lived in solitude, and the author uses the blog as a vehicle for communicating with the outside world, relating personal experiences, anecdotes, and much of the daily idiosyncrasies of life as a translator. Most entries, in fact, begin with little tidbits about the author’s day-to-day life, but I was hard-pressed to find an entry that didn’t quickly bridge the authors personal life to the blogs mission: the art and business of translation. For example, the remodeling of the bathroom leads to an entry about the solitary existence of a translator; watching an episode of ER leads to a discussion on the structure of the Klingon language from Star Trek; a weekend stroll quickly becomes an entry about an uncommon English word (copse). The writing in all the entries is clear and well-structured, as I would hope to see from someone whose living is based upon language and communication. However, because the blog focuses on a specific and uncommon industry, some of the writing becomes technical and the author’s professional vocabulary is unique to the point that a reader who is not familiar with the business of translation or odd grammar rules might have some difficulty keeping up. Also, some entries use specific examples of what the author is working on and if you don’t know much French, these entries will probably mean very little to you.
The best technical aspect of the blog: on the main page the sidebar includes a list of the categories the author uses and links to four or five entries in each category. This feature enabled me to quickly find that the author’s entries cover a wide spectrum of topics about language and translation, with categories ranging from ‘Words’ to ‘It’s a funny job.’ The design is excellent and keeps the user focused on the blog’s specific purpose. One change I think could be beneficial is the inclusion more entries on the main page, as currently only the three latest entries reside are displayed, forcing the user to click through the archives or the categories to get more than a brief glance into the mind of the author.
The blog is an excellent, stimulating site for anyone interested in translation, writing, linguistics or the peculiarities of an uncommon job. The categorized list of links to older entries enables the reader to find topics that he or she might be interested in or information about a specific topic covered by the weblog quickly. The author is both knowledgeable and a clear writer. It gets a 4.5.
Naked Translations