Founded by Daniel Hahn in 2010, the Emerging Translator Mentorship programme aims to develop successive new cohorts of literary translators into English, particularly for languages whose literature is currently under-represented in English translation.
The scheme matches up experienced translators with emerging translators for a six-month period during which they work together on practical translation projects, developing their craft through working on a chosen text or texts. The mentor acts as an adviser to the mentee on aspects of life as a professional translator, such as time management, meeting deadlines, managing finances and understanding contracts, and as an advocate for their mentee with publishers in search of literary translators.
Mentees receive a £500 bursary and reasonable travel expenses associated with the mentorship, which varies according to the relative geographical locations of the mentoring pair. The mentorship will include a residential weekend as well as access to various (UK) industry events such as International Translation Day and London Book Fair. Samples of mentees’ work will also be published in an anthology.
National Centre for Writing will facilitate an initial planning meeting between successful applicants and their mentors to agree on the scope of their project and how they will work together. The mentoring period lasts for six months, from October 2020 to March 2021, during which the mentoring pair will meet at least four times, either in person, by Skype or by telephone as appropriate. In between meetings, they will exchange work and comments via email.
The programme is open to emerging translators at no cost to them. An emerging translator is someone who has published no more than one full-length work of translation. MFA and MA students in translation can apply, but priority may be given to those who do not have access to the kind of guidance already present in a translation degree programme. Though English is the target language, the emerging translator need not live in the UK. The organisers particularly welcome applications for all mentorships from those groups which are currently under-represented in the literary translation community.
