A good translation experience

Hello Charlie,

Saturday the 14th, I took part in the "Prix Atlas Junior",  a translation competition taking place in Arles.
It was created by the association ATLAS, an association which promotes literary translation. This association created prices like the "Prix Atlas Junior" to sensibilize students to the literary translation. Indeed, translator and literary translator aren't the same profession at all. The translator's job is to translate a language into another language, but the literary translator's job is to translate a literary piece from a language to another.
They don't only organize this competition in English, but also in German and Italian, among other languages, and even "provençal".

I highly recommend you take part in it next year because it's a great linguistic experience.
So, if you want to participate next year, here is a quick guide, based on my experience there:

The competition takes place in the "Espace Van Gogh", which is a lovely place, with a small garden, composed of flowers, and a small fountain. There, I went to a library where a member of the association welcomed me, gave me the texts, and explained to me the theme of this year: infidelity.
After that, all the participants ate together. I sat in a room, took some paper, a pen, a dictionary, and my translation adventure began.

The little garden at the entrance of the "Espace van Gogh"

I stayed three and a half hours translating the two texts, which were two songs ("lipstick on your collar" by Connie Francis, and "Miriam" by Norah Jones, if you wish to listen to them), and I realized that translating a text isn't just translating the sense of the text, it is also about rhythm, and more generally about the way that you ear the language. This is what I spent the most time on: trying to figure out how to say "du rouge à lèvre sur ton col" in only six syllables.

The library where we were welcomed, and where some students translated.

If by miracle I am one of the two winners, I will tell you about the awards ceremony.

Here is the link to the Atlas's website if you are interested:  http://www.atlas-citl.org/

Lino