Advice for Manga Translators: 9 Points For Success

Deb Aoki Explores What Makes a Great Manga Translator

What does it take to make a living as a manga translator? Japanese-English fluency is important, of course but that’s just one skill of many needed to be a successful professional translator. To find out what makes a freelance translator stand out from the rest, I asked the people who work closely with manga translators: manga editors.

I sent a few questions to manga editors at N. American publishing companies, including VIZ Media and Udon Entertainment, and asked them to share their advice for aspiring manga translators who want to go pro. For starters, what do they look for when they’re considering a new translator? Here are their top 3 criteria:

1. A fluid translation that reads like native English
   “No mistranslated idioms or half-translated "set phrases."

2. Creativity and variety in word choice and sentence structure
   “English has a ton of vocabulary. We also have slang, unique sentence structures and idioms. Anything less than fully porting a sentence structure and word choice to English sounds stilted.”

3. Accuracy

I also asked them for advice they’d like to share with up-and-coming translators. Here are their top 6 tips:

1. Hit your deadlines, or at least tell us you’re running late
   “It's best to tell the publisher or editor that you are running behind early on so we can make plans. I’ve worked with so many people (not only translators) that just disappear and won't communicate -- That is a definite no-no.”

2. Like the manga that you’re working on
   “You don’t have to always LOVE everything you work on, but if you hate it or are ambivalent about it, it will show in your work.”

3. Be nice, and learn how to accept constructive criticism gracefully
   “Comics in general is a small industry, and manga is even smaller. Most editors know each other at least enough to swap stories of who's good and who is troublesome. Be good.”

4. Learn and use the company’s house style consistently. House style includes guidelines for script formatting, punctuation and sound effects for all manga that is published by a company
   “When a translator doesn't deliver work in house style no matter how many times you remind them, or forget terms/names of characters, that really diminishes your faith in the accuracy of the translation when you see forgetfulness or disengagement like that.”

5. Be flexible, and provide options for translations
   “It's so important to be able to work with an editor and give options, especially when it comes to humor or cultural translations -- not just cultural differences but grammatical things like word-play that don't easily translate-- that need some tweaking. You may need to offer advice to your editor or rewriter as they tweak it to make it work. Keep in mind that there are other elements at play rather than strict literal translations, that the editor is addressing, such as retail requirements, market-based changes, and overall business-side requests that may need to be addressed.”

6. Do your research, and be prepared to explain your translation choices if necessary
   “The best translators all research extensively, not just for their own information, but to better back up their arguments for queries from their editors when they don't ‘get it’ too!”
   
   

Remember, manga translators are often freelancers, not full-time employees of a publishing company, they’re often hired on a project-by-project basis. By following these tips, you’ll have a better chance of getting translation jobs more consistently. Good luck!

Debora Aoki has been writing about manga professionally since 2006, but is also a lifelong manga reader who has many happy memories reading Nakayoshi when she was in grade school. From 2006-2013, she was the Manga Editor for About.com. She is currently the editor of MangaComicsManga.com, a site devoted to manga and comics from around the world. She is also a contributing writer for Publishers Weekly. Debora lives in California, in the San Francisco Bay Area and regularly writes about comics events throughout North America, and occasionally Japan.

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