On World Book Day, the conversation around literary translation has shifted from what is lost to what is gained. Sophie Hughes, the most nominated translator in the history of the International Booker Prize and a judge for the 2026 edition, spoke with European Pulse about the craft, its challenges, and its role in connecting readers across borders.
Hughes, who has translated works by authors such as Fernanda Melchor and Vincenzo Latronico, describes translation as a process of rewriting. “A translated book is one that has been written twice,” she says. “Two distinct languages aren’t just a little bit different from one another – they’re extremely, often utterly different. This means that the words you read in translations are the translator’s words, even if they are chosen with the author’s words in mind.”
Why Translators Deserve Equal Billing
The International Booker Prize, which awards both author and translator half the prize money, has been instrumental in raising the profile of translators. Hughes notes that this recognition is overdue. “If a novel is 60,000 words long, and the two languages have no shared lexicon, that’s at least 60,000 decisions per book. But of course, it’s many, many more than that when you consider syntax, punctuation, spelling, dialect, intention, tone, linguistic conventions, cultural conventions, English variants, and the list goes on.”
This structural acknowledgment matters in a continent where literature often travels across linguistic borders. From the Bundestag to the Élysée, European readers rely on translators to access works from neighbouring countries and beyond. Hughes points out that translation is not a mechanical act but an interpretive one. “Translators, like all readers, also interpret. Translators constantly make decisions on behalf of the author and also the future reader, holding both in mind.”
What Is Gained in Translation
Hughes challenges the old adage that something is always lost in translation. Instead, she emphasises what is gained. “Publishing contemporary fiction from all over the globe widens the view and enhances the quality of conversation we are all having about the world, from the most topical news stories to inherited assumptions about people and places we don’t know.”
She cites the example of Samuel Beckett, who wrote the short story Sans in French and then translated it into English. “English’s particular malleability allowed him to ditch the preposition for what he considered to be the far more metaphysically rich ‘Lessness’. When he went back to adapt the original title, he apparently found there was no noun in French capable of expressing absence in itself. The translation improved the original. This isn’t a rare phenomenon.”
Translators as Cultural Scouts
Beyond the page, translators play a vital role in building literary communities. “All of the professional translators I know are extremely passionate readers, and passion is infectious,” Hughes says. “Today’s translators don’t only translate the words themselves, they also pitch writers either new or new to English-language publishers and promote their work to readers in essays and interviews and at book events.”
This scouting function is especially important for European literature, where smaller languages often struggle for visibility. Translators act as bridges, introducing readers in Paris, Berlin, or Warsaw to voices from Bucharest, Ljubljana, or Reykjavík. The WUF13 conference, for instance, highlighted how urban narratives from different European cities can enrich each other—a process that translation facilitates.
Hughes also reflects on the ethics of fidelity. “Edith Grossman, the great translator of Don Quixote, once wrote that ‘fidelity is our noble purpose’. But I also think of today’s translators as the very best in our community at communicating simple excitement for a book or writer. For readers wishing to expand their horizons, to read stories set beyond the confines of their own life, our purpose is also to be very reliable, really knowledgeable scouts.”
When asked about translations that have gone wrong, Hughes cautions against a nitpicking approach. “Precisely because translation involves an act of readerly interpretation, it’s easy to look across an original and someone’s translation and say: ‘That’s not what that means!’ or: ‘There’s a better word for this!’ But we’re sort of asking for the joy to be sucked out of reading translations if we approach it like this.”
For Hughes, a successful translation leaves no trace of its own labour—it feels as though the author wrote directly in the target language. That invisibility, paradoxically, is the highest compliment. As the International Booker Prize continues to elevate translated fiction, readers across Europe have more reason than ever to celebrate the art of the translator.
