INTERNATIONAL TRANSLATION DAY, jointly organized by Free Word, English PEN, the British Library, takes place 2nd October 2015. For anyone within reach of London, there's a fine selection of talks and workshops.

The particular one I'm involved in (because it's of particular interest to me as a translator from Chinese) is: ‘TRANSLATOR-SPEAK’: LITERARY DIFFERENCE OR BAD ENGLISH? ‘Translator-speak’: a translation that sounds awkward. But does ‘translator-speak’ really indicate literary and cultural differences that should be respected by editors? Do editors have the right - or even the duty - to re-write an awkward-sounding translation? Meike Ziervogel,Peirene Press, Laura Barber, Editorial Director at Granta, and translator Frank Wynne debate the limits of editing using a selection of anonymised excerpts from translated and original-English novels. Will they and the audience be able to tell which excerpts were translated and which were authored in English? Chaired by yours truly.

If that doesn't take your fancy, there's much more besides. Booking and prgramme details here: https://www.freewordcentre.com/assets/public/files/ITD_2015_Web_Programme_Final.pdf