Gregory Rabassa Quotes & Sayings

A translation can never equal the original; it can approach it, and its quality can only be judged as to accuracy by how close it gets. — Gregory Rabassa

Teaching translation is more of an editing job. You act as editor. But you can have fun with it. — Gregory Rabassa

A translator is essentially a reader and we all read differently, except that a translator's reading remains in unchanging print — Gregory Rabassa

So the poor translator must not just go back and forth between two languages, but if he is worthy of his calling must shift between two selves, with all the perils of this induced schizophrenia. — Gregory Rabassa

I have always maintained that translation is essentially the closest reading one can possibly give a text. The translator cannot ignore "lesser" words, but must consider every jot and tittle. — Gregory Rabassa

When you hear Portuguese, if you're listening fleetingly, it's as if you're hearing Russian, which never happens with Spanish. Because the Portuguese and the Russians share the open vowels and the dark "L," the "owL" sound. — Gregory Rabassa

The translator, we should know, is a writer too. As a matter of fact, he could be called the ideal writer because all he has to do is write; plot, theme, characters, and all other essentials have already been provided, so he can just sit down and write his ass off. (p. 8) — Gregory Rabassa

Translation is a disturbing craft because there is precious little certainty about what we are doing, which makes it so difficult in this age of fervent belief and ideology, this age or greed and screed. — Gregory Rabassa

One of my favorite tricks was taking a page and having the first student translate it from English into whatever language he or she was working on, and the next one would translate it back into English and then into the foreign language, and we'd go around the room and compare the two English versions at the end, and it would be amazing how much survived. — Gregory Rabassa

Every act of communication is an act of translation. — Gregory Rabassa