David Thayne, a translator and editor who has been working in Japan for 20 years, uses his experience in writing, editing, and designing books and magazines for major Japanese publishers to help independent translators contact publishers and complete translation projects.

The image of “translator” is often that of a non-Japanese university professor translating literature, but the best translators, says Thayne, translate full time to make their living, and they live in Japan. They are people who are eager to translate works from Japanese that will really be read, enjoyed, and learned from in English, regardless of their origin in Japanese. How can the energies of translators be better used to redress the imbalance we see skewed against J-E translation?

Thayne will introduce some of the books he has worked on and a newly established network, J-SPOT, Japan Society of Publication-Oriented Translators, which aims to help translators translate books they are truly interested in. He’ll also talk about how to approach and work with Japanese publishers.

Date: May 28, 2005 (Sat.)

Time: 3:00-5:00 P.M. (doors open at 2:00 P.M.)

Place: Sophia University No. 7 Building, Room 1215
7-1 Kioi-cho, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 102-8554

Access: Yotsuya Station, JR railway; Marunouchi and Nanboku subway lines. Enter Main Gate (Sei-mon), turn left at main campus crossroads and go to
12th floor of tall white 15-story building (No. 7 Bldg.) in front of the
North gate. See [url=http://www.sophia.ac.jp/E/E_universityinfo.nsf/Content/yotsuya_map]campus map[/url] and [url=http://www.sophia.ac.jp/E/E_universityinfo.nsf/Content/yotsuya_access]access map[/url].

Fee: ¥1,000 for SWET and JAT members, ¥1,500 for non-members.
No reservations necessary