Obstacles abound in Indonesia'a book translation business<\/p>\n
By Hermawan Sulistyo<\/p>\n
JAKARTA (JP): Book publishing is always a gloomy business in
\nthe Indonesian industrial landscape. Only about 3,500 titles are
\npublished every year -- most of them school textbooks -- and only
\nless than ten percent are "enlightening books".<\/p>\n
Among these titles, translated works dominate and almost none
\nof them were first printed over 3,000 copies. Year after year for
\nover a decade, foreign works have dominated books of scholarly
\nliterature, novels and literary works.<\/p>\n
Translated from their original works (mostly in English), they
\npose some complicated problems, both in technicalities and in
\nsubstance.<\/p>\n
Technically, publishers get some advantages from publishing
\ntranslated books. They usually do not need to deal with
\nindividual authors. For an original manuscript, an author
\nreceives royalties ranging from ten to fifteen percent of the
\nsale price for an originally published work. In contrast, a
\npublisher who wishes to translate an already published work, only
\nneeds to pay between five and ten percent of royalties to the
\nowner of the copyrights of the original work.<\/p>\n
In the old days, many publishers hijacked foreign works. This
\nyear, Indonesia adopted the rules from the Bern Convention, which
\nregulates intellectual copyrights. Law enforcement of articles in
\nthe convention has yet to be seen, but the adoption at least
\nprevents further violations in obtaining copyrights for book
\ntranslation.<\/p>\n
For some years, some of Indonesia's big publishers have taken
\npart in the Frankfurt book fair, the largest book fair in the
\nworld. With the adoption of the Bern Convention, Indonesian
\npublishers should be in a better stance to deal with their
\nforeign counterparts.<\/p>\n
Copyrights owners are mostly the original publishers of a
\nmanuscript and sometimes are literary agents (it is a rarity that
\nthe author of an original work keeps the copyrights).<\/p>\n
By dealing with a foreign publisher rather than individual
\nauthors, an Indonesian publisher would then have ample
\nopportunity to secure some more potential marketable books. A
\nseries of contracts thus can be made in a more comprehensive
\nfashion for bestselling books such as the works of John Grisham
\nor Michael Crichton.<\/p>\n
For scholarly works such as monographs which have a more
\nlimited readership, translation also fares well for Indonesian
\npublishers. Many scholarly works, published mostly by research
\ncenters located within university systems, are released with a
\nflat-rate system of payment rather than a royalties system. The
\nrespected Modern Indonesia Project at Cornell University, for
\ninstance, commonly hands over a copyright for a monograph with a
\nflat-rate system for only US$150 to $250.<\/p>\n
Translation projects for scholarly works have some other
\nadvantages. For various reasons, from philanthropic to political,
\nmany non-profit organizations and endowment funds happily
\nsubsidize these projects.<\/p>\n
In developed countries, due to tax-related technicalities,
\nthere is a clear separation of function between a commercial
\npublisher (more specifically called trade publisher) and a vanity
\npress. The latter depends on endowment funds for its operation.
\nHowever, unclear definitions of these two types of publishing
\nhouses in Indonesia provide some advantages for translation
\nprojects to be partially funded by endowments.<\/p>\n
In general, seen from the perspective of Indonesian
\npublishers, a translation project in book publishing can reduce
\noverhead costs to some considerable percentage of the total
\nproduction.<\/p>\n
Yet, once a copyright is obtained, the problem starts. Finding
\na good translator is not an easy task. There are many good
\nEnglish readers around. But, to translate a book, let alone a
\nscholarly work, one should also have mastered the writing skills
\nin both languages.<\/p>\n
A good English reader is not necessarily a good writer in the
\nIndonesian language. Most, if not all, scholars who have mastered
\nreading and writing skills have already occupied positions that
\nwould provide benefits unsurpassable by any of these translation
\nprojects.<\/p>\n
A first class publisher in Jakarta pays at the most two
\ndollars for a translated page. Working on six pages means that a
\ntranslator would receive no more than $15. In contrast, the
\nwriter of an article of the same length published in a newspaper
\nwould be paid at least five times higher.<\/p>\n
One would argue that writing an original article for
\npublication or just for a seminar and other type of "workshop" is
\na more difficult task -- thus making the two products
\nincomparable.<\/p>\n
But we should not forget that those who have the mastery over
\nboth reading and writing in the two languages are always skillful
\nenough to write original works. They are mostly scholars
\nthemselves, and they have surpassed the "stage" of only being
\n"craftsmen" in translation projects.<\/p>\n
A logical consequence of this situation is that translation
\nprojects are often left to be finished by those who are actually
\nonly second, third, and even fourth-tier translators. A finished
\nproduct, then, is often only a second-class translated book.
\nMuddled sentences, misinterpretation of terms and illogical
\nparaphrasing as a result of misunderstanding the original work,
\nare not uncommon.<\/p>\n
Many publishers have recognized this problem. Unfortunately,
\nthe remedies are sometimes also illogical. Many publishers "hire"
\nbig names as translators, who in turn often "subcontract" their
\n"employment" to second-tier translators.<\/p>\n
With low quality translations, it is more difficult to sell
\nbooks to a discerning readership -- leaving only non-
\ndiscriminating consumers buying these books, many of whom are
\nundergraduate students.<\/p>\n
A known technique to avoid a low quality readership, which
\nalso means a shrinking market size, is that publishers ask a
\nrespected scholar to write an "introduction". To some degree,
\nthis strategy seems effective to widen the market. However, many
\nreaders may not be reading the translated book beyond this
\n"introduction".<\/p>\n
It could be argued that many Indonesian undergraduate students
\nreaching the final stage of their study, will have problems
\nproducing a good quality thesis due to a lack of well-translated
\nbooks in the market. This problem may also be aggravated by their
\nadvisors being too preoccupied to check thesis' sources or even a
\nstudent's understanding of the subject. Within a generation of
\nscholarship, we may find a less number of gifted future scholars.<\/p>\n
This is a grim picture indeed. It is even worse if we look
\ninto the production figures of the biggest trade publishers,
\nwhich show that translated books are still their main and best
\nmarketable productions.<\/p>\n
A better picture is for the translation of novels. Technically
\nspeaking, translating a novel needs less language skills than
\ntranslating a scholarly work.<\/p>\n
In many cases, a publisher also provides better payment for a
\nnovel translation compared to a scholarly work due to its better
\nbusiness prospects. This explains why we see more and more
\ntranslated novels around in bookstores.<\/p>\n
Recently, in addition to novels, translated books are mostly
\nin the fields of management, computer science, how-to-do or
\nmanual books and spiritual life.<\/p>\n
On one hand, these translations seem to facilitate the
\neducational roles assumed by translated books. But on the other
\nhand, the increasing number of these types of books also
\nindicates a lower quality of readership. A lower quality of
\nreadership now may, in turn, produce a new generation of
\nreadership mainly familiar only with these "second-class works".<\/p>\n
Almost two decades have passed since the first proposals were
\nvoiced that the only solution to help the book publishing world
\nwould be through a determined political will.<\/p>\n
One practical solution proposed by the Association of the
\nIndonesian Publishers is a waiver of various taxes on book
\nproduction. However, to the disappointment of many bookworms, the
\nminister of education and culture has rejected this proposal.<\/p>\n
The writer is a researcher with the Indonesian Institute of
\nSciences. He received his PhD. degree from the Scholarly
\nPublishing Program, Arizona State University, United States.<\/p>",
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