The title of Clifford E. Landers’s book says it all — Literary Translation: A Practical Guide. It is a handbook for beginning practitioners, with useful hints on every aspect of the subject, from the decision to become a translator of literature to negotiating the fine print in contracts, with everything that comes in between, elevated topics such as literary style and tone as well as down-to-earth matters like having a real desk instead of working off the kitchen table. Landers delivers on what he promises, with winning good humor and enthusiasm. But his book elicited rather melancholy reflections in this reviewer. Having done a fair amount of reading in current translation theory — though perhaps not as much as a professional translator and professor of translation should — I have come to believe that there is a widening gulf between theory and practice in our field.
