The Importance of the Editor in Translation

Abstract

This article is concerned with the significance of the editor in the translation process. The author presents the current status of editors in translation studies and calls for more attention to be paid to them. In the analytical part, the author analyses and presents selected examples of editorial changes of the first version of Yuri Slezkine’s House of Government translation into Polish. The analysis deals with passages where the editors corrected the translators’ mistakes. Particular attention is paid to fragments where the editors implemented difficult, potentially controversial corrections. This serves to show the role editors play in the translation process as well as the multitude and importance of the changes they introduce. The article stresses that the choices in the final translation that the audience, including translation scholars, reads are very often the editors’, not the translator’s, which should be taken into account while giving praise or assigning blame.