You do know what's coming up when you're translating. I suppose the concentration, then, is on finding a formulation which is speakable and in character - and economical as well, actually.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
I always read the translator's draft all the way through - a very laborious business.
What do I mean by concentration? I mean focusing totally on the business at hand and commanding your body to do exactly what you want it to do.
If a translation doesn't have obvious writing problems, it may seem quite all right at first glance. We readers, after all, quickly adapt to the style of a translator, stop noticing it, and get caught up in the story.
The translator's task is to create, in his or her own language, the same tensions appearing in the original. That's hard!
The market is like a language, and you have to be able to understand what they're saying.
The existence of another, competing translation is a good thing, in general, and only immediately discouraging to one person - the translator who, after one, two, or three years of more or less careful work, sees another, and perhaps superior, version appear as if overnight.
While you're writing, you can't concentrate nearly as well on what the speaker is saying.
You should not translate for more than two hours at a time. After that, you lose your edge, the language becomes clumsy, rigid.
When I need a word and do not find it in French, I select it from other tongues, and the reader has either to understand or translate me. Such is my fate.
Concentration is the ability to think about absolutely nothing when it is absolutely necessary.