Announcements

Back in 2009, I wrote a short post about legendary interpreter Peter Less, a Holocaust survivor who interpreted at the Nurembeg trials. After a quiet and happy childhood in Koenigsburg, Germany, Peter fled to Switzerland at age 17 when the Nazi party rose to power. Although Peter’s mother assured him that the Nazi regime would not last long and that the family would soon be reunited, she, along with Peter’s father, grandmother and only sister died in the Holocaust, leaving Peter as the only surviving member of his family.

In the face of this almost unimaginable tragedy, Peter showed amazing resilience, attending the University of Geneva on a refugee scholarship program and earning his undergraduate degree and then his interpreting degree, becoming one of the first trained simultaneous interpreters in Europe. At age 25, Peter was one of three interpreters from his University of Geneva class to be hired to interpret at the Nuremberg trials, where he interpreted the testimony of the very war criminals who had murdered his family. Again, Peter’s sense of integrity and resilience were apparent, as he committed to faithfully interpret the testimony of the Nazis, believing that they deserved a fair trial and that the world deserved to know what had happened in the concentration camps.

Peter Less ultimately emigrated to the United States, where he worked as an attorney in Chicago for over 50 years. In 2006, he was awarded the Gode Medal, the American Translators Association’s highest honor. In the post linked above, you can watch a video of Peter describing his experiences, and read an interview between Peter and interpreter Tanya Gesse.

Peter is now 91 years old and in failing health; he is in hospice care. Nataly Kelly has set up a beautiful online tribute to Peter, along with a link to submit a tribute or thank-you of your own. Nataly reports that Peter’s daughter is reading him these messages daily, and that she (Nataly) will assemble all messages submitted by September 25 into an album to be presented to Peter. Thanks to Nataly for setting up this lovely project, and please submit your own message, even if it’s just a few short sentences of thanks to a true hero of translation and interpreting!

The next session of my popular online course Getting Started as a Freelance Translator starts on September 26 and runs for four weeks. The past three sessions of the course have filled up before the start date, so please head on over to my website and register if you would like to join us! Students in the last session of the course commented:

–Simply put, this is one of the finest resources for any translator. No matter what your specialization is, I guarantee you will take something away from Corinne’s online course. For those just starting, it will instruct and guide. For veterans, it can remind and reaffirm. In either case, you’ll definitely enjoy the experience!

–I think that this course offers tremendous value for the cost. However, this is the smallest part of its worth. Corinne takes you from where you are and helps you move a step forward with thoughtful, detailed, and thorough advice for every question. To my knowledge there is not another course like this, and it fills a terrible void and need, but does so in a friendly yet rigorous way. I cannot say enough good about Corinne’s approach.

During the four-week session, we work on four very targeted assignments: your resumé and cover letter, your marketing plan, your rates and payment terms and your online presence (website, association profiles, LinkedIn page, etc). Everyone in the class receives individualized feedback from me on every assignment, and then we supplement that with at least four question and answer conference calls that you can attend live or listen to at another time. You also receive a complimentary copy of the second edition of my book How to Succeed as a Freelance Translator. The course is open to translators in any language pair, and both beginning and experienced translators are welcome! The course fee is $275 with a $50 discount for members of the American Translators Association. For more information or to register, please visit my website.

Thoughts on Translation is on hiatus until mid-August. Feel free to browse the archives in the meantime, and happy summer!