A translation for the House of Lords of the United Kingdom

Case history of a translation from Italian into English for a special thanksgiving

A couple of days ago, a local company from Forli called us to request a translation from Italian into English to send a special thanksgiving message.

The translation would be engraved on a plate which had to be donated to the president of an important multinational company based in Great Britain, a life member of the House of Lords.

Of course, given the importance, the translation had to be absolutely perfect, ‘flawless’.

The text was only 70 words. But it doesn’t mean it was an easy job!

What were the challenges of this translation?

A very short but formal text, bordering on poetic.  Plus, a very short deadline: in fact, we only had a few hours to translate and proofread the text.

Anyway, the customer was very helpful and caring. He said:

“Feel free to adjust the text as long as you perfectly convey the content and style of the original”

For reasons of privacy, we are not able to show you but a very short part:

[…] il ricordo di un momento particolare in cui la vostra mano tesa è stata di grande supporto…

[…] … the memory of a particular moment your outstretched hand was of great support…

It’s not so frequent to find clients wanting a ‘free’ translation.

They more often ask us for 100% correspondence to the original text.  

In this case, however, the translator could translate freely, mainly focusing on the meaning and style of the English words, which was the best guarantee for a quality translation here.

Who translated the text?

We chose one of our best translators, a UK Consul in Italy.

Then, as usual, we submitted the translation to another professional Italian-English translator for proofreading to ensure it was free from any oversights or spelling mistakes.

Just to make an example, mixing up “it’s” and “its” is a very common mistake English, just like in Italian you must be very carefull to write “perché” (with acute accent) and not  “perchè” (wrong, with grave accent).

In conclusion, we were very proud about the way we approached this special translation job and the relationship with the client.

Do you want to know more about professional translations? Read our article: Identikit del perfetto traduttore 

Learn more about the House of Lords!