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Hi Jane and Fiona,

I have a question about member indexing. Is it allowed to index a translated book? I am currently indexing all my English cookbooks, but there are some some that are translated in Dutch. I would really like to index them also. For example Food and travels: Asia (by Alastair Hendy) which is owned by 5 and 9 other members so isn't likely to be indexed very soon (I think). 

I feel confident about getting the translations right, but cannot be sure as I don't have the English original version.

Another option could be to index the whole book in the personal recipes section, but then other EYB members cannot profit from books being indexed this way.

What do you recommend?

Manon

Hi Manon

So can I just get this right? You want to index in English an English cookbook from the Dutch translation? I think this should be OK since as you say it is unlikely that anyone else is going to index it.  Perhaps we could request that one of the other members who owns the book proofreads it after with their English edition and corrects any mis-translations.

As you say, it would be a shame for this book to be indexed as Personal recipes since there are 13 other members who will benefit from you indexing the book.

thanks for the answer Jane, will start indexing this book soon!

One problem with this might be variations in the recipe titles that would make searches for those recipes more difficult.  If the translated book doesn't include the original English title along with the Dutch version (for example) the indexer's own translation may not match the title in the original English edition.  

It's not a huge problem, but perhaps Jane's idea of matching the indexer with someone else who owns the original English edition for proofreading purposes is probably a good one!

Yes, that could be a problem. In this book, some of the recipe titles are somewhat subjective to translation (for example "nightfisherman's soup"). But most are in the style of "shrimp-cucumber salad from Hue" and some of the recipes have the original names included "khong tom yam".

It would be great if someone could proofread.

I found out that for this particular book, the index is listed on amazon.co.uk so I could copy all recipe titles from there. That would decrease translation mistakes a lot.

I do think a careful proofreading is in order, as sometimes the original translation can be very sloppy as well. For instance, I own a cookbook where puff pastry and shortcrust pastry have been exchanged consistently in the ingredients lists. And this is a cookbook by a well-known cook. I actually found this out through EYB!

I volunteer for proofreading if anyone wants to index a Dutch cookbook of which I own the original. 

I think I´ll index all my English books first, as that is much easier. And then later start with some translated books, I´m sure anyone will be willing to proofread!

@wester, thanks for volunteering! Did not see this book in your list (food and travels asia by alastair hendy) but it is great that there are EYB members who are willing to help with indexing as many books as we can and make this a better site.