A new UK-based service, GlobeScribe.ai, has launched offering AI-powered fiction translation for $100 per book, per language. Founders Fred Freeman and Betsy Reavley claim the tool makes translation “a viable option for a much broader range of fiction,” adding that tests showed readers “could not reliably distinguish” between AI and human translations.
But translators have voiced strong concerns. Ian Giles of the Society of Authors’ Translators Association argued the service “sidelines the very people who make literature resonate across cultures,” while translator Polly Barton stressed that “the best literary translations offer more than simple accuracy… pacing, atmosphere, emotional timbre, rhythm.”
Booker prize-winning translator Deepa Bhasthi warned that some words “contain whole cultural worlds… that needs a human being.” Translator Julia Sanches added that AI gives “the appearance that translation is instant,” which risks making “good enough the new standard for the literary arts.”
**You can find the article on the Guardian website.