Translator Antonella Lettieri on the International Booker Prize, AI and why shame is unhelpful.
In conversation with award winning translator, Antonella Lettieri, about the art, culture and politics of translation.
Antonella Lettieri is a multi-talented genius in the translation industry. For fourteen years, she has been an academic, editorial and commercial translator, as well as a reader and consultant for publishers, agents and literary scouts. While she continues to do this, Lettieri’s heart lies with literary translation.
Over the last three years, she has been growing her career as a literary translator to incredible success. Lettieri won first prize in the John Dryden Translation Competition in 2023, was awarded the 2024 PEN Grant for the English Translation of Italian Literature to translate ‘Your Little Matter’ by Maria Grazia Calandrone, and in 2025 won the TA First Translation Prize for her translation. In February 2026, Lettieri’s translation of ‘The Duke’ by Matteo Melchiorre was longlisted for the International Booker Prize. Lettieri’s growing decoration articulates her immense talent and passion for translation.
The translation industry is something I am immensely interested in. However, I find that interviews with translators focus, almost exclusively, on the intricacies of translation. While this is relevant, it is also alienating. Most people do not want to know about syntaxes or grammar choices, and are instead curious about the landscape of translation in a much broader sense; its artistry and culture. Beyond the sentence structures, there is an appetite to understand how the translation industry operates, and how it is under threat.
When I called Lettieri, an earnestly enthusiastic face framed with striking red glasses met mine, and I knew we were in for a treat. Afterwards, Lettieri graciously said that our conversation had been one of the most stimulating interviews she’d had, because we spoke beyond the books. Which articulates that my suspicion is correct - both readers, and translators, want a refresh on the translator interview format - and I am happy to oblige.
Below is a condensed version of our conversation. I do hope you enjoy it.
Congratulations on being such a superstar at the moment! (being awarded the TA 2025 Translation Prize and The Duke being longlisted for the International Booker Prize!)
I don’t know what to say - it’s been a crazy, insane time, in the best possible way.
Does the International Booker longlist feel particularity gratifying because you passed the title onto Richard Village (the editor and publisher)?
Yes, it does. The Duke is a book I feel a real sense of authorship about. Obviously, the author is Matteo Melchiorre. But it is a book I feel I have discovered and championed to be brought into English. I’m not going to say I feel smug about it, but…
I think you can feel smug about it! What was it about The Duke that compelled you to pass it on to Richard?
I work as a reader for a scout, meaning I start reading lots of books every week. Most of them are dropped because I don’t think they’re particularly interesting or will work in translation. That’s how I first stumbled across The Duke. But unlike the others, it stood out right away. I was immediately hooked as a reader, and at that point any kind of ‘professional’ hat was gone.
When I started working with Richard on Your Little Matter, we became friends. I asked him if he was looking for something specific, and he said he wanted to read a book that has the feel of a family saga, but is different. I thought of The Duke - a saga about a family of one. I didn’t have a pitch, only my enthusiasm and my memories of reading it. Richard reads and translates from Italian, so all I had to do was tell him to read it! As he was reading, he kept telling me, ‘This book is extraordinary,’ and I could tell that he was exactly taken by it as I had been. It was very easy - kind of like a fairytale! Richard Village and I are in a love triangle with The Duke.
[Laughter from both] What are you looking for to make a good translation into English? How do you get a sense for what works, and subsequently what wouldn’t work?
The truth is, it’s a personal reaction. It is also about perspective on the market, and the publishing industry. What I might discard, someone else might think is good. There is no perfect formula. For me, I try to read the first 30-40 pages to see if I want to read more, if I’m curious about what might happen. Once I’m hooked, I start thinking about it in the publishing landscape at large and how a non-Italian reader would receive it.
Do you feel you have lost the ability to read Italian books for pleasure because you’re always thinking about the potential for a translation? Can you separate them at all?
I can read a book in Italian and not think ‘Should I be pitching this?’ if it’s already translated. In that case, it’s easy to relax. [laughter] But it’s not necessarily possible for me to keep them separate. Not because of pitching, but when I like a book, I start translating it in my head. It’s not something I do consciously, I just hear my brain transforming it - I do it from Italian to English and English into Italian. I’ll encounter interesting technical problems and think about how I would tackle them. It’s never completely ‘off’. I definitely can read for pleasure in Italian - but these days I tend to read in English for pleasure and Italian for work.
Truly fascinating. What’s the hardest thing you’ve ever had to translate?
There are several - hard in different ways. But in Your Little Matter, where the author goes into detail about the autopsy, I had to research a lot of language about drowning bodies and what the corpse of someone who has drowned looks like, from a scientific point of view. And that was tough because I had to look at images that were uncomfortable, and because the emotional charge of the paragraphs was really high.
Is it intimidating to translate things that are so personal?
Oh it really, really is. I felt it a lot with Your Little Matter - you feel a strong sense of personal responsibility because you can feel that the author has poured everything onto the page, in a raw, vulnerable way. You want to convey that, but in the most exact way possible. You don’t want to make up anything, because they haven’t. It’s a weird act of ventriloquism, translating a memoir, because you’re becoming an ‘I’ that is not you, for however long the process of translation lasts.
It’s a very unusual position, because translation is a lonely profession. You don’t get to complain to a colleague and say, ‘you’ll never believe what I had to translate today!’ But it is also not your story, so you can’t stake a claim to any of it, because it didn’t happen to you. But still it has happened to you, through words. Fiction is much easier from that point of view, because you can follow the author wherever they lead you.
I love that phrase ‘it has happened to you through words’. What’s your favourite part about being a translator?
Oh, lots of things. But mostly spending my day with excellent books. Getting to do that as a job, spending eight hours a day disassembling and reassembling a wonderful piece of literature, it’s just fantastic. [Antonella grins] There’s nothing better than it.
How different is the process of translating commercial and literary?
The process is different, but I definitely have developed my own system based on my experience. Commercial was my first apprenticeship into translation, so of course I’ve carried over some of the lessons I’ve learnt. But there is also a massive difference in nature. All that matters for commercial translation is precision, accuracy and that it reads well in the target language. There is no room for creativity, but it’s a much quicker process. I will do a few drafts and a project can be closed in a matter of hours or days – weeks if it’s a big one. While a book is something you have to settle into, it’s a long ride.
To my understanding, commercial translation is the most impacted by AI, but literary not so much. Do you think AI fails both in the same way?
[sigh] I hate AI. I have nothing positive to say about it. I don’t have any positive outlook on what it can offer to any creative industry. I know little about it, and the little I know, I don’t like. The translation industry has basically been the Petri dish of AI, and I have seen it go downhill, and disappear, in a matter of ten years. And anytime I read any good-willing commentary about how this is just a ‘professional evolution’, it’s frankly bollocks. They said that about commercial translation, and look what happened.
People who were making their livelihood from it are not anymore. Rates have plummeted, the quality of the jobs is abysmal, there’s no sense of pride or ownership in any of the outcomes because it’s all slop. If people want to know what AI does to an industry, they just need to look at commercial translation. It’s already been done, and it’s already happened, and I’ll never believe anyone who says otherwise because I have experienced it firsthand.
Do you feel like you are competing with AI in commercial translation?
That competition has been lost. Commercial translation doesn’t even exist anymore as such. All that exists now is the post-editing of machine translation.
It sounds like a nightmare, post-editing a machine translation.
It really is. It’s soul-crushing work. I don’t wish it on anyone. The biggest risk of AI in translation - both commercial and literary - is that users get used to the ‘good enough’ standard. Especially in commercial translation, this has become so evident. The focus immediately went from perfect, fluent translations to anything that gets the gist of the meaning across and reads passably. The standard of quality has plummeted so much. It’s hard to express.
Could this happen to literary translation? I am in two minds about it. There are moments where I think all of this wonderful momentum we are witnessing about literary translation is just a swan song, and that in ten years’ time, none of it will exist. We will look back to it as an odd time when translators were famous, important and listened to for five minutes, and then it was all gone. That’s when I feel the bleakest, most dejected about it.
Other times, I feel that the saving grace of literature is that most people read for pleasure. And when you’re reading for pleasure, you want to engage with something that speaks to your humanity. I feel hopeful that most readers will reject all forms of AI-created literature. Because in what way does AI speak to my experience of being alive?!? It can’t - because it doesn’t know what it’s like.
Do you think there will ever be a difference between Independent and the Big Five publishing when it comes to AI translation?
I mean, there are definitely already sectors where AI has infiltrated the commercial side of literary publishing, romance has. But, to me, so-called ‘literary fiction’ is going to be way more impermeable to that. I’m not sure there is going to be a difference between Indie and Big Five publishers.
On the one hand, you’d like to think that an Indie publisher appreciates the art of translation more, but they could be swayed by the big cost savings of AI. Whereas big publishers might care slightly less about the optics of using AI, but have the economic power to commission translations without giving it too much thought. I don’t think it’s necessarily going to be a battle fought along the lines of Big Five versus Indie publishers.
It’s going to be a fight where readers are going to be the real front line instead - whether they go for it or not, whether they accept it or not. Because if they don’t, then publishers can’t justify it. But if readers are undiscerning or uninterested, then of course the cost saving is going to be too interesting to overlook.
God it’s depressing. It’s another fight for translator visibility. I know that with the three books you have translated, you are on the cover. When you’re a translator, can it be requested and/or discussed, or is it the publisher’s decision?
It’s important to make a distinction between being credited as a translator, and having your name on the cover. Because, even in cases where the translator’s name is not on the cover, usually they are credited as the author of the translation inside the book, whether it’s in the copyright page or inside cover. Usually, in this day and age, the name of the translator is given. For a translation to not be credited at all, that would be extremely egregious and I don’t think I can think of any modern cases…
[Martha pulls a face]
You have a case. Do you have a case?
I got sent a book from a publisher in the US, that claims it’s a translation, but a translator name isn’t anywhere on the book…
What about in the copyright notice?
Nothing, I can’t find anything.
To me, in this day and age, we can assume it’s AI - especially if it’s not credited.
Right. I won’t be reading that. On the other hand, the UK edition has a translator credited... Because surely the copyright, for a translator, is contractual?
Yes, it is - don’t quote me on the law, but yes, you do retain copyright in most of the cases. There’s a difference between not being credited at all, like the book you just showed me - that is something I have not come across before in recent times. I don’t know how to respond to it, other than thinking it must be AI. Apart from this case, I would say most translators are credited these days - whether cover or inside.
Is being on the front cover the ‘highest’ level of credit?
Yes, I guess it is. Most publishers are more keen on crediting translators on the covers these days. I have been lucky that it has always been a given and I haven’t had to fight for it. A translation contract, like any other contract, involves a negotiation. There is usually some margin for conversation and discussion.
If I were to work with a publisher that doesn’t offer the name of the translator on the cover, I’d probably make a point of asking if they would reconsider. You’d hope, even if they said no, they’d note your feelings about it. For me, but others might not agree with me, my name on the cover is not necessarily a hill to die on. If I’m excited about the project, and I’m certain my translation would be credited properly, my name on the cover is not the be all and end all. It’s not ideal, and I don’t love it, but personally speaking I’m not going to pass on a project I feel passionate about simply because of it.
I hope that the industry will move away from that organically over time. I hope that if lots of translators keep asking for their names to appear on the covers, a certain threshold will be reached that will mean that even publishers who are still hesitant will reconsider their approach.
Do you think publishers do it to deceive readers that books aren’t translated? Because sometimes there is an assumption that translated books are inherently challenging?
In the past, publishers were definitely trying to bury the lede a bit, but I don’t think that’s what goes through a publisher’s mind now. For some it has to do with how the cover looks, for others it has to do with a certain understanding of authorship, meaning that they prefer there to be only ‘one’ author of the book. I can’t say that these are arguments I particularly agree with, but I can see the point.
What do you think about translated literature becoming so popular in the market? I know you’ve said that you could not pinpoint the first translated book you read, because it was so integrated in your childhood. I’m sure that’s common across the board for those who aren’t native English speakers, that they are interacting with translation much more, and earlier?
I mean, I don’t think we should romanticise it. It’s not that everyone is beautifully educated in Italy. It’s just the consequence of the dominance of English and the media all over the world. But there is definitely a strong cultural wave that comes from America, and the UK to an extent.
It’s not something that should be romanticised, but it is an interesting, stark comparison. I can only speak for Italy, because that’s my experience. Italy has a certain reputation as a country that is always looking abroad as a way to find itself lacking. Obviously, it’s a generalisation, but it is kind of the truth. Historically there has been a lot of hunger for things from abroad - that ‘they do it better over there’ feeling. Quite the opposite is true in the UK, and that is a solid legacy of colonialism. It’s just cultural dynamics, and the only way we have to contrast them is by being aware of them, and actively working against the grain.
Yes. I agree it isn’t something to romanticise. I grew up in an incredibly affluent part of the UK, a very insular, ‘English’ environment, where school did not value languages. It wasn’t until much later in my life that I gained awareness of translation. To hear you had awareness from aged 9 of something that was unknown to me for a long time, blew my mind. The cultural difference is just so stark.
Yes, but you also have to think about the opposite. I grew up being told by parents, teachers, everyone around me that you must learn English if you want to have a good job - you cannot be anyone of importance, or success, if you do not know English.
Which is an immense pressure on a child?
Yes. When I was growing up, people spoke English really badly in Italy. Now it is much, much better because of the media. It’s just different - we can’t say one is better than the other. Obviously, when we talk about colonial feelings surviving in contemporary society, that’s bad…
[Martha and Antonella both laugh] Very, very bad.
But, when it comes to translated literature, and in all spheres of life, shame doesn’t get us far. It’s a counterproductive, unhelpful emotion. Should we feel ashamed that we do not speak another language? Or that we don’t know much about the literature of another country? No - we can’t know everything. What we should be is curious - which is a much more helpful sentiment when it comes to translated literature, and everything else. It’s curiosity that gets you far, shame just keeps you stuck.
Yes absolutely. Nothing is static, there is always time to be curious. To your point, I was not exposed to much curiosity when I was younger to other cultures. That is just an inherently British thing, it’s embedded in everything here.
What do you think about the term ‘translated literature’ categorising books together? Some readers do not like it, but it is a ‘thing’ (for lack of a better phrase) in the publishing landscape?
It’s a fact that some books are translated, I don’t think there can be any arguing against that?! It’s not a genre, of course it’s not, but it is a category. If it’s useful to talk about something we weren’t doing before and we are doing now, then it’s helpful?
I’m obviously passionate about translated literature, so I am confused about how someone might be irked by the use of this definition. I can maybe understand why that might be the case – it’s a matter of taking a political stance, perhaps – but on the other hand, it describes a fact. If a book is translated, you’re not reading the original book. That is an unchangeable truth. However you want to approach it, whether you decide to read the book or not because it is translated, that is up to each individual reader. The fact that a book is translated is non-negotiable. If we were talking about a generic label of ‘foreign’ literature, that would be perhaps different, and othering. But translated literature just describes a fact.
Is there a right way to talk about translated literature? Sometimes reviewers (myself included) get criticised for not engaging with the ‘original’ text, for not commenting on the translation?
It’s a tricky subject because translators advocate for visibility, which is absolutely right, but I can feel the plight of critics talking about translation, because there is a limited list of adjectives. Translations can be ‘brilliant’, ‘luminous’, ‘astounding’ - you know, or negative adjectives, but it kind of has to stop there in a way? Unless you have the language to, or unless there is a translator’s note that illustrates a particular challenge in the translation and how they went around tackling it, then it kind of has to end there? It’s a difficult conundrum because, as a translator, I understand visibility is important for the profession. But as a reader, I also know the limits of what I can say about a text, about a source I cannot read.
It’s also a limit on what the reader can see, because the reader only sees it as the end product? I read great reviews written by translators who speak about specifics of the translation from the original text. But I, and many others, can’t write a review like that?
I don’t think you should be expected to. My feeling, more as a reader than as a translator, is that it is important that we are aware of literature from elsewhere around the world. It is important that we read in translation. But it is just literature at the end of the day - sure, it’s translated, but it works like any other literature. There is a limit to what can be asked of reviewers or critics. If you suspect a translator put in creative solutions, that’s something that is nice to remark upon. But beyond that, I can’t imagine that a reviewer who doesn’t have the source language will realistically have much to say about the translation itself. It sounds like translators are hankering to have a voice, but a solution for that would be for translators’ notes to become more common.
It is gutting when there are no translators’ notes. Translators’ notes are so illuminative, because those decisions have already been made by the time you’re reading it, you can’t see them.
The reader has to ‘miss’ those decisions, that’s kind of the point. We talk a lot about the invisibility of the translator, but perhaps there is a distinction that needs to be made between the visibility of the translator and the invisibility of the translation. When you’re reading a book, you want it to be seamless. You don’t want it to be shouting at you, ‘I’m a translation,’ on every page. There’s a big difference to be made in the industry about the fact that translators should be visible, but the translation should be a little bit invisible.
What do you think people misunderstand the most about translation?
I think people who have no second language think it is a one-for-one substitution and that it’s pretty straightforward. Instead, most of the time, there is no equivalent at all, or there is a one-to-a-hundred equivalent and you need to make a choice.
What do you wish people knew about translation?
I don’t think people necessarily understand how creative it is. Because there’s no one-to-one equivalent, translation is sometimes daunting, but other times utterly joyous because you have so many options. I also wish people knew more about how collaborative the translation process generally is. When I was working on my first translation, I had this fantasy that my editor would read it and say, ‘Perfect!’. I knew that wouldn’t exactly be the case, but it was what I was aiming for. But now, I know that the editing stage is actually an incredibly collaborative moment. When the editor and I go through the translation, the best solutions are often found between us. One of us will say a word that triggers a train of thought in the other, and it goes back and forth until everything clicks into place. And that is incredibly enjoyable, and I wish people knew that.
What do you think about the assumption that gets thrown about that it is harder to read translated books?
This stems from many factors that are hard to separate. I think the original source of this misconception is from the attitude that the publishing industry had in the past, which was very academic. For a long time, especially in the twentieth century, publishing translated literature meant just taking the giants from any literature and telling people they must read them if they wanted to be ‘well read’.
A lot of that misguided prejudice about translated literature still remains in general culture.
The idea that translated literature is inherently challenging is something we need to engage with so as to show that it isn’t so, that there are excellent books that are perfectly accessible and enjoyable. That is the job that publishers, and especially Indie publishers, are doing these days. They are bringing into English works from all sorts of genres - both more commercial and literary - and we are spoilt for choice. All readers will be able to find a book that they like. It is important to demystify the whole thing. This is one of those cases where being political about it has good intentions, but not necessarily helpful results.
I think both shame and over-intellectualisation can be used when discussing translated books, and it makes people apprehensive of it.
Yeah, it all goes back to the canon, something we are hopefully doing away with. It’s like saying that you ‘have to have read’ a certain author to be well read but that simply isn’t true. There are so many good contemporary entry points into translated literature that act a bit as a gateway drug to rediscovering those classics. There’s so much choice these days when it comes to translated literature that any reader can pick a book they’ve read in the original English that they’ve liked, and find something that does something equivalent in translation. And that’s a good way to start.
I’d whole-heartedly agree.
Antonella’s Reading List:
In translation:
‘Strangers I Know’ by Claudia Durastanti, translated by Elizabeth Harris (Martha’s review)
‘The Art of Joy’ by Goliarda Sapienza, translated by Anne Milano Appel
‘History’ by Elsa Morante (coming out later this year 11/2026)
In Italian (and not yet translated):
Antonella’s Translations:
Thank you for reading! You can find Antonella’s website here, and her instagram here. I look forward to reading my copy of The Duke soon! If anyone else has read it, I’d love to know what you thought.
Let me know if you enjoyed this, whether you learnt anything new (!) and what ‘translator conversations’ you’d like to see in the future?
That distinction between the visibility of the translator and the invisibility of the translation is so key! A novel is such a solitary enterprise, until it reaches the point that it is not: the collaborative moment of editing, translation, design
I love how candid and genuine this conversation was. Amazing interview on both sides! As someone who invests in tech, I see it as my job to learn about the ways that technology impacts the work of people that are affected by it. What Antonella shared about the impact of A.I. to the work of translators and how readers are pretty much conditioned to accept an AI sloppy version of translated literature goes beyond the literary world. It can be applied to pretty much any sector now. Given that the major AI tools have been trained on stolen books and they are constantly subjected to updates so they can comprehend and communicate more like humans (pretty much doing the job of translator, but poorly), I think that conversations like these bring practical and significant perspectives on the shiny world of tech. On another note, I also appreciated Antonella discussing the dominance of the English language - as an Italian who reads writes and works in English, I resonated with it a lot. it is definitely something instilled in us from a young age and nobody talks about it that much. Thank you both for sharing such amazing insights 🤍