AI Translates Controversial Novels: Is the Quality Not Inferior to Human Translations?

An artificial intelligence (AI) translation service for novels that has just been launched in the UK has quickly caused controversy among translators and writers. Many are concerned that this technology is threatening the value of literary translation.

Translated novels are a booming business at a Lisbon bookstore - Photo: The Guardian

GlobeScribe, a new translation platform based in the UK, is offering AI-powered novel translations for $100 per book, per language, aimed at both traditional publishers and self-published authors.

According to The Bookseller magazine, founders Fred Freeman and Betsy Reavley have just announced the launch of this platform with the ambition of breaking down language barriers and opening up access to global markets for books that may never have been translated due to cost, time or demand constraints.

Translate novels in just a few hours

According to the two founders, AI cannot completely replace humans in translation but can open up opportunities for works that are not too literary complex.

Betsy Reavley and Fred Freeman, co-founders of Globescribe - Photo: The Guardian

"There will always be a need for professional translators for complex, highly literary books," the founding team said.

But they believe AI can be a powerful tool when used and embraced responsibly.

Globescribe currently offers novel translation services in five languages: Spanish, German, Italian, Portuguese, and French.

Describing how it works, Betsy Reavley gives   know users can download EPUB or DOCX manuscripts via a secure portal.

AI will translate based on licensed bilingual data. After a few hours, the translation will be returned with the same format, style, and layout as the original.

Publishers can integrate the platform into their editorial workflow, receiving volume discounts.

“Client manuscripts are never used to train AI. We provide a clear copyright transfer for the translation. All rights to both the original manuscript and the translation remain with the client, and files are only stored temporarily during processing and are deleted immediately upon delivery,” Reavley asserts.

According to Reavley, the team conducted tests comparing the AI translations to human translations, sending them to native speakers for evaluation. The results showed that many people could not distinguish between the AI translations, and some even responded that the AI translations had a tone and linguistic fidelity closer to the original.

Translation is not just about language

Before the launch of the GlobeScribe platform, many famous literary translators spoke out against it, arguing that translation is a job that requires a delicate sense of culture, style and character psychology, which AI cannot yet grasp.

Sharing with The Guardian , Ian Giles, chairman of the Translators' Association (Society of British Authors), commented that GlobeScribe may say that they are helping novels reach global readers, but in fact they are ignoring the role of the real people who help literature cross all borders.

Polly Barton, translator of the novel Butter (Asako Yuzuki), emphasized that a good translation needs to be true to the meaning, preserving the rhythm, atmosphere, emotion, and literary tempo of the original:

"That is something that can only be achieved when the translator truly immerses himself in the world of the book."

"There are words in Kannada (one of the major languages of India) that have a whole cultural world within them. Translating those words requires understanding both the explicit and the implicit parts of the culture. AI cannot do that," said Deepa Bhasthi, winner of the 2025 International Booker Prize for her translation of Heart Lamp from Kannada.

Some translators have also questioned the reliability of the testing process GlobeScribe claims to have used, and worry that the popularity of AI services is inadvertently lowering the standards of literary translation work.

“Services like this make people think that translation is a simple, mechanical job, when in fact it requires great sophistication and emotional and intellectual investment,” says Julia Sanches, translator of the English version of Eva Baltasar’s novel Boulder . “It would be very sad if ‘so-so’ translations generated by AI became the new standard in literature.”

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Lam Lake

Source: https://tuoitre.vn/ai-dich-tieu-thuet-gay-tranh-cai-chat-luong-khong-thua-kem-ban-nguoi-dich-20250713131000559.htm