AI translation

[EmilyMiller]

I understand German quite well if spoken to, but the German writing... Oh so frigging hard...
So sadly no.

Does Dutch do the verb at the end thing as well?

 

[DellaLu]

Does Dutch do the verb at the end thing as well?

Quite often yes, especially in subordinate clauses or in compound verb groups.

 

[Bramblethorn]

It made me wonder about the possibility of publishing both versions of one story. You can't publish the same story twice, Lit doesn't want to be cluttered up with redundant content; you can't use AI-translated stories for the same reason you can't use AI-created stories; you can't publish a translation of someone else's story without their permission on general principles; but can you publish a translation of your own story? I don't see why not... It won't be any time soon, but maybe someday.

It's been done: https://www.literotica.com/s/human-cattle-ch-01

I think there are other examples on Lit, but that's the first one I could find on a search.

 

[redgarters]

At least one of my favorite authors here
- one I have beta read for - has English as a second language. And he is highly regarded by others as well. His name, @redgarters and his work is really amazing.

You are too kind

As a non-native English speaker I often despair of my lack of English vocabulary, feeling my writing is simple and my stories too similar because of it.
I've found that two things are essential:
1. Extensive googling of synonyms and colloquialisms (story research isn't just about finding facts).
2. Finding native English speaking beta readers that you trust to kick you in the ass when needed, be it over spelling, grammar, stupid word use or just plain bad writing.

I've tried having AI read chapters and suggest changes. It never works. It just makes it feel like AI writing, not mine. The only way is to put in the work.

So trust your beta readers and put in the work to fix what they point out.

 

[CatPerson]

I just wanted to take a moment to thank all the authors who took the time to reply and share their advice on my post. I really appreciate the thoughtful suggestions and the willingness of this community to help out a fellow writer. Your feedback has given me several things to try and a better understanding of how to approach the issue going forward. It means a lot that people here were willing to share their experience and offer constructive guidance.

Thanks again to everyone who responded. I truly appreciate the support.

 

[Kasumi_Lee]

Does Dutch do the verb at the end thing as well?

Japanese is SOV by default.

 

[YourGentleDom]

@Kasumi_Lee
I just wanted to say how much I appreciate your writing. Your characters are vivid and your stories are really captivating. Your German translation of your "Vertrag der Cuckquean" is really good, just a few small mistakes here and there, but overall it works very well. あなたの才能に感心しています。

@DellaLu
Being Austrian, I have to admit… Dutch sounds incredibly sexy. Somehow even more so than German. Even just hearing “Neuken in de keuken” makes me chuckle. And it sounds incredibly naughty. En jouw verhalen spreken me helemaal aan.

I don’t need to comment on redgarters - he really is a class of his own. The same goes for EmilyMiller

 

[SkyBubble]

English is my first language, but I speak a little French.

Je parle Francais aussi, plus q'un peu.

 

[SkyBubble]

1. Extensive googling of synonyms and colloquialisms (story research isn't just about finding facts).

thesaurus.com is excellent for that.

 

[EmilyMiller]

I don’t need to comment on redgarters - he really is a class of his own. The same goes for EmilyMiller

Only just saw this - thank you

 

[DirtyREX]

Good morning, I just submitted my first story, but it was rejected. I used Grammarly to proofread it and a third-party translator to translate it into English, since my native language is Spanish and I understand very little English. Could someone recommend an approved translation tool or a volunteer editor who accepts translations, or offer any advice on how to do the translation myself with the help of a third-party translator without my work being rejected again?

 

[DellaLu]

@DellaLu
Being Austrian, I have to admit… Dutch sounds incredibly sexy. Somehow even more so than German. Even just hearing “Neuken in de keuken” makes me chuckle. And it sounds incredibly naughty. En jouw verhalen spreken me helemaal aan.

Hehe, almost every one in Holland chuckles at the sound of "neuken in de keuken" but apart from that phrase, Dutch erotica sounds crinchy.
But I'm glad to hear you like my (English) stories.

 

[devtek]

Good morning, I just submitted my first story, but it was rejected. I used Grammarly to proofread it and a third-party translator to translate it into English, since my native language is Spanish and I understand very little English. Could someone recommend an approved translation tool or a volunteer editor who accepts translations, or offer any advice on how to do the translation myself with the help of a third-party translator without my work being rejected again?

My suggestion is to do the translation yourself, perhaps using Google Translate as if you were using a dictionary, one word at a time, and then build the sentence without worrying too much about mistakes.
Then submit the text to an editor here on LIT, specialized in the category of the story you want to submit.
This way, any software will confirm that the text is 100% human.

 

[XerXesXu]

Good morning, I just submitted my first story, but it was rejected. I used Grammarly to proofread it and a third-party translator to translate it into English, since my native language is Spanish and I understand very little English. Could someone recommend an approved translation tool or a volunteer editor who accepts translations, or offer any advice on how to do the translation myself with the help of a third-party translator without my work being rejected again?

Any AI should be able to translate/interpret between languages for you. AI is native in all major languages. Construct your own prompt, tell it what you want it to, what you want it to avoid doing. Once you've perfected your prompt you can use it repeatedly to translate between any two languages. Avoid Google Translate.

 

[EmilyMiller]

Good morning, I just submitted my first story, but it was rejected. I used Grammarly to proofread it and a third-party translator to translate it into English, since my native language is Spanish and I understand very little English. Could someone recommend an approved translation tool or a volunteer editor who accepts translations, or offer any advice on how to do the translation myself with the help of a third-party translator without my work being rejected again?

Did you use translation s/w to write this, if not your English is much better than many native speakers here.

As things stand, there appears to be no solution to the problem of machine-translated prose. Your best options if you want to publish in English are:

1. Write in English
2. Get a human to translate for you (presumably a lot of skilled work)
3. Try your best to translate it yourself and get a native English speaker to take a look (assuming they have the time and inclination)

The ask an editor feature seems to be a mixed bag.

 

[SandraMaus]

Reddit has lots of groups you could check out https://www.reddit.com/r/eroticauthors
https://www.reddit.com/r/literotica

 

[liliput1]

English is my first language, but I speak a little French. When I wanted to work on a story when I was worried about someone reading over my shoulder, I did it in French. Add up various segments and I have almost 2000 words in French from two stories so far, no doubt more to come at some point.

Holy fuck. You just unlocked a childhood memory. I tried to write erotica, in high school, in French. I hadn’t even kissed anyone yet.

Wow, it really is always the quiet ones, isn’t it.

 

[liliput1]

View attachment 2602367

When my step kids got old enough that it felt delusional to deny that they were enjoying adult beverages and, ah, other fruits of adulting, I switched by goodbyes from, “be good” to “make good choices.”

Sometimes you gotta do the wrong thing for the right reasons.

Make good choices!

 

[liliput1]

I agree.

I'm Dutch and, fortunately for me, Dutch is (in my opinion) such a crude languague that it is totally unfit for the kind of erotica I want to write. So I write my stories in English to begin with.
The big drawback is of course the vocabulary, which is less. But dictionaries, either a book or online, comes in handy and with time the vocabulary will expand so that the subtleties that native writers can put into their stories will come as well (I hope)

And then there's the grammar and spelling... That's a thing as well.
I'm not afraid to make mistakes and if people can't stand those grammar and spelling mistakes. Well fine, then it's their problem.
But I am glad that I've got an editor now. Saves me a lot of negative comments and 1s ratings ;-)

TLDR:
As a non native speaker, just start writing in English, find an editor and don't be afraid to fuck up from time to time.

Where do you go for idioms and euphemisms? I was always jarringly good with accents (my French teacher called me a human parrot) so my impostor syndrome kicked in with feeling like I sound like a third grader, or worse, an alien wearing a human suit. That’s ultimately what made me stop keeping my second language up. Every time I tried to restart my vocab and idioms were blown farther to hell and it just got worse.

 

[liliput1]

You are too kind

As a non-native English speaker I often despair of my lack of English vocabulary, feeling my writing is simple and my stories too similar because of it.
I've found that two things are essential:
1. Extensive googling of synonyms and colloquialisms (story research isn't just about finding facts).
2. Finding native English speaking beta readers that you trust to kick you in the ass when needed, be it over spelling, grammar, stupid word use or just plain bad writing.

I've tried having AI read chapters and suggest changes. It never works. It just makes it feel like AI writing, not mine. The only way is to put in the work.

So trust your beta readers and put in the work to fix what they point out.

I’ve made an occasionally annoying hobby of trying to clock where people or their ancestors came from based on how they talk, and I’m pretty sure you fooled me with your ESL.

The silver lining of translating is that sometimes prose becomes more purple rather than less because one expresses an idea that is not routinely expressed from that exact perspective and it brings some novelty to the writing.

 

[redgarters]

I’ve made an occasionally annoying hobby of trying to clock where people or their ancestors came from based on how they talk, and I’m pretty sure you fooled me with your ESL.

The silver lining of translating is that sometimes prose becomes more purple rather than less because one expresses an idea that is not routinely expressed from that exact perspective and it brings some novelty to the writing.

True, literary translation is an art in itself.
We learn English in school over here from a young age, but I still struggle with bits of it. Vocabulary especially.

 

[THBGato]

My German is extremely basic, so when I wanted some German phrases for "Four weddings and a leaving do" I used Deepl translator. There were only a dozen or so lines of German dialogue across 12k words. That didn't seem to trigger an AI rejection.

 

[DellaLu]

Where do you go for idioms and euphemisms?

I read tons of stories on Lit just for research for idioms and euphemisms but also for writing- and/or story telling style and just general inspiration.