Enjoying translation for practice

[Schadenfruede]

So I've been making pretty steady progress while looking into various ways of practicing my L2(German) and L3(Russian). Long story short, I've found that I like translating from L2/L3 into English. It combines writing and language learning for me.
This isn't a question about becoming a professional translator because it's been asked a million times online and I'm definitely not there yet. But does anyone agree? I know the arguments for and against translation but it seems to work for me. Novels are daunting but I do like short stories.

[Speakeasy]

Schadenfreude, although I have never used this type of translation exercise myself, my first thought would be, if this practice routine truly works for you and if you find it motivating, then you should continue with your current regime. Nevertheless, a couple of questions arise.

First, do you have a means for measuring the quality of your translations? For example, do you work “blind” from an L2/L3 text for which a good translation exists and, having completed your exercise, do you compare your translation to the model which was presumably prepared by a professional and try to improve your ability at translating, or do you simply translate texts from the original and assume that you have done so correctly? In the latter case, the possibility exists that you have merely transliterated the original but have not really produced a good translation, which leaves me to wonder about the usefulness of this type of practice.

A second question concerns the ultimate usefulness of the translation process. That is, rather than working on your skill at translating, would it not be more useful to develop your ability to understand the original texts as a native-speaker would?

Finally, and you may already have covered this point in another exercise routine, does any of this translation work have a positive effect on your ability to produce the L2/L3 languages either as translations from English or in response to questions, in the development of your own thoughts, and the like? Even if it does, compared to the alternatives, is this type of practice an efficient use of your time?

In the final analysis, if you're pleased with results and if you find the practice routine motivating, then you can and should ignore my questions.

[Sayonaroo]

I've been interested in the bi-directional translation method that the polyglot Lucas L uses for the purpose of improving my output abilities. I just feel the limits of improving my output from just reading and outputting and I didn't have any motivation to work on my output all this time until now. It also reminds me ofBenjamin Franklin's method. Like you I'm not interested in becoming a translator. I only tried the bi-directional translation method for 2 days (I modified it somewhat since Japanese is very different from English like sentence order and I don't have goals of becoming a translator. I made sure to choose 2 short texts that resonated with me.) so I can't say it works yet but I definitely noticed stuff I wouldn't notice just from just reading/listening/outputting since I am checking syllable for syllable what I was able to produce compared to the original.

[Schadenfruede]

Speakeasy,

For the first question, I do have something of a means of checking the quality. The website zeit.de has news articles in both German and English so I can do exactly as you said and translate then compare. Russian is harder but there are ways. Finding both a Russian book and its English translation is easy enough through something like Project Gutenburg. Articles are probably online, I need to look harder.

For the second question, it's not the only means I'm using, just one method. I'm also using extensive reading, music and Netflix for German and 3ears for Russian.

[zjones]

I'm not sure that what I do can actually be called translation, because I work from my own notes and not from written works. Also, I prefer to work from my L1 (English) to my L2 (French). For example, right now I am listening to an audio course on understanding Western concert music. My notes are in English, but I make a paragraph summary and then translate the summary into French, using a dictionary when needed. I try to keep everything concise and elegant, and then I send them to someone for grading. However, I do not send my English notes, so I'm being graded on my French alone and not my translation from English.

Again, I'm not sure if this could rightly be called translation. They're probably just basic writing exercises.

Either way, I'm glad to hear that you're having fun with your translations!

[Schadenfruede]

I definitely think that should called translation, you are translating after all And I can't say for certain that if in the future I became fluent/very, very good at translation and was offered the chance to do it for money, that I would turn the offer down. But right now my means of checking my work is to use something like a book that has both languages already available(Morgan Rice is one author on Amazon with multiple translations of his work for free or cheap). To be honest I think that translation is a little like solving a puzzle, maybe like a cryptogram. But that could just be my werid mind, lol.