Children’s books – literary translation

Our team has translated hundreds of children’s books and youth literature in multiple languages over the past two decades. This project combines product with content in a fun creative process involving not only the story translation but transcreation and copywriting in a variety of foreign languages and alphabets. The French, Italian, Russian, Spanish, Japanese, Korean, and Chinese versions of this book were published and released to the marketplace throughout the US, in European cities, Canada, and Southeast Asia, where the original product has been widely sold. 

Babel’s linguists balanced challenges and solutions to successfully rhyme the interactive content of this book to ensure a natural flow for this age group. “The Brushies” is not just a book for reading, but also the world’s first finger puppet toothbrush. Each character in the book is a puppet toothbrush represented by an animal with a name. As a result, our work also included the naming process, with adaptations for each language/market.

This project certainly proves that the art of translation is far from being a mechanical mapping practice from one language to another.

These brushies are cute silicone finger puppets that double as toothbrushes, helping parents to turn the act of brushing kids’ teeth into a fun game rather than a challenging chore. Check out The Brushies at Babiators.

SERVICES PROVIDED: Transcreation, naming, literary translation, rhyming, cultural & linguistic adaptation, book cover, layout validation, non-Roman alphabets, marketing translation; multilingual