Charlotte Coombe is an award-winning British translator working from French and Spanish into English. After a decade translating creative texts in gastronomy, the arts, travel and tourism, lifestyle, fashion and advertising, her love of literature drew her to literary translation, with a particular interest in women’s writing. She translates fiction, non-fiction and poetry.

Her translation of Abnousse Shalmani’s Khomeini, Sade and Me (2016) won a PEN Translates award in 2015 and is her second title with World Editions. She has translated The President's Room by Ricardo Romero (2017) and a collection of novellas and short stories by the Colombian author Margarita García Robayo, published as Fish Soup in 2018, both by Charco Press. Her translation of Eduardo Berti's novel The Imagined Land was published in 2018 by Deep Vellum Publishing.

She has translated work by authors such as Marvel Moreno, Antonio Diaz Oliva, Orlando Echeverri Benedetti, Lucía Baskaran, Elizabeth Duval, Juan Villoro, Rosa María Roffiel, Santiago Roncagliolo, Edgardo Nuñez Caballero, Jimena González and Aminata Aidara. Her translations have appeared in publications such as The Southern Review, Modern Poetry in Translation, Words Without Borders, World Literature Today, Latin American Literature Today, Project Plume, and Palabras Errantes.

She won a PEN Translates award for her translation of the novel Holiday Heart by Margarita García Robayo (Charco Press, June 2020). In 2019, she was shortlisted for the Premio Valle Inclán for her translation of Fish Soup by Margarita García Robayo.

In 2020, she co-founded the YouTube channel Translators Aloud, shining the spotlight on literary translators reading from their published work, or work seeking a publisher in English.

Her co-translation with Isabel Adey of the novel December Breeze by Colombian author Marvel Moreno was published by Europa Editions in November 2022.

She received the Oran Robert Perry Burke Award for Literary Translation for the translation from Spanish of Antonio Díaz Oliva’s story, “Mrs. Gonçalves and the Lives of Others,” which featured in the spring issue of The Southern Review in 2022.

Her translation of the non-fiction title The Seaweed Revolution by Vincent Doumeizel was published in April 2023.

As well as translating literature, working as CMC Translations she provides transcreation, proofreading, editing and revising on a daily basis for various private clients and agencies. 

Feel free to get in touch with any potential translation or editing projects!

As well as translating literature, working as CMC Translations she provides transcreation, proofreading, editing and revising on a daily basis for various private clients and agencies. 

Get in touch to discuss a project: [email protected]

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  CREDENTIALS:

  • Recipient of the Oran Robert Perry Burke Award for Literary Translation for the translation from Spanish of Antonio Díaz Oliva’s story, “Mrs. Gonçalves and the Lives of Others,” (The Southern Review, spring issue 2022)

  • Shortlisted for the Premio Valle Inclán 2019, for a translation from the Spanish of Fish Soup by Margarita García Robayo

  • Longlisted for the John Dryden Translation Competition 2019 for her translation from Orlando Echeverri Benedetti’s Spanish text Criacuervo

  • Winner of a PEN Translates Award 2019 for her translation of Margarita Garcia Robayo’s Holiday Heart (forthcoming from Charco Press, May 2020)

  • Winner of a PEN Translates Award 2015 for her translation of Abnousse Shalmani’s Khomeini, Sade and Me (World Editions, 2016)

  • DipTrans IoLET - Diploma in Translation from the Chartered Institute of Linguists - Spanish to English - Specialised papers: Social Sciences and Literature (merit) - (2012)

  • BA Hons in Modern Languages and European Studies from the University of Bath (2007)

  • Member of the Chartered Institute of Languages (MCIL)

  • Associate of the Institute of Translation and Interpreting (AITI)

  • Member of the Society of Authors (Translators Association)

  • Member of the American Literary Translators Association (ALTA)

  • Member of the Authors Guild

  • Working self-employed as a full-time freelance translator, proofreader and reviser since 2008.

  • A total of 2 years’ experience working in-house for translation agencies in the UK and Spain.