Professional Interpreter from European Commission Tells about Three Main Qualities of Successful Conference Interpreters

Mr. William Long, a senior interpreter of the Directorate-General for Interpretation of the European Commission, has visited Astrakhan State University once again. He has given a series of master classes for our MA students and supervised our graduates’ final exam.

Our guest has been in regular contact with our Caspian Higher School of Interpreting & Translation (CHSIT) for a long time. He says it is his 18th visit to Astrakhan; he looks forward to visiting our University again and again. Over the past years, Mr. Long has contributed to the development of the CHSIT significantly, as well as to training of qualified interpreters and translators in Astrakhan.

Mr. Long remarks that the CHSIT has passed a long way; every single year it graduates more and more professional specialists. He says that when the School was only beginning to operate, it trained good specialists, and it was a real pleasure to work with it; now the quality of education has been enhanced, which is normal, as everyone – both the faculty and the students – are constantly studying. Mr. Long was also a member of the examination commission. He could see a substantial improvement of our graduates’ professional knowledge and skills, as he had been present at their entrance examinations two years before.

As a top-level specialist, Mr. Long shared his vision of an interpreter’s tasks; he named three qualities that are necessary for a qualified conference interpreter.

The first and foremost quality is an interpreter’s interest towards languages; a good interpreter ought to be ready to master them. Yet, as Mr. Long says, it is not enough.

A second quality for a successful specialist is their ability to think logically and understand the speakers’ thoughts. He explains that all the people present their ideas in a different way, so an interpreter ought to be able to understand the way the speaker thinks and present the precise message which that speaker wanted to deliver to their audience.

Third, a successful interpreter ought to be aware of what is happening in the world. They should be interested in politics, economy, international relations, etc. This is how one can become a true specialist in conference interpreting.