Goodreads Librarians Group discussion

Search for "Tolkien" does not bring up https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6... even though Tolkien is the translator and is mentioned on the listing. Is there something wrong with the search parameter, or does Tolkien need to be listed elsewhere in this book?

The search does not always find secondary authors.

There is nothing librarians can do about that.

However, it does seem odd that Tolkien is listed as the translator on so many editions, including ones in other languages. Is that correct?

And this search is finding the book just fine: https://www.goodreads.com/search?q=to...

rivka wrote: "However, it does seem odd that Tolkien is listed as the translator on so many editions, including ones in other languages."

Well if the original poems are in medieval English, the translators have probably used Tolkien's modern English translations as a basis for their own translation. I doubt many of them know old English well enough.

Yes, it was just the general "Tolkien" search that was failing in "My Books" even though I have the book in My Books / on my list of read / owned books. If I searched "Tolkien" in My Books, I got all other books I own with Tolkien as the author, but it appears it wasn't searching translators. If that's a known issue with secondary authors, then thanks / question closed.

Rivka, yes Tolkien did a lovely translation of this much older / Old English work, and his translation from Old English into Modern English was then translated to other languages.

In some of them the translation is of Tolkien's translation, rather than the original. His is considered pretty definitive. There was one German edition where the translation was from the original (I corrected), but there was a Tolkien essay included.

Searches in "My Books" definitely do not find secondary authors. (General searches sometimes do and sometimes do not.)