A Commitment to Excellence

Hi! My name is Michael Engley and I am committed to helping my German-speaking clients communicate effectively with an English-speaking audience by producing outstanding translations and transcreations.

I started freelancing full-time in 2006 near the end of a lengthy education and founded Bullish Translations in 2019 as an expression of my drive for excellent communications. My love of language led me to the translation industry and my commitment to excellence has helped me maintain client relationships since the very beginning. My clients appreciate my problem-solving approach to their translation projects as well as my dependability, confidentiality, and subject-matter expertise.

German to
English Translation

PROFILE

A Commitment to Excellence

Hi! My name is Michael Engley and I am committed to helping my German-speaking clients communicate effectively with an English-speaking audience by producing outstanding translations and transcreations.

I started freelancing full-time in 2006 near the end of a lengthy education and founded Bullish Translations in 2019 as an expression of my drive for excellent communications. My love of language led me to the translation industry and my commitment to excellence has helped me maintain client relationships since the very beginning. My clients appreciate my problem-solving approach to their translation projects as well as my dependability, confidentiality, and subject-matter expertise.

From the Black Forest to the Gulf Coast

In the early days of an academic year abroad in Freiburg, Germany, a Romanian philosopher I met at the University of Freiburg asked me: “What do you want to be?” Without hesitating I told him that I wanted to be a writer.

Visions of short stories and poetry aside, little did I know at the time that years later I would, in fact, earn a living expressing ideas in writing. Yet it had always been clear to me that my destiny lay with the written word. And how right I was!

Fast forward more than 20 years from that campus in the idyllic Black Forest and I find myself on the sun-drenched Gulf Coast of Florida transforming ideas expressed by faraway clients in German into well-honed English. Sometimes this requires me to hew closely to the source text, as with financial reports, while other times I am given carte blanche based on a thorough briefing, as with advertising slogans.

From the Black Forest to the Gulf Coast

In the early days of an academic year abroad in Freiburg, Germany, a Romanian philosopher I met at the University of Freiburg asked me: “What do you want to be?” Without hesitating I told him that I wanted to be a writer.

Visions of short stories and poetry aside, little did I know at the time that years later I would, in fact, earn a living expressing ideas in writing. Yet it had always been clear to me that my destiny lay with the written word. And how right I was!

Fast forward more than 20 years from that campus in the Black Forest and I find myself on the idyllic Gulf Coast of Florida transforming ideas expressed by faraway clients in German into well-honed English. Sometimes this requires me to hew closely to the source text, as with financial reports, while other times I am given carte blanche based on a thorough briefing, as with advertising slogans.

Investing In Experience

I never returned to the University of Michigan, where I had been studying Creative Writing and Comparative Literature and German, choosing instead to remain in Germany. The formative decade that I spent in Freiburg was an invaluable learning experience both in and out of the classroom. Immersed as I was in German culture and society, I became familiar not only with German literature and poetry, but also with German politics and history as well as with the German economy, economic philosophy, German Accepted Accounting Standards and International Financial Reporting Standards, which became a key focus of my studies.

After studying Economics at the University of Freiburg, which I had discovered at the end of a winding road through the Humanities, I returned to the United States to obtain a Masters of Accountancy at the University of Louisville in Kentucky.

I supported my graduate studies with a fast-growing translation business, quickly making a name for myself in the German Language Division of the American Translator’s Association by helping other translators with tricky financial terminology.

Investing In Experience

I never returned to the University of Michigan, where I had been studying Creative Writing and Comparative Literature and German, choosing instead to remain in Germany. The formative decade that I spent in Freiburg was an invaluable learning experience both in and out of the classroom. Immersed as I was in German culture and society, I became familiar not only with German literature and poetry, but also with German politics and history as well as with the German economy, economic philosophy, German Accepted Accounting Standards and International Financial Reporting Standards, which became a key focus of my studies.

After studying Economics at the University of Freiburg, which I had discovered at the end of a winding road through the Humanities, I returned to the United States to obtain a Masters of Accountancy at the University of Louisville in Kentucky.

I supported my graduate studies with a fast-growing translation business, quickly making a name for myself in the German Language Division of the American Translator’s Association by helping other translators with tricky financial terminology.