Merete Kock

Translator and interpreter: Danish and Italian.

I started learning Italian at the age of 11, when I went to stay with a friend's family in Italy. There was no way round it; if I wanted to know what they were saying I had to learn the language. Ever since then most of my holidays have been in Italy, and early on I chose to make the Italian language my profession.

Following my studies at the University of Copenhagen, at the Copenhagen Business School and in Italy, I was accredited as a translator and interpreter of Italian in 1981.

I then worked as an independent translator, and was also a senior lecturer in Italian legal and business language at the Copenhagen Business School. In the year 2000 I founded TranslatørHuset.

The fields I have worked in range from law (concentrating especially on legal documents relating to contract law, procedural law, criminal law, corporate law, and family law and succession) to annual reports, and the building and construction sector. Projects have included manuals and technical documentation in areas such as dental equipment, freeze-drying systems, fish-meal equipment, beet sugar production, metal foundries, dairy production plants and the motor vehicle industry. I have also translated product descriptions in the furniture, design, optics and fashion markets. I have translated journalists' interviews so that they could be used in publications in other languages, and I have translated private documents and certificates.

I have worked as an interpreter in both Denmark and Italy, for the police and in law courts, both in criminal and civil cases. In the corporate sector I have worked as an interpreter in connection with contract negotiations, on technical training courses and for visiting delegations.

In 2009, I was certified as a legal assistant.

I am a member of the Danish Association of State-Authorised Translators and Interpreters