How does the use of English as a semi-established international lingua franca affect English translators?

The other day I took the Paris metro for the first time since before lockdown started, and two things jumped out at me. The first was the fact that pretty much everyone was respecting the rules, wearing masks, keeping their distance from others, etc. The second was the new announcements, a semi-dystopian “message from the government” reminding passengers of these rules. Depending on the line, normal Paris metro announcements can come in at least six languages that I’ve heard: French, English, Spanish, German, Italian, and Japanese. These new, important health and safety announcements, however, were given only in French and English. The French version started with “Afin de tenir à distance le virus…”, which is clear, immediately understandable and, furthermore, harks back to the concept of social distancing. In English, a crisp, southern British accent announced “To keep the virus at bay…”.

I’ve been thinking about this choice for a couple days. It’s a nice translation, a natural expression, perhaps something I could have suggested myself. It’s effective and idiomatic. For Anglophones. But is this message aimed at Anglophones? Not really. It’s for tourists, travellers, passersby, anyone who isn’t French or doesn’t speak it, and with that in mind, the use of “to keep at bay” suddenly seems a little less appropriate. This is a critical reminder that must be understood immediately by anyone using the metro, and those with a moderate or lower level of English might not recognise the expression. It would maybe have been wiser to stick to something less stylish but more accessible and closer to the French, such as “to keep the virus at a distance”, perhaps even simply “to (help) stop the virus”.

This international use of English is something that Anglophone translators absolutely have to bear in mind. When we’re translating, how often can we be certain that our text is going to an actual Anglophone audience? If a formerly monolingual website is being translated into English only, is it specifically to capture the UK or US consumer, or rather just to grab any possible other market outside the home country? How do we know who we’re speaking to?

I think many of us, certainly myself included, got into translation initially because of a love of languages, whether foreign or our own, but the final destination of our text and the needs of our target audience might mean on occasion that we have to let go of our personal notion of “style” in order to produce something perhaps less “nice”, but arguably more effective.

What do you think? Am I overthinking the use of “to keep at bay”? Should we consider “international” English as a local variant separate from UK, US and the like?