The aim of this dissertation is to examine the literary image of translation and its meaning and functions in Western contemporary fiction and culture. The corpus is made up by 90 German, Spanish, English, French and Italian novels and short stories. The conclusions show that the literary representation of translation in fiction tends to have literary functions, either as resource or as artifice, as a symbolic element or as a motive. As a resource, it usually recalls modern problems such as fictionality, relationships between fiction and reality, or between story, author, narrator and reader. It can even be said that the translator (or the interpreter) is a typically modern hero. The role occupied by 'narrated translation' is increasingly central. The author concludes that the literary representation of translation turns this phenomenon into a symbol of modernity.