Examining the challenges posed to literary translators by the existence of national and other variants of their target languages, this essay focuses on the differences between the English of the United Kingdom the United States, advocating a mid-Atlantic approach that minimizes disruptions to the reader's suspension of disbelief. This approach also offers the translator extra resources for differentiating stylistic registers: a formal register can be signaled by introducing certain aspects of UK English, while informality can be marked by adopting certain US terms and constructions. Competency in mid-Atlantic English needs to be cultivated consciously by the literary translator, through both broad and specialized reading and the use of up-to-date monolingual dictionaries. Regional variants, slang and colloquial variants, and stylistic, formal, and chronological variants can be addressed in similar ways by attentive translators who are active listeners and readers of the multiple varieties of English.