I came across a great command line translation utility 'translate
shell' [0]. It provides a script 'trans', which is written in pure
bash and gives an interface to the most popular online translation
sites (by default it will use Google translate). Here is an example
of it translating one of my recent French phosts [1]. The
translation is pretty accurate, at least enough to convey the
meaning. It has loads of options and I could see it being used to
facilitate a gopher-based translation site.

slugmax@ [/meta/s/slugmax] > cat /meta/s/slugmax/docs/phlog/static/foo
Un histoire drôle - il y a deux semaines que j'ai prend un
rendez-vous avec mon medecin famille, et j'étais fier de moi parce
que je parlais en français tout le temps sur l'appel. La
receptioniste m'a dit que le rendez-vous a été le «jeudi
prochain». Il a été mardi, donc j'ai pensé que j'ai eu neuf jours
jusqu'à mon rendez-vous.

Alors, le jeudi prochain, neuf jours plus tard, je suis allé à mon
medecin, et la receptioniste m'a dit que le rendez-vous a été la
semaine derniere! Évidemment, si on aimerais dire «next thursday» en
français, on dit «jeudi prochain», même si on veut dire deux jours a
l'avenir. Soupir.
slugmax@ [/meta/s/slugmax] > trans --no-warn file:///meta/s/slugmax/docs/phlog/static/foo
A funny story - two weeks ago I took a appointment with my family
doctor, and I was proud of myself because that I spoke French all
the time on the call. The receptionist told me that the appointment
was on "thursday next". It was Tuesday, so I thought I had nine days
until my appointment.

So, next Thursday, nine days later, I went to my doctor, and the
receptionist told me that the appointment was the last week!
Obviously, if we would like to say "next thursday" in French, we say
"next Thursday", even if we mean two days the future. Sigh.

[0] https://github.com/soimort/translate-shell
[1] gopher://circumlunar.space/0/~slugmax/quebec/le-jeudi-prochain