Yeah, I can't begin to imagine the challenges the translators faced! But I get the impression that the assignment was almost like a passion project for them. Literary translators don't get paid very well, after all. In the academic article about the translation work, the author talks about how Burgess loved the French translation and thought the translators had done an incredible job. All of them -- the translators and Burgess himself -- seemed to have been major language nerds as they all seemed to know English, French and Russian to a scarily impressive degree.

And yeah, I have trouble not finishing books, even if I'm not enjoying them. I once resumed a children's book that I hadn't read in about twenty years just so I could finish it for good. It's not even really about the story. It's just about having a sense of accomplishment -- or rather avoiding the frustration of non-accomplishment. Just a personality quirk, I guess!

The academic article is here if you're interested: https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9783110586459-017/html