The aim of this study is to investigate the relevance of a cognitive perspective in Japanese-English translation. More specifically, it looks at how a preference of different perspectives in the two languages could explain contrasting narrative techniques. Based on Ronald W. Langacker’s notions of subjective and objective construal, it has been noted how Japanese speakers tend to prefer an internal perspective (subjective construal) and how English speakers tend to prefer an external perspective (objective construal). In this study, Hiromi Kawakami’s novella Hebi o Fumu (“A Snake Stepped on”) is compared to its English translation in order to see how alleged subjective features in Japanese are translated into English. The results show that even when not strictly needed because of grammatical reasons, the English translation tended to switch to an external perspective – something that in turn lead to different effects in the two versions.