Bret Devereaux

I always like to give my own translation when I'm writing a primarily English document.

I’m the same way.

I tend to that in my thesis, and in most cases for publications.

I always did my own translating because other versions may not catch the nuance I wished to discuss. Loved rendering Juvenal’s Greek into schoolboy French.

I do the same— but for most of the papers I have published I was eventually asked by the publisher to quote a “well known translation”...

Makes perfect sense to provide your own translation. Translations almost always involve a choice of emphasis or nuance, and people are reading you to learn your choice. Doubly interesting if you compare it with a different choice. (fwiw, I translate French science professionally)

Do most texts typically have relatively recent translations which don't gloss over or whitewash the text?

I do my own translating for publication, except sometimes long passages where the exact wording isn’t the point or I especially like a particular phrasing of another translator. Though I’m not a philologist: I check with other translations to make sure I haven’t erred.