“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

“Whenever a book is translated, it is almost impossible, of course, to say the same thing in the same way. Such a book will always be expressed through those invisible national characteristics that are so intimately involved with language—and obviously, were that not so, no book could be understood by someone of a foreign language. There are bound to be distortions, but the distortions themselves are meaningful.”

Our editor, Tam Mossman, has verified for us that the contract between Prentice-Hall and Ankh-Hermes contains a clause prohibiting cutting, unless Jane’s and my permission is given. Already those at Ankh-Hermes have been asked to withdraw from sale their shortened version of Seth Spreekt, and to publish a full-length one instead—a very expensive proposition indeed. Jane and I regret this, now that our first anger has passed. We’re caught between the economic realities of the situation as far as Ankh-Hermes is concerned, and our own intense desires that translations of the Seth books match the original versions as closely as possible. We fully agree with Seth that changes and distortions are inevitable as the Seth material is moved from English into other languages; we just want those alterations kept to a minimum. It appears that language difficulties involving publishers and agents led to the whole mix-up to begin with. Tam has begun work on a contractual amendment designed to prevent more such confusions. And all concerned must wait at least another year before a full-length version of Seth Speaks will be published in the Dutch language.