“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

During this session hiatus I’ve been spending much time upon a series of letters to the publishers of Seth Speaks in Switzerland and in the Netherlands, as well as to those in charge at Prentice-Hall.¹ Last Saturday night we had a very interesting meeting with a psychologist from New York City. Our visitor taped Seth’s copious material, and is to send us a transcript of it.

1. Some of my letters were triggered on October 9 (this month), when Jane and I received our first copies of Seth Spreekt, the Dutch-language edition of Seth Speaks. We saw at once that the people at Ankh-Hermes, the publishing company in the Netherlands, had cut the book considerably. As I wrote in the notes for the private session we held the next evening: “Our first reactions were ones of such stunned surprise that we didn’t even get mad.”

In effect, Ankh-Hermes has published not only a translation but a condensation. Considering the eagerness with which we’ve looked forward to having the Seth material published in other languages, and the long waiting periods involved, this situation is frustrating indeed. Many of my notes, some of which contain excerpts of Seth material, have been eliminated. So have large portions of a number of the sessions themselves. The Appendix in Seth Spreekt is only 11 pages long, chopped down from 67 pages.

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.

4. Seven Two, as we call it, was published by Prentice-Hall in May—five months ago. Delacorte Press published Emir just last month.