MISTAKES
found in Volume 8 of
Satprem’s Carnets d’une Apocalypse

(by the staff of arianuova.org)

Volume 8 of the “Carnets” in French
has been published in July 2009.
It is the first volume published
without the direct overseeing of its Author
(who left his body in April 2007).

Here is a first list
(unfortunately rather lengthy!)
of mistakes to show the care and respect
that the Author deserves so much.
We have to be assured that the volumes
yet to be published are transcribed with faithfulness!

– page 21: note 1, error of translation — «this» has been translated with a feminine while it refers to «our present state». Sri Aurobindo’s translated sentence becomes incomprehensible. One can also regret the not so good translation of «pouring». Another word would have better expressed the meaning in French.

– page 42: «papiers» should not have an “s” in this case.

– page 61: «sans-abri»: should have no hyphen as it is not a noun here. The same error is found further down.

– page 89: «ses observations»: one does not understand what the possessive is referring to.

– page 96: «se de» instead of «de se». Further down, there is a discrepancy in Satprem’s sentence.

– page 105: the comma should not be placed after «discrimination» but after «balles».

– page 107: «oeuvres» should be «œuvres».

– page 111: «bien que les perspectives d’un règlement en Afghanistan s’annonçaient bien» — error in the mode. There should be a subjunctive verb after «bien que». Further down: «M. Carlucci dit que les relations des Etats-Unis avec l’Inde et le Pakistan devaient s’appuyer sur leurs valeurs respectives» — the tenses are inconsistent.

– page 111: «Islmabad» instead of «Islamabad».

– page 117: «se replatissant» instead of «raplatissant».

– page 120: «g...» for «garce»: Satprem was not in the habit of censoring his own words (see the other volumes).

– page 124: there should probably be no “e” to «sentie»?

– page 159: «Cette Bastille, qu’est mon corps» — the comma is misplaced.

– page 162: «existe» or “existes”? Further down: there should be a capital after a full stop.

– page 168: «Je recommence debout. à marteler» — there should be or a capital or no full stop since there is a new paragraph and Satprem used not to punctuate in such a case. This error occurs several times.

– page 171: there should be no “e” to «mortes». The agreement is with the object in such cases.

– page 173: Conversation with Sujata: one does not understand why the beginning of the recording is not transcribed. Was there a technical problem? Is it a deliberate choice insofar as certain Tamil «bad intentions» could be implicated? The least should have been to add a note explaining why this first part has been omitted.

– page 180: «Je prendrais volontiers le parti de ce pauvre Satan si je savais où il se cachait» — error of tense.

– page 181: «Un règlement pacifique autour et en Afghanistan» — the translation is faulty (the prepositions imply two different structures).

– page 195: «souriant» (smiling): Satprem and Sujata seemed to be alone during these conversations. How can the expression on their faces be recorded?

– page 209: a sentence not very intelligible: «Je vois alors des choses qui sont de l’ensemble». Is it a problem of transcription?

– page 215: «des» instead of «de Reagan».

– page 216: there should be “leurs” instead of «ses», speaking of the USA. The translation is besides very awkward.

– page 216 again: «Bille» does not really make sense. Is it a problem of transcription? Should it be “Bible”?

– page 217: the quotation marks are not opened at the beginning of the first paragraph of the article.

– page 219: «ultras conservateurs” — the space should be deleted (“ultraconservateurs”).

– page 225: a comma is missing after «généralement».

– page 228: “rire” has no “s” in «éclats de rire».

– page 229: «Ou bien notre système humain mortel, est inexorable» — the comma is misplaced and spoils the consistency of the syntax.

– page 238: there should be two “m” to «Evidemment».

– page 248: a comma is missing between «plate» and «je».

– page 264 : one does not say «sur les rues» in French.

– page 265: there should be no “e” to «executées». (Same mistake as in page 171).

– page 267: “Sarama”: an explanatory note would have been welcome. Not all Western people know who is Sarama, the Hound of Heaven, representing intuition in the Veda!

– page 268: «je ne peux pas m’envoler directement, il y avait un poids» — problem of tense. Further down: two quotation marks are open and not closed: «M’«empêchaient…

– page 282: there should be no “s” to «t’inquiète» (imperative).

– page 283: “Mahastami” and “Vijaya Dashami” would also require an explanatory note.

– page 309: there should be a comma between «pas» and «ma Douce».

– page 313: there should be no “s” to «grenade».

– page 314: there should always be a comma after «Eh bien». It is systematically omitted in this volume. Again a comma is missing before «ma douce».

– page 323: there should be no “s” to «transport».

– page 325: «The chariot of Jagannath grinds slowly, but it grinds exceedingly fine»: the French translation is clumsy and moreover does not give the shade of meaning implied by “grinds”.

– page 326: there should be a comma before «quoique».

– page 334: «Nancy Drew...». Inconsistency of tenses in the French translation.

– page 339: «d’Angola» should be placed after «cubains».

– page 343: «vivait» takes an “s” and not a “t”. Further down: the quotation marks are not closed.

– page 351: first paragraph of the article: one does not understand who is the person referred to and the translation of the second paragraph is a gibberish.

– page 352: there should be an “i” to «atteignions» (subjunctive).

– page 356: «en» is probably missing between «et» and «martelant»?

– page 357: the full stop after «loin» is missing.

This list is not exhaustive.
The punctuation mistakes are so numerous that it is impossible to list all of them. The choice of leaving out the capital after a question mark creates a particular problem. This approach is relevant for certain sentences in Satprem’s writing when the question is an integral part of the whole and one cannot break the rhythm, but it seems to be incorrect in many sentences where there is no justification for it.

The translation of newspaper’s articles is on the whole very clumsy and apparently too literally.

One can also note that «ma douce» has a small “d” while there should be a capital D as in the preceding volumes. The same can be said when Sujata calls Satprem «mon Doux».

Finally, one can regret the not so good taste in the choice of certain terms and the parsimony of explanatory notes (for example, why not give the meaning given to the pomegranate by Mother since Satprem and Sujata are wondering about it for a long time?).

In short, this volume 8 of the Notebooks contains a great number of spelling, grammar, punctuation and translation mistakes. It also seems to show an erroneous transcription of the original manuscripts and one passage at least has been omitted without explanation (see page 173).
Is this due to a too careless proof reading? Or to a lack of means? Or to the deliberate choice of not calling in skills that are outside Mira Aditi or the I.R.E.?
Whatever the answer, it seems obvious that such an approximate work can only be detrimental to the passing on of Satprem’s work.

January, 2010