Philosophical Question

[lavenderbard]

When transcribing someone’s Juvenilia, should one preserve the spelling errors, or not?

Mirrored on My Website.

Comments

[lizvogel]

Depends on the purpose of the activity, methinks. Is it to showcase how far the writer has progressed since those early efforts? Then leave them in. Is it to include the work in some collaborative project? Then you're effectively functioning as an editor, and editors clean up spelling. And so on.

[lavenderbard]

I guess that's my problem, I don't really know why its worth transcribing: maybe it isn't.

It's actually my juvenilia. I've got a lot of it (a bank box full of hand-written mss -- mostly incomplete) and my daughter has offered to "transcribe it all" for me, clearly not having any idea of just how huge that task would be.

I love the thought of having it available in some kind of electronic format. But at the same time, I can't really figure out what the point of hanging on to it all is.

(Which doesn't mean I'm willing to get rid of it, of course. I think it would take the house burning down, or a tornado or something.)

[lizvogel]

Well, you'll take my early scribblings away from me when you pry my cold, dead fingers from the pages, and you'd better bring a crowbar at that. So I completely understand.

If electronic format is appealing, then searchability might be a factor, which would argue for fixing the spelling.

Or you could just cop out and leave it to the daughter's judgment. ;-) If the task doesn't make her flee screaming, maybe she'll have some insight on what the result is for.