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We produced it using Project Gutenberg's modern F. P. Walter translation. At the time, there was no copyright notice on the text, only PG's public domain boiler
by acabal 4y ago
We produced it using Project Gutenberg's modern F. P. Walter translation. At the time, there was no copyright notice on the text, only PG's public domain boilerplate, so we produced it thinking it had been dedicated to the public domain. Some years later PG added a copyright notice, so we were forced to take our edition down.
There is no acceptable PD translation of 20,000 Leagues; all the classic translations are widely considered to be slapdash, very bad, or severely bowdlerized.
- JJMcJ 4y agoAlso some other classics like The Three Musketeers.
- acabal 4y agoYes, bowdlerization and poor translations were common in those days. We do our best to select a single "best" translation that scholars/readers agree is the most faithful of the public domain options. But in some cases, like 20,000 Leagues, we'd rather not host a book at all than host a bad translation, if that's our only option.