Metropolis project

[hackimoto]

I don't know if this is the right section for this, but I have been working on a recording of Thea Von Harbou's novel Metropolis(1925), the basis of the silent film since I didn't see it in the Librivox library and I'm pretty confident that it qualifies as public domain. It's a big project for me only because I'm still new at the whole process, but it's not a very long book.

My issue with it is that there are a number of obvious errors in the text which I cross-checked with a copy I have of the book and the errors are in there too. For example there is a part in which a character is told to use "the first escape" when it seems like what was meant was "fire escape" and clear misspellings such as "haying[having] a heart and brain". My copy of the book also specifies that it's based on the original English translation from 1927.

I would guess it is policy to read the text verbatim, errors be damned, even if they are obvious but it's going to sound stupid. I wonder if maybe this is the reason why nobody has recorded this particular book.

I was just wonder if anyone has insight on that situation or has any interest in adding this book to the Librivox collection or if the errors just make it unrecordable. What do you do when this happens?

[TriciaG]

My copy of the book also specifies that it's based on the original English translation from 1927.

Regarding copyright: this statement scares me. "Based on" doesn't mean it IS the original English translation. If there are significant edits, it may have incurred a new copyright. What does the copyright page say exactly?

But regarding your original question: We read the texts as written, but sometimes there are typos and such that we night overlook. Your "haying vs. having" example is one of those. If I were reading it, I'd probably stick with "having" because it's obviously a typo. But the "first escape" rather than "fire escape" is trickier. If possible, I would be interested in seeing what the original German(?) text had there.

What you could do is state in the intro/summary that the translation has many textual errors, and that they are read as written. That way, although they sound stupid, you're "covered" in that you acknowledge they're wrong but are sticking with the text as written.

[hackimoto]

"This Ace edition follows the text of the first English edition, originally published in 1927"

Though the text I'm reading from is from PG Australia
https://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks06/0601891h.html

Actually that "haying/having" mistake was a typo on the PG text and actually wasn't in the book, so I wonder if it's ok to just ignore something like that anyways if you can confirm it's a transcription error as opposed to an alternate edition or something.

In any case, the project is a good exercise for me.

[flavo5000]

"This Ace edition follows the text of the first English edition, originally published in 1927"

Though the text I'm reading from is from PG Australia
https://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks06/0601891h.html

Actually that "haying/having" mistake was a typo on the PG text and actually wasn't in the book, so I wonder if it's ok to just ignore something like that anyways if you can confirm it's a transcription error as opposed to an alternate edition or something.

In any case, the project is a good exercise for me.

We usually don't use the Gutenberg Australia versions since they typically don't specify what version of the text they are referencing, but in the case of Metropolis, they do actually specify that's it's the 1927 version. So it should be ok to use as a source.

Also, since you are already recording it, I would suggest you go ahead and create a solo project for it and secure a proof listener and meta co-ordinator for it. The directions for how to do so can be found over here: viewtopic.php?t=13513

On a personal note, I've been hoping someone would pick up Metropolis. It seems like it could be a cool one to do.

[annise]

PGA still says -

Project Gutenberg of Australia eBooks are created from printed
editions which are in the public domain in Australia, unless a
copyright notice is included. We do NOT keep any eBooks in
compliance with a particular paper edition.

And it is not a scan showing the date so I don't think you could read from it.
So I think further discussion is needed.

Anne

[flavo5000]

PGA still says -

Project Gutenberg of Australia eBooks are created from printed
editions which are in the public domain in Australia, unless a
copyright notice is included. We do NOT keep any eBooks in
compliance with a particular paper edition.

And it is not a scan showing the date so I don't think you could read from it.
So I think further discussion is needed.

Anne

With most PGA books, that's true. But if you look at this one specifically, you can see here:
"First German edition:
August Scherl Verlag, 1926

First English edition:
The Readers Library Publishing
Co. Ltd., London, 1927 (this version)"

They specifically reference that the 1927 edition is the version presented. I've rarely seen them do that.

[hackimoto]

https://archive.org/details/TheaVonHarbou19271963Mertopolis/Thea%20Von%20Harbou%20%281927-1963%29%20Mertopolis/page/n3/mode/2up

How about this place? Or do you only like to use stuff on PG? That's actually why I thought PGAu would be just as good but I also just don't like reading from the scan viewer as much.

I may actually come back to this project a little later anyways since Audacity just lost a whole bunch of my data and I may need to start it over again so I can use a better program that won't do me like that.