Roger Pearse

Imagine an ancient text stuffed full of gloating descriptions of the most obscene vices. But imagine also that most of the text is of real interest for antiquity. Should we translate and upload these passages? yes or no?

I'm slightly nervous that people will respond depending on whether they like obscenity or not. So imagine it describes graphically child-rape or something.

Ben C Smith

No worries here. I generally dislike obscenity, but am in favor of leaving it in when reproducing a text.

Thanks, Roger, for your ongoing efforts to get these texts online and available.

Ben.

Ben C Smith

The Latin option is basically what the ANF series did for book 3 of the Miscellanies, right?

Ben.

-Jay-

I think that the integrity of the material is best served by including all of it, even the unsavory bits.

Amaleq13

Ditto.

Roger Pearse

That's correct. The idea is not to suppress it, but to ensure that those specialists who need to consult it can do so.

Of course the other motivation, in Victorian times, was to avoid your book being turned into an under-the-counter item!

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Potoooooooo

Where can I find some of these texts?

Roger Pearse

This, of course, is what I thought might influence voting. Perhaps I should have a separate poll on that?

andrewcriddle

C S Lewis was asked this question concerning an unexpurgated edition of Pepys. He supported an unexpurgated edition, arguing that there was a significant loss to scholarship involved in expurgation, and only a trivial increase in the amount of available obscenity involved in full publication.

Andrew Criddle

Potoooooooo

enough with the chit-chat, where can I get some of this ancient porno:devil1: