Translator’s notes.

As soon as we assumed the commitment to render into Portuguese the Spiritist Review of Allan Kardec, we found ourselves seized by a certain apprehension, before the very magnitude of the work: twelve substantial volumes, published in Paris under the direct responsibility of the Codifier, in the period from 1858 to 1869, totaling four thousand, five hundred and sixty-eight pages, from the French originals that form part of the collection of the Library of Rare Works of the Brazilian Spiritist Federation, in Brasília.

Alongside this purely material aspect, there was the emotion of plunging, so to speak, into the gentle psychosphere of nascent Spiritism, whose radiances were beginning to pour over suffering Humanity, in fulfillment of Jesus’ promise to remain eternally with us. Conscious of dealing with a precious tool, from the outset we assumed the unswerving commitment never to distort the truth, so as to guarantee the necessary fidelity to the translated text; in the full twenty-first century, we could no longer fall into the old artifices of the past, which time, to be sure, has already buried. Who does not remember the interpolations, suppressions, and other lamentable modifications that prevailed in the times of intolerance, inserted into the Gospels precisely by those who ought to have watched over the purity of the teachings of Jesus? Legislating in their own cause and in the pay of unconfessable purposes, many times the truth was cunningly concealed by the very theologians who served the dominant Church, with a view to whitewashing their untenable doctrines. And, as if all this were not enough, there was the fear, natural and understandable, of embracing an activity until then entrusted only to choice minds, of the expression of Luís Olímpio Guillon Ribeiro and Manuel Justiniano de Freitas Quintão, so as not to stray from the Brazilian Spiritist Federation, nor from their irreproachable translations of the basic works of Allan Kardec.

Nevertheless, and setting aside the extraordinary content and significance of the Spiritist Review, this task represented an unforgettable opportunity to see Paris again with the eyes of the soul… To be sure, not the futuristic Paris of La Défense, disguised as an American megalopolis, but that of the Belle Époque, embellished by Napoleon III and wrapped in the charmante atmosphere of the nineteenth century, with its Boulevards adorned with plane trees and elms, réverbères and cafés, always crowded with beautiful people… Once more to traverse those streets, alleys, and places, once so familiar to the Codifier: Vaugirard, Grange-Batelière, Rochechouart, Passage Sainte-Anne, Ségur, Harpe, Martyrs, Tiquetonne, Sèvres, Odéon, Tuileries, Luxembourg, Palais-Royal, Galerie d’Orléans, Montparnasse, Montmartre, Père-Lachaise… To gaze again upon the beauties of the City of Light, whose magic human language is incapable of portraying… Indeed, how to describe the mists of the morning, the golden hues of autumn, the gentle enchantment of dusk, the twinkling of the stars in the firmament, and the frenzy of the passersby on the Champs-Élysées? Reveries aside, it is important not to lose sight of the fact that the translation of a work is a thorny task.[1] However careful, however faithful and honest, it will never express, in its entirety, the varied nuances of the original language. There are words, sentences, and maxims that find no satisfactory equivalence in our language. On the other hand, the emotions themselves are diluted or amplified when transferred from one culture to another, not to mention the traps that are laid for us when we translate literally or – more serious still – when we interpret the author’s thought, in the inglorious attempt to surpass the original text. Alongside this, there is the desirable observance of the grammatical and stylistic rules pertaining to the language in which we express ourselves, so as to make the reading agreeable and not to tire the reader. Having made these remarks, we sought to confine ourselves to the words and expressions of the French language that find perfect correspondence with their Portuguese counterparts, as they are employed in Brazil. When, by the very structure of the language in question, it was not possible for us to observe this rule, or so as not to reproduce words and periods that recurred frequently, we abandoned here and there the rigidity of the text, chiefly in attention to the clarity and the melody (euphony) of the sentences, without, however, ever forgetting to keep the faithful meaning of the truths translated into our language.

The present translation is of our entire responsibility, with the exception of some parts, whose indication, in a footnote, we ask the reader to refer to the original source. As is known to all, besides the primal function of an organ of doctrinal diffusion, the Spiritist Review constituted a kind of free tribune,[2] where Allan Kardec probed the reaction of men and the impression of the Spirits concerning certain subjects, still hypothetical or poorly understood, while he awaited their confirmation, through the concordance and the universality of the teaching of the Spirits. Many texts revealed by the superior Spirits, as well as others from the pen of the Codifier himself, previously published in the Spiritist Review, were transcribed by Kardec, integrally or with small modifications, in the basic – definitive – works that bear his name. Thus, we made use of the translations of Guillon Ribeiro and Manuel Quintão when the same passages of the Revue coincided with those already translated by these two former presidents of the FEB. Recognizing our real limitations in matters of poetry, whose rules must be scrupulously observed, in order to preserve the rhyme and the versification of the original language – almost always disfigured in the version that is translated – we entrusted this difficult task to our esteemed confrere and belletrist Inaldo Lacerda Lima who, at once and willingly, accepted it, carrying it out with mastery and unmistakable competence.

We sought to avoid, as much as possible, the insertion of footnotes, except when they had the purpose of clarifying the reader concerning the translation itself, of some doctrinal point, or, further, when they related to facts directly connected to the life and work of the Codifier. It is for this reason that we deliberately set aside any and every explanation that can be easily found in the encyclopedias and compendiums of General History.

Finally, in offering our modest work to the companions of the Spiritist ideal, we are the first to recognize that we have not made a perfect translation. Faults, to be sure, will be detected, some, perhaps, during the graphic process of composition and printing, others through our inattention, affording us the happy opportunity to remedy them in later editions of this work, provided that we count on the inestimable aid of the readers in pointing them out to us, with a view to its perennial improvement.

Brasília (DF), October 10, 2002.

Evandro Noleto Bezerra.

Translator.

[1] See bibliography consulted at the end of this volume.

[2] See Genesis, by Allan Kardec, introduction, final paragraph.