Is it acceptable to buy a Wordsworth edition?
>>8074172
its cheap, why not?
>>8074172
Only depending on what it is
Their translations are trash. If you open up their Essential Kafka, the first line says he was changed into a "verminous, terrible bug" which we know to be objectively shit translating
Their english ones are okay if you can take the shit aesthetics and whatnot
>>8074172
I bought the edition of crime and punishment pictured and it's very poor. I couldn't tell you what's good but I'd recommend not purchasing that one
only if you collect them all
>>8074386
Have it open in front of me, it, uh, doesn't. Reads "huge verminous insect", at least in my copy.
>>8074458
Same thing really
The original German says NOTHING about being a bug. Simply "vermin". Any translation that says more than that is horseshit
Also the cover has Gregor as the vermin pictured on the cover—something Kafka explictly said to never do
>>8074474
Hmm fair enough. Not as bad as "bug" though.
>>8074412
/thread.
>>8074172
I have the Wordsworth edition of Anna Karenina. Makes me smile every time I see it. So, yeah, it's acceptable.
Wordsworth classics are patrician as fuck
>>8074172
If I get dubs you can buy it.
>>8074474
fuck mine reads "gigantic insect". FUCK
whats a good translation of all the short stories?
>>8074172
Their Tales of Mystery and the Supernatural series has all manner of good stuff from weird fiction writers (Hodgson, Howard, Lovecraft) as well as genre fiction by Victorian authors; Conan Doyle.
Buying Wordsworth logically makes no sense for someone who browses /lit/
There are reasons for buying physical editions of books, and that it because they feel nice, look nice, and have the potential to impress other people. However, if those aren't things that you care about, obviously you will feel more inclined to just download the book and read the fucking thing for free.
Wordsworth offers essentially none of the nice attributes you typically get from buying physical books, therefore it would make more sense to save your money and just download.
>>8074172
buy it for the cover
>>8074851
A cheap paper copy is still preferable to reading on a screen. Buying expensive editions makes less sense really - if it is a book in English the text is the same and any reading around you want to do would be better done on the internet anyway.
The above argument does not apply for translations (although I do have a soft spot for the old public domain ones), or books which need lots of footnotes. However for eg Austen I don't see why you'd spend £8 or whatever when you could buy four books at £2 each
>>8074386
As with all series, quality of translations vary. It also rather depends on why you're buying a translation. For example, I have a couple of their Homers, because one is a complete Chapman, another TE Lawrence's Odyssey (both now out of print), and their Apuleius (because it's the old Loeb translation, with supplements to reverse the expurgation).
I have their Ulysses edition. It was $2. I wouldn't pay much more for it.
