INES G. ZUPANOV - Ines G. Županov

Prologue • 13
especially, such as Somberius, and even non-Catholic compilers like
John Lockman, a later British translator of Lettres édifiantes et curieuses,
were accused of adulterating the original Jesuit texts, although
the fashion of retailoring the letters actually started with Polanco's
secretariat itself. 37 He shortened some letters in order to highlight
edifying stories and 'improved' the style and tone of sometimes
rather illiterate writing. In one of the letters by Alfonso Salmerón, it
appears that Nadal ordered that some of the letters be corrected in
Lisbon, their first stop in Europe, before being sent to Rome. 38
Probably the most famous collection, which attracted a popular
audience and became a mine of ideas for the Enlightenment philosophes,
were the thirty-four volumes oí Lettres édifiantes et curieuses.
This editorial enterprise was a great success, from the first volume,
edited by P. Le Gobien in 1702 until the end of publication in 1776, a
date which coincides with the suppression of the Society of Jesus. 39
Already in 1705 (February 2), an article in the Journal des savants
criticized Le Gobien's editorial policy of improving the style of the
letters to the point where their veracity was dubious. Later editors
took even more liberty with the texts. One can imagine what happened
with further translations of the Lettres édifiantes et curieuses
into other European languages, and the publications after 1776, when,
instead of Jesuit editorial authority, anybody was able to abridge and
refurbish these letters according to his own taste. After the reconstitution
of the Society of Jésus in 1813, new Jesuit collections of
unpublished letters appeared.
F. Joseph Bertrand, himself a missionary in Madurai during the
1830s, edited four volumes of La Mission du Maduré d'après des documents
inédits, a selection of letters written in or about the Madurai
mission, from 1606 until the suppression of the order. 40 From the
choice of the founding date, which coincides with the appearance of
Roberto Nobili on the scene and the exclusion of important letters
37 Lockman, John, Travels of the Jesuits into Various Parts of the World.
38 Salmerón to Nadal, 28 September, 1561, in Epistolae P. Hieronimi Nadal Societalis
lesu ab anno 1546 ad 1577, Madrid, 1898, voL 1, p. 529.
39 Vol. 1-7 were edited by P. Le Gobien; 9-26 by the China specialist P. du Halde,
vols 27,28,31,33 and 34 by P. Patouillet; the editorship of vols 29,30,32 is uncertain—
either René Maréchal or J. B. Geoffrey.
40 Bertrand, Joseph (ed.), La Mission du Maduré d'après des documents inédits,
Paris, 1847-50,4 vols.