In this season of lotsawa conferences, there is a lot of reflection and discussion about how lotsawas do their thing, all of it tying in quite neatly with the purpose of this site. In the spirit of this atmosphere of introspection, here is a set of guidelines laid out by the excellent Padmakara Translation Group on their burgeoning new site:
- Start by receiving transmission and explanation of the text from a qualified teacher
- Careful, painstaking translation of the meaning, with extensive research and study where necessary
- Submission of difficult points and doubts to competent teachers with a good knowledge of the text
- Double-checking of the draft translation by at least one other translator
- Careful editing and rewriting to produce a clear, readable style
- Final text proof-read and approved by a person who knows the subject and has a good command of the final language
For five days in March, several lamas and many of the world’s leading Tibetan Buddhist translators came together at the splendid Deer Park Institute in the Himalayan foothills of Northern India for Translating the Words of the Buddha, an impeccably organized conference that was several years in the planning. The aim was to discuss the current state and future direction of Tibetan Buddhist translation, but as we arrived few of us had any idea what to expect.
Here’s one for fellow Tibeto-bibliophiles. Gene Smith of TBRC was recently asked for his pick of the ‘must have’ Tibetan dictionaries. These, I am told, were his ‘top three’: 
The following points, derived from Gene Smith’s Among Tibetan Texts by Kurtis Schaeffer, were shared at Columbia University’s panel discussion on the future of Tibetan studies after Gene Smith.
During a recent visit to the offices of TBRC, I was fortunate enough to glimpse Gene Smith‘s famous ‘notebooks’, the painstakingly typewritten transcripts of texts and interviews, with their own particular system of colour coding, capitalisation, underlining and marginalia. Many pages feature handwritten corrections and further notes added at a later date. Most of the books are leather-bound in green with titles on the spine. There appeared to be at least fifty in the office, but there might be others elsewhere. Jeff Wallman estimated that they represent about twenty years of work.
Adam S. Pearcey 
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