The death of A. W. S. O’Sullivan in August 1903 was the sudden death of the translator of the English edition of The Achehnese, by which the project lost both its translator and the man who had undertaken to compile the alphabetical index and to write a translator’s preface. O’Sullivan’s death occurred, Snouck Hurgronje tells us, “when the book was at last completed in manuscript, and when the first volume had been printed in full and the second to the extent of some pages”. The loss of these projected features of the English edition was made good, so far as could be, by R. J. Wilkinson, who “kindly undertook” both the compilation of the index and the translation of the introduction.
O’Sullivan’s project
When Mr. O’Sullivan, early in 1899, informed Hurgronje of his project of translating the book, and requested him to look through his version and give him the benefit of any amendments in the text that might seem to be needed, “it was just the very time that the real conquest of Acheh was being commenced.” The undertaking might have been seriously delayed by the fact that the translator and the author were separated — “one in the Straits Settlements, the other in Netherlands India” — and that both, “wrapped up in official duties, would already find it as much as they could do to get through their self-appointed task, especially as the English edition would have to be printed in Europe.” It was therefore with some difficulty that the work was at length completed in manuscript.
The loss of the translator’s preface
Besides the alphabetical index rerum, which would take the place of the lists of contents of chapters as well as of the list of Achehnese words attached to the original edition, “Mr. O’Sullivan planned a translator’s preface to follow mine.” This last feature, Hurgronje notes, “must now be lost to the reader” — the consequence of his sudden death in August 1903. “The compilation of the index as well as the translation of this introduction was kindly undertaken by Mr. Wilkinson who was intimately acquainted with Mr. O’Sullivan’s project.” Wilkinson’s task, in the absence of O’Sullivan’s own notes, was necessarily reconstructive; but his familiarity with the translator’s intentions allowed him to supply, in some measure, the place of the lost preface and the projected index.
O’Sullivan’s other contributions to the edition
Besides the absence of the translator’s preface, the differences between the Dutch and English editions are recorded by Hurgronje in his introduction. “Mr. O’Sullivan has appended some notes, marked as coming from the translator and dealing especially with the aspect of the phenomena cognate to those in the text whenever they are also met with in the Malay Peninsula.” The two geographical maps which accompanied the Dutch edition were entirely re-cast, “as the expeditions which traversed the country during the last years of the war were extremely useful for topographical purposes.” Of the photographic plates which illustrated the first edition, “some have been omitted, others replaced by better, and many are inserted for the first time.” Some texts in the Achehnese language, of which a summary or translation appeared in the course of descriptions — e.g. regarding the conclusion of a marriage in Vol. I, and regarding the sadati-dances in Vol. II — were given in the Dutch text as appendices; “these appendices are now omitted. Finally the spelling of Achehnese words has been somewhat modified to suit English eyes and ears.”
The death of O’Sullivan is thus, in the bibliographic history of The Achehnese, the event that deprived the English edition of its translator’s own voice, and committed the completion of the work to his colleague and friend.
See Also
Source
The Achehnese, Vol. I, by Dr. C. Snouck Hurgronje, translated by A.W.S. O’Sullivan, indexed by R.J. Wilkinson. Leyden: E.J. Brill, 1906.