Where are Ron's original writing?
As I understand it, people researching different subjects can go to libraries where they can find original papers concerning their subject. Can you do that the Scientology? NO.
In the video talk (see: http://www.truelrh.com/SummaryReport.html ) David Miscavige makes some strong statements about how Ron's original books were perverted. But no one can check what he said. The archives are shut. I believe there are archives but they are not open to the public or to scholars. [This link doesn't work at the moment (July 2017), but the whole homepage is still there at: http://www.truelrh.com .]
The copies of most of the original books are available. They came into my possession as PDF files a few years ago, and I've been able to get them, all forty books, placed onto this site. They are stored as PDF files, being copies of the original pages of first and early editions, and you can check them.
Go to the column on the left of this article, click on "Early Scientology History", and then click on "First Editions of Scientology Books" and there you have them with an explanation of their origin by the man (or group) that made them.
It's a subject I feel rather deeply about having been in Scientology since 1954. I never witnessed books being changed or perverted in the way David Miscavige talks about or implies. In 1964 I worked at St Hill (England) in a basement office together with the person who typed Ron's handwritten Bulletins and Policy Letters. When we came at 9 o'clock in the morning there was a stack of handwritten pages from Ron (in red or green ballpoint) which the typist (Joan Watson) typed up during the morning (she was part-time) duplicated, and placed in all staff members com baskets, including a copy to L Ron Hubbard. She then placed Ron Hubbard's original in a folder together with surplus copies of the duplicated Policy Letter or Bulletin and these were carefully preserved. Years later (about 1970) I worked in the office of Athena Publications which made books out of the Policy Letters and Bulletins. Rosemary Delderfield was the typist. I was the typesetter and also the proofreader's reader. That is to say when Rosemary had typed something up, I read out to her what she had typed and she checked that it was what was on the original. Sometimes there was some discrepancy or suspicious item (because some of the things we worked from had been re-typed once, twice or more) and if we couldn't sort it out locally she then sent a dispatch to the LRH secretary who checked with the originals.
There was a reverence for Ron and a very earnest attempt to duplicate exactly what he meant. This attitude was noticeable to me in all the time I worked in Scientology, going back to 1957.
I contacted Jefferson Hawkins who was concerned with the publication of Scientology books since he joined Pubs Org in 1968 in Edinburgh until 2005. You can see his account in the book he wrote, Counterfeit Dreams ( http://counterfeitdreams.com/ ). This is what he wrote to me:
I think the books were written in a variety of ways. DMSMH was famously typed - that's promoted by Scientology in their films and biographies (and Hubbard was apparently a two-finger typist according to Sanborn). Self Analysis was dictated onto wax cylinders. The other books - I don't know how they were produced.
But the whole "transcription errors" thing is a sham. Scientology is trying desperately to keep Hubbard's books out of public domain, so they have to regularly renew the copyrights, but a new copyright can only be granted if there are "substantial changes or updates" in a written work, so they had to invent a way to justify changing the books. The idea that Hubbard was not aware of errors in his books is insane.
I (Antony) do get a bit worked up about this! So I hope you'll excuse me.
But the message here is that if you look under "First Editions of Scientology Books" you will find the nearest we have to Ron's originals. Note that Ron himself would certainly have read them, and handled it if what David Miscavige said happened did happen.
Enjoy them, while I go off and get a cold drink to cool off a bit! Hope you enjoy them, and find them useful, and if you like to copy them or pass them on or even post on another site on the Internet please do so. Ron once wrote "You won't always be here. But before you go, whisper this to your sons and their sons 'The work was free. Keep it so.' (Scientology: Clear Procedure - Issue One (December 1957).
All best wishes, Ant(ony).
PS. (written a day later). As stated above I have knowledge of how Ron Hubbard's Bulletins and Policy Letters were written and preserved. I lack first hand knowledge of how he wrote the books, and I was surprised by David Miscavige's statement with regard to them being dictated (not written). I've seen data that Ron Hubbard was very fast on a typewriter and that the pulp fiction books which he wrote in the 30s were done on a typewriter.
If anyone can dig up further data on how Ron wrote a Scientology book, whether by dictation or on a typewriter or otherwise, I'd be glad if you would pass it on to me at ant.phillips@post8.tele.dk . Anyone with a curious turn of mind, please step in and investigate.
The two books I do know about how they came about are Scientology 0-8 and The Phoenix Lectures. These were compiled by John Sanborn, working in Pubs Org. Scientology 0-8 was created in Copenhagen and I did the typesetting for it. I understand in the "Miscavige" reissue of Scientology 0-8 an important (in my opinion) passage was left out. It was a passage which originally appeared in The Creation of Human Ability and in my first edition starts on page 10, beginning:
PS. (written a day later). As stated above I have knowledge of how Ron Hubbard's Bulletins and Policy Letters were written and preserved. I lack first hand knowledge of how he wrote the books, and I was surprised by David Miscavige's statement with regard to them being dictated (not written). I've seen data that Ron Hubbard was very fast on a typewriter and that the pulp fiction books which he wrote in the 30s were done on a typewriter.
If anyone can dig up further data on how Ron wrote a Scientology book, whether by dictation or on a typewriter or otherwise, I'd be glad if you would pass it on to me at ant.phillips@post8.tele.dk . Anyone with a curious turn of mind, please step in and investigate.
The two books I do know about how they came about are Scientology 0-8 and The Phoenix Lectures. These were compiled by John Sanborn, working in Pubs Org. Scientology 0-8 was created in Copenhagen and I did the typesetting for it. I understand in the "Miscavige" reissue of Scientology 0-8 an important (in my opinion) passage was left out. It was a passage which originally appeared in The Creation of Human Ability and in my first edition starts on page 10, beginning:
Considerations take rank over the mechanics of space, energy, and time. By this is meant that an idea or opinion is, fundamentally, superior to space, energy, and time, or organisations of form, … [The first sentence was in italics in The Creation of Human Ability and Scientology 0-8]
This data can be verified/amplified, for example via http://www.truelrh.com/index.html#S8-80
