We’re currently closing in on the last ten pages.
Denoument
Today we started the last chapter. Just over a hundred pages to go.
T Minus 10
As of tomorrow, ten days remain in this crazy hundred day marathon.
Will we make it? Yes. And no.
We will (more than likely, Krishna willing) finish what we set out to do, which was read everything that Sivarama Maharaja had written. There are two more thirty-page documents (an appendix, and some “concluding words”) that are still being written and will need to be edited and read.
Nevertheless, it will be done when it’s done, which I hope is soon.
Onward Krishna Soldiers!
During a reading session a few days ago Sivarama Swami recalled—perhaps less than fondly—that in primary school he was forced to learn and sing the well-known Christian hymn and Salvation Army processional, “Onward, Christian Soldiers.” It reminded me of a good “non-devotee” friend of mine who used to sing that tune whenever he saw me, though with different words: “Onward, Krishna soldier!”
Earlier today, caught in a particularly low ebb in our steadily waning momentum, Sivarama Maharaja raised his right arm triumphantly and delivered our new battle cry, “Onward, Krishna soldiers!”
“Little drops of water wear away the stone.”
Just over thirty days remain in our hundred-day marathon. Nearly seven out of nine volumes have been completed—practically three thousand pages. The last two volumes—comprising the “Radhe-Syama chapters” that deal explicitly with the Gayatri mantras and Hare Krishna maha-mantra—are easily the most complex and philosophical, to say nothing of the fact that they account for a quarter of the total text. Still, hopes are high that not only will we finish on time, we might even finish early. [knocks on wood]
This book is a sprawling, gargantuan epic of a thing. And though we’ve been working on it practically every day for the last two and a half years, the idea that this phase might soon (very, very soon) be reaching completion is difficult to grok.
It Was A Banner Day
Today we set a new record: seventy-eight pages in one day. We also passed the thousand page mark.
Only three thousand five hundred to go.
Progress Report
After eighteen days in (with one day “off,” which was really a free day to catch up on writing and editing as yet unfinished) our average daily page count is pretty strong—just over forty-nine pages per day.
If we can keep up this pace—which I have to admit feels like it may be killing me—we can make it in a hundred days.
Prayers, blessings, and benedictions welcomed.
After eighteen days in (with one day “off,” which was really a free day to catch up on writing and editing as yet unfinished) our average daily page count is pretty strong—just over forty-nine pages per day.
If we can keep up this pace—which I have to admit feels like it may be killing me—we can make it in a hundred days.
Prayers, blessings, and benedictions welcomed.
At Long Last
And suddenly it’s here: tomorrow we start the final read-through for Nava-Vraja Mahima. All writing (well, almost all writing) and all “first pass” editing (OK, not quite all) are finished. Early tomorrow, Sivarama Swami, Kesava Bharati Maharaja, and myself will sit down together and start reading the four thousand four hundred or so pages of the literary behemoth we’ve been slogging away at for the last few years. Our hundred-day plan will hopefully bring us to the end of the process by the beginning of December, provided we maintain a pace of forty to fifty pages a day. When we dig into the introduction tomorrow morning at five AM we’ll have our first clear impression of just how feasible that plan might be. If we were only reading, fifty pages a day might not be too much, but there are sections of the book–more than a few sections–that will require some discussion and quite possibly some rewriting, though the majority of the text will (hopefully) need little extra work.
To be honest, I’ve had my doubts that we would ever get to this part of the process. But here it is. When Sivarama Maharaja first asked me to come to Hungary and get to work the plan was for five months of editing and two months of read-through, with two extra months “just in case.” Those last two months ended up being a little longer, with an ever-increasing page count bringing me into two years (exactly two years on August tenth) “on the job,” with another three or four months to go.
This project has been more than I expected in a hundred different ways, but it has also been more than I’d hoped for. I think it’s safe to say that I will never work on another book of this size or with such an incredible scope. It’s probably just as safe to say that I will never encounter another place like New Vraja-dhama, or meet people quite like those who have made this place their home.
But let’s not get maudlin. We’re still a few thousand pages away.
P(rof)undit.
Devotee: How’s the book coming?
Me: It’s coming.
Devotee: Is there a light at the end of the tunnel?
Me: Yeah, I think so. But I can’t tell how far away it is. Actually, it goes out sometimes. Maybe that’s just my eyes.
