This is a MS Word file version 97-2002. There is no embedded formatting other than the font being Arial, 12pt normal and the alignment left. The file size is 9.17 megabytes. It's 2228 pages long when I open it up with standard sized pages.

Some duplication was eliminated and there were a few additions to this file, some corrections, and the lecture source file name was added to the top of each lecture so they can be found more easily. Notes were removed because they screwed things up. They will be added back in a subsequent version but not with note formatting, just as part of the text. This file is not formatted to be printed in pages with page numbers embedded though of course it will print. Also, diacritical marks such as macrons were removed. They still exist as do the notes on the original lecture files that can be accessed from this website's base page at either the Shunryu Suzuki Lecture Index-all or the same index broken down by years. This index is in the form of a data base with the lectures listed by file name in a long row and information on the lectures presented in a line of columns. In the future we plan to add some of that information to the top of each lecture in this all-in-one file.

Updates to this file will happen here. Check here periodically to see if there's a new version. That way as lectures are added and corrections are made, rather than us having to notify you who are first on our list and a slew of others and making a list of who's been sent the latest version of this file and so forth, rather than that, those who are interested can check here.

dchad3[at]sonic[dot]net

cuke.com

A Note from Ray Watkins about his work on the All-in-one file of Shunryu Suzuki Lectures.

Reformatting SSL-All-110620:

SRL-12-05-08

Shunryu Suzuki’s lectures have nurtured the Buddhist community for years, and capturing their radiance from audio-tape to text has attracted many gifted editors. More than eighty of these lectures have been published in three books, but many more (about 300) still have their only home in the “All File”. This file compiles the efforts of many transcribers over the years, and, as a result, it has acquired a range of stylistic variations. At last it seemed time to smooth out a few of its wrinkles.

The reformatting of the “All File” involved no content modification whatsoever. The first objective was simply stylistic consistency. Various editors had employed varied typographies and writing conventions, and these inconsistencies have been smoothed. For example, only the double dash ( -- ) is now used to indicate both pauses in Suzuki’s speech and words the transcribers were unable to understand.

Stylistic consistency seeks a second objective: cross-platform compatibility. Only two web-friendly fonts were used (Arial and Times New Roman), and macrons and other diacritical markers were removed. Thus, the file should appear the same without regard to browser, computer-make, or installed fonts. This stylistic uniformity also makes printing more predictable.

A third objective was accessibility. Scholarly footnotes — an impressive feature in the original — have been simplified for readers new to the archive. Since each document originated as a lecture or talk being heard by mostly non-Japanese hearers, Suzuki explained, in context, almost all Japanese words or phrases as he used them, but about twenty-six terms not so explained have been grouped into a Glossary. (Hundreds of geographical and historical details — much of it the result of Bill Redican’s painstaking work — remain in the original file, comprising over 1300 footnotes.)

To assist in navigating through the file, a Lecture Separator is used: it’s a 33 character underline:            _________________________________   This separator, if copied and pasted into the search bar of a word-processor or internet browser, enables readers to “jump” from lecture to lecture with ease. Of course, readers can always search the All-File by any word. And they can search the file by date: each lecture/talk is titled by year/month/day (for example: 69-04-24 means that the lecture was delivered on April 24, 1969).

Work on the “All File” remains to be done: accurate dates and sequencing can sometimes be elusive, and some audio tapes have been waiting for new sophisticated technology to make their contents clear. For now, I hope this modest “smoothing out of a few wrinkles” may make reading all his lectures more effortless.

DC note: The glossary may at some point include list of words with diacritical marks that were removed for the All file to make them easy to search for. Till then these words with their correct spelling or sometimes several correct spellings, can be found quickly by searching the Internet.