Notes For The Reader

The conventions that are used for this unusual material may not be familiar to all readers, so that a few explanations at the start may be useful.

Almost the entirety of the material is transcribed conversation. Consequently, the American convention of double quotation marks (“) to denote conversation could be used, but would be so pervasive as to clutter the text. Therefore, the convention of leaving them out but only implying them is used. As a consequence, the next set of quotation marks denoting quotes within quotes (‘) is used as the first set of quotation marks the reader will see. However, as Mary is often reading from her diaries in these transcribed conversations, and it seems important to distinguish this from general conversation, the single quote punctuation mark (‘) is used mostly to distinguish such material.

Whenever Mary is quoting Krishnamurti or anyone else, double quotation marks (“) are used.

The transcribers of these conversations have agreed to another convention that seems useful in understanding this material, and are consequently being passed on to the reader. All five transcribers of this material have commented on the joy and especially the laughter is these conversations. While the joy seems impossible to denote, laughter is not; and it seems important to do so as laughter can change the meaning of what is read (e.g., “Oh, we can’t do that” reads differently to “Oh, we can’t do that” [Mary and Scott laughing]). There was so much delight in Mary’s life with Krishnamurti, and they often had such fun doing small things together (and this, again, has been commented on by all the transcribers) that it seems important to translate this to the written page. Transcribers have denoted non-verbal aspects of the conversation they thought were important by writing out what they heard inside square brackets ([]).

The transcribers also, in trying to maintain as much of the voices as possible, wanted the readers to know when there were significant or poignant pauses, and this they did by putting three dots (…) between words.

Of course, as in most conversation, there were in these conversations a great many of what linguists call “place holders” (e.g., um, ah, hmm, etc.). These clutter written text, so they are, for the most part, left out. However, sometimes, they denote that a person is thinking, or that one person in a conversation in agreeing with what the other person is saying (e.g. mm hmm); and when it seems germane to the conversation, they have been left in, though usually with a transcriber’s note (e.g. [affirming]).

An important part of our verbal communication is how emphatically we say a thing, and it seems right to give the reader of these conversations some sense of that. While we have many ways in conversation to emphasize what we are saying, this material only uses three: a normal emphasis (e.g., “I was very unhappy.”), a greater emphasis (e.g., “I was very unhappy”), and the top emphasis (e.g., “I was very unhappy.”) This denotation of emphasis was not done by the transcribers, but by the editor when proofreading all the transcripts. So, although there is clearly some subjectivity in the use of this denotation of emphasis, it is at least the consistent subjectivity of one person.

Many people might disagree with all of the small every-day details that are included in this account, feeling that they are insignificant next to the esoteric aspects of Krishnamurti’s life. But this is an account of what it was like to be with Krishnamurti, and that was a seamless blend of the every-day and the esoteric. In fact, Mary felt very strongly that due to the nature of Krishnamurti’s presence, every-day things often seemed unusual. This phenomenon is discussed twice. At any rate, small every-day things make up a large part of all of our lives, so it didn’t seem right to leave those out of an account of being in the presence of Krishnamurti.

There are also various names used for Krishnamurti. In India, ji is frequently put after at least part of a person’s name when speaking about someone for whom one has affection as well as respect. Consequently, Krishnamurti was often called “Krishnaji” by many, and is usually done so in this text. In the same way, Mary was often called “Maryji” or “Mariaji” (Krishnamurti called Mary “Maria”) in India. Also, Krishnamurti frequently referred to himself as “K,” and those around him sometimes did the same. Mary did not often refer to Krishnamurti as “K,” but she did occasionally. However, in her diaries she often calls him “K” for what usually seem to be reasons of brevity. In this text, whatever version of Krishnamurti’s name (“Krishnamurti,” “Krishnaji,” or “K”) is actually spoken, that is the one that appears.

Scott H. Forbes

March 2013