FROM THE TRANSLATOR It is unlikely that I can say anything about the heroic Captain Beefheart that has not already been said many times before me, so I will limit myself to only the necessary comments. Firstly, it seems to me that the translation was a success. Nine months of evening vigils after work were not in vain, and during the final reading I was surprised by how few errors and typos there were in the text. As one of the first commandments of the proletarian says, you can’t waste skill. Of course, I don't want to say that I produced a masterpiece, but nevertheless I think that I didn't screw it up too much. If anything is wrong, I apologize. Secondly, as you probably already understood, I am an enthusiast. I don’t know what connotation this word has in your eyes, but in mine it’s rather negative. So to speak, it indicates some splitting of the psyche. My only consolation is that, for example, Bill Harkleroad and Mark Boston played with KB for free for five years, and nothing happened - they are alive and well and creatively wealthy. What I mean by this is that I still strongly object to the commercial distribution of my... uh... work, and welcome non-commercial distribution in every possible way. So be it. Thirdly, I have no idea how Mike Barnes would react to my work, and what could save our pirate souls. Well, and finally, I want to express my deep gratitude to my friends Grigory Chiknaverov and Dmitry Senchakov, without which all this activity of mine would probably have died out in the bud. Thanks guys. PC, February 8, 2010.