I’ve only just learned that there’s an online/electronic edition of Migne’s Patrologia Graecae. Wow! It’s only images of the pages, which is fine by me, but the metadata (authors, etc) are searchable. The best part is that anyone who buys this image-only edition will receive the planned XML version, fully searchable, at a reduced price once it is completed. Fantastic!
This makes an excellent companion to the online edition of Migne’s Patrologia Latina, which I’ve often dipped into.
While many of the texts in both of these supernumerously-volumed series have of course been published in critical editions since Migne’s collections were made, there are many, many texts, indeed most, within each which have never been further edited, much less translated.
It is a noble dream of mine to somehow arrange to have all the Patrologia Graecae volumes translated into English. The wealth of theological insight of the Eastern Fathers is something that really needs to have greater exposure, particularly these days when interest in them is growing. The work involved to produce translations of all the volumes in anything approaching a useful timeframe would require the project to involve quite a number of people, of course. It’s something I think of now and again. Of course, having all the texts available in a format in which they could be easily distributed to participating translators is key, with the above-mentioned forthcoming XML edition of the PG being perfect for that. I certainly don’t find it practical to photocopy 161 volumes! We’ll see what the future holds.