Unless You Sat Right Next to Him

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Ludicrity sometimes erupts when an interpreter of the original writings gets the relationships wrong.

Text:
The only problem was he spoke so goddamn softly that unless you sat right next to him, even in these tiny dorm rooms where his acolytes would gather, you could miss a pearl or two. Seth would take notes on the lecture and everybody would take notes on Seth. At times it seemed as if they would canonize him, despite his single eccentricity. He would go to bed at nine o'clock--unyielding as Horatius on the bridge, he wouldn't even compromise for nine-fifteen. (Doctors, Erich Segal, p.215) (The Korean version1, p.269)

Dano's comments:
It's been a bad habit for the Korean translators to change an original statement into an utterly different story. That's been so arbitrary. Such an attitude would exceed the discretion of a translator, or translators.

The bold-typed clause describes a cordial scene in which a study group of Harvard dorm students are clustered together, but does not mention any attitude they were making. The relationships between characters are physically immediate and close; they sit right next to one brilliant student who is enacting the day's classroom lecture. It's a sheer creation for the Korean translator to the effect that they are listening to the lecture with a greater attention.