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Do there exist translations of Serre's early papers on spectral sequences? In particular, I am interested in the following ones:

Serre, Jean-Pierre Homologie singulière des espaces fibrés. Applications. Ann. of Math. (2) 54, (1951). 425–505.

Serre, Jean-Pierre Groupes d'homotopie et classes de groupes abéliens. Ann. of Math. (2) 58, (1953). 258–294.

Serre, Jean-Pierre Cohomologie modulo 2 des complexes d'Eilenberg-MacLane. Comment. Math. Helv. 27, (1953). 198–232.

ps : I know that many people will respond by saying that I should learn French. Well, I can read mathematical French, but it is painful and takes a long time. Since these are classic papers, I thought that there might exist translations of them somewhere.

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  • $\begingroup$ Dear Julia: Reading mathematical French will become less painful as you practice it more often (i.e., if the time required is dissuading you each time the situation arises then the "painfulness" you're encountering won't reduce). $\endgroup$
    – user30379
    Jan 9, 2013 at 15:07
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    $\begingroup$ If you can understand math fast enough that it makes a real difference in terms of time whether you read in French or English you must be really smart. $\endgroup$ Jan 9, 2013 at 17:23

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You can look at this volume: http://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/8444

ps: J.-P. Serre's papers are written in a very elegant style, his french is beautiful and nice to read :-)

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    $\begingroup$ A cautionary note: such commercial publications may be very expensive and hard to access, while the quality of all mathematical translations varies a lot. Usually the translators are paid minimally. (I recall one crucial line in a Russian paper involving some symbols being omitted entirely in a super-expensive English translation journal; the anonymous translator probably didn't understand the mathematics.) It's a burden for many people to read mathematical French, but it's also a burden for the French to cope with so much stuff in English. $\endgroup$ Jan 9, 2013 at 14:37

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