Beware of the Book! Censorship

[angelaudie]

I do agree both would been better. But, again, I do think it's hard to admit you were wrong about something. I'm pretty jaded by apologies. I've seen too many fake apologies so I'm at the point saying, "I'm sorry" just doesn't cut it anymore.

Back to Huck Finn, am I the only one who thinks censoring out the n word makes it a lot easier for Hayley Barbor types to argue "Hey, it wasn't that bad for blacks guys!"?

[chonies]

Jan 10, 2011 17:20:21 GMT -4 angelaudie said:

Back to Huck Finn, am I the only one who thinks censoring out the n word makes it a lot easier for Hayley Barbor types to argue "Hey, it wasn't that bad for blacks guys!"?

It's hard to say. Ostensibly, he and others of his mindset were likely assigned Huck Finn at some point, in the original, and ta-da! doesn't give a steamy crap anyway.

[incognito]

Yeah, sorry I went OT. I guess Ebert's comments would be better suited for the Celebrity Dumb Quotes thread. (And I hear ya on the insincere apology thing.)

Anyway, the whole Huck Finn controversy has reminded me of something. About a year ago, I bought a recently reissued hardcover version of The Egypt Game by Zilpha Keatley Snyder. I was startled to see that Melanie Ross and her family were constantly referred to as being Negroes instead of black, especially since I distinctly recalled my old paperback copies calling them the latter. I can only surmise that, when TEG was first published in the 1960s, the text used "Negro", that this word was substituted in later editions with "black", and that the publisher of the newer hardcover decided for whatever reason to go back to the first edition text.

What do you guys think of this? I mean, with Huck Finn I understand the argument that the racism and related language are a large part of what makes Huck Finn the story it is. But racism was never a focal point of The Egypt Game, IMO. So I guess I don't get the rationale for reverting back to Negro instead of black, when I don't think it adds anything to the story.

[Carolinian]

The author Michael Chabon has an interesting guest-blog post on reading Huckleberry Finn with his kids. The comments section (TNC's comment section is the only one I ever read) led me to this post, which is a high school teacher's thoughts on teaching Huckleberry Finn. I also found a letter from Twain himself, written in response to learning that Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn were to be banished from the children's section of a public library because they were bad moral exemplars:

I am greatly troubled by what you say. I wrote Tom Sawyer & Huck Finn for adults exclusively, & it always distressed me when I find that boys and girls have been allowed access to them. The mind that becomes soiled in youth can never again be washed clean. I know this by my own experience, & to this day I cherish an unappeased bitterness against the unfaithful guardians of my young life, who not only permitted but compelled me to read an unexpurgated Bible through before I was 15 years old. None can do that and ever draw a clean sweet breath again on this side of the grave.

[Shalamar]

I love Mark Twain.

[thingee]

I was looking to add The Book of Negroes to my Goodreads list and was perplexed when I couldn't find it. Turns out, the novel was published under a different title (Someone Knows My Name) in several countries, including the US where Goodreads is based.

Seriously? Are people that sensitive? It is a work of historical fiction about the slave trade, written by a black man, that refers often to an actual, real-life register called the Book of Negroes. Yet the title had to be changed? FFS.

[chonies]

Weeeeeeellllllllll, Thingee, in defense of my fellow Americans, I would counter that it's not sensitivity (exclusively, anyway) but instead offer two possible suggestions, based on the real document of the same name. Two other books listed in various databases that have similar titles, including First Book of Negroes by Langston Hughes, which could be annoying or confusing to anyone looking for it; same with the original historical text (and vice versa). Differentiation is important. Additionally, it might just be a marketing thing. Seabiscuit was almost released under the title Dark Horse, which is dull, nondescript and overused as a metaphor, so maybe it was just one of those decisions. In some circles, the original title might be more memorable, but...I'd also like to take this opportunity to wait for an explanation from Australian or New Zealand Greecies. Ahem.

[thingee]

You may well be right, but it seemed off to me that it was called the same thing all over the world except for 3 countries. That strikes me as curious.

[angelaudie]

Censorship strikes again! A MO high school took the books Twenty Boy Summer by Sarah Ockler and Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut off the library shelves. This all got started after somebody filed a complaint against the books because "they teach principles contrary to the Bible". The individual also included Laurie Halse Anderson's Speak but the board ruled that book can stay on the shelves. The complainer is glad Twenty Boy Summer and Slaughterhouse-Five were pulled is sulking Speak was allowed to stay.

One of the board members stated Twenty Boy Summer, a book which is apparently about a girl struggling to move on after her boyfriend dies, was banned due to bad language, sexual promiscuity, drunkenness, and lying to parents and not feeling bad about it. He also stated if the book had ended on a different note then he may have a different outlook on the book. Now, I've never read this book but I'm guessing the girl sleeps around and doesn't end up pregnant, with an STD, and or face any sort of punishment for her behavior which means this guy can't handle the book being on the shelves.

Slaughterhouse-Five acknowledged gays were victims of the Holocaust so yeah naturally that book would be out as well. I'm still amazed that people freak out over Speak. A description of rape is not porn people!

Oh and only one person on the board actually bothered to read the books.

[piscessiren]

I bet Catcher in the Rye is okay, because it's about baseball, in the Midwest, right?