I was an English Major in college before I dropped out and ended up in Art School
I studied The Greeks for a semester:
Euripides
Aristophanes
Pericles
Sophocles
Spectacles
Testicles
.
If we are going to leave books alone, lets get the Bible back to its original language and get rid of everything that came after, trying to interpret what the authors intended. Same goes for all other religious texts too, if you can’t read or understand them in the original, then either learn it, or move on…
Translation is a different subject. I think these books should be translated as faithfully as possible, and then not edited to reflect new sensibilities, but only if it becomes clear a translation error was made. If we decided that today’s sensibility doesn’t accept male authority figures, that doesn’t mean we should change the Bible to reflect God as female or non-binary.
The case in the OP seems pretty straight forward, the folks that"own" the rights to these books can make their own decisions, and they seem to move towards inclusiveness, thus sell more books, which is their objective.
I don’t think anyone is confused by what’s happening. The question is whether or not it “should” happen. Is altering an artists work to sell more product ok? Is it ok if it’s just surface level alterations? If it alters the meaning or intent? ‘Happy’ can become ‘glad?’ ‘Secretary’ can become ‘top scientist?’
I do however think in the case of childrens books, that there ought to be some clever editing to smooth over old racist and insensitive material. Not totally, always have the originals available, but some of the Old Sambo and other works I saw as a kid, I just don’t even want my kids to even think for a second they are ok, or funny.
So how about someone write new children’s books that you can comfortably give your kids to read, instead of changing the work of a previous author?
Kid was not born with that attitude, but we can all see where he got it from. I remember my son when he was 6, and we were eating next to a guy at least 500 lbs. He quietly whispered to me about the mans appearance, and then we had a long conversation afterwards about what he saw, how you react in public to a person like that, and to basically have some empathy for them. SDG’s kid is now on the path to being a bully and will only learn that lesson when he gets his ass kicked someday by a heavy kid. But then he will have the knowledge that he can go get a gun and even the score, and the cycle continues…And no SDG, those incidents dont make those folks go out and join Jenny Craig, you think your little snot was the first time they realized they were overweight?
So in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Augustus Gloop represents gluttony. He’s fat. He’s enormously fat. He’s a big, great, greedy, nincompoop. How would changing “enormously fat,” and changing it to “enormous” do anything to make parents more comfortable with the message their children gets? How far are we willing to change the language before modern sensibility gets in the way of the message about gluttony? With the Dahl books we’re talking about, the changes are not removal of racial slurs. A woman in The Twits is no longer “ugly and beastly” but just “beastly.” Really? Kids can’t be exposed to the concept of ‘ugly’ anymore?
Spectacles
Testicles
…Wallet & Watch?
Just because this particular publisher is making changes to the work, doesn’t mean all the other versions go away, or that no one else is allowed to print the original
I have10 editions of* Frankenstein*, maybe half a dozen of* Dracula*, four* The War of the Worlds* and three Moby Dicks
D’Kid has at least three editions of* The Great Gatsby*
The publisher and the estate own the rights, no? I can’t just go and publish an unadulterated version on my own.
Copyright does not last forever.
Unless your copyright happened after Mickey Mouse, then it may last forever.
So the question is “should the copyright owner publish work in the manner that they want�
My answer is: yes. The copyright owner has the legal and moral authority to do what they see fit.
I’m fine with people bellyaching about the changes. I’d like to see people explore how the specific words are either important to the overall theme or inconsequential to the overall theme. Is there other artistic merit to the specific words?
If there is no identifiable reason to keep the words (artistically or otherwise), then “because tradition†isn’t good enough for me. Tradition is used to justify too much crap for it to hold much power for me.
I don’t think the term “censorship†is appropriate in this case because censorship implies someone other than the author is exerting control over the copyright. Here, the copyright owners want to make the changes. That’s not censorship.*
*Similar to Twitter enforcing its own TOS. It’s not a free speech/ censorship issue.
I was an English Major in college before I dropped out and ended up in Art School
I studied The Greeks for a semester:
Euripides
Aristophanes
Pericles
Sophocles
Spectacles
Testicles
I tore my trousers and took them to a Greek tailor.
He said “Euripides?”
I said “Yes. Eumenides?”
Why does Shakespeare need footnotes?
“so readers could understand what intended to say”
are you tendering the idea that all of Shakespeare’s terms, usage, and intent are crystalline? He was meant to be played, not read.
A good Shakespearian actor can get you through the thickets (or more likely the director cuts them out) but much of it is inscrutable when read
So any Roman, French, Italian, German, Greek, Spanish, Nordic or Old English author is now off the market? //
Were they just translated, or translated and edited?? I dont think we are talking about translation here, but editing, which of course many religious texts has been through, many, many times in their history.
pointing out that unless the original was dead simple language, like an instruction manual, there is always a degree of editing and choice involved in translation – many words and concepts in the original won’t have exact equivalents in the target language.
am now reading the novel Babel, which goes into all of the above issues to a fantastic and entertaining degree.
It’s a bit like Harry Potter, but with colonialist baddies instead of Voldemort and language nerds for the heroes. Very good so far.
So any Roman, French, Italian, German, Greek, Spanish, Nordic or Old English author is now off the market? //
Were they just translated, or translated and edited?? I dont think we are talking about translation here, but editing, which of course many religious texts has been through, many, many times in their history.
pointing out that unless the original was dead simple language, like an instruction manual, there is always a degree of editing and choice involved in translation – many words and concepts in the original won’t have exact equivalents in the target language.
I listened to a podcast recently about the challenges of translating the New Testament. One example they talked about is in one of Paul’s letters he’s laying out some insults or something along those lines and he has a Greek word that translates (IIRC or heard it right) as something like “men’s beds”. Whatever it literally means, it’s translation is a mystery because it’s the only time the word occurs in any ancient writing, so there’s no other contexts to figure out it’s meaning. At times it’s been translated as homosexual, which of course has implications for modern Christians positions. The scholars both agreed whatever it meant, it wasn’t homosexual, because there was no such concept in the ancient world.
Replacing “N****r Jim†in Tom Sawyer, for example, is reasonable, though I think a footnote should be included with an explanation of how it was originally written and to provide context for the original language.
I’ve always been a fan of realism. That seems to be one of the more egregious examples of “white washing” history that suggests race relations were something other than what they were.
pointing out that unless the original was dead simple language, like an instruction manual, there is always a degree of editing and choice involved in translation – many words and concepts in the original won’t have exact equivalents in the target language. //
Well that was the subtle point I was trying to make, that most all of the most revered religious texts have been heavily edited over the years, and often times from bad actors with their own agendas. So everyone with their panties in a bunch over this latest stuff, who ignore that fact, well seems like a pick and choose, and not a real stand they are taking…Many people base their entire lives on those old books, so seems like that is just as important, or even more so than some children books…
Why does Shakespeare need footnotes?
“so readers could understand what intended to say”
are you tendering the idea that all of Shakespeare’s terms, usage, and intent are crystalline? He was meant to be played, not read.
A good Shakespearian actor can get you through the thickets (or more likely the director cuts them out) but much of it is inscrutable when read
The understanding of the reader is idiosyncratic. I understood Shakespeare when I read it and came away with what I perceived his message. Then in class we all discussed what are takeaways were.
Footnotes would substitute someone else’s interpretation and deprive the reader of the exploration of the text.
sure, but did it get granular with stuff like bodkin?
Why does Shakespeare need footnotes?
“so readers could understand what intended to say”
are you tendering the idea that all of Shakespeare’s terms, usage, and intent are crystalline? He was meant to be played, not read.
A good Shakespearian actor can get you through the thickets (or more likely the director cuts them out) but much of it is inscrutable when read
The understanding of the reader is idiosyncratic. I understood Shakespeare when I read it and came away with what I perceived his message. Then in class we all discussed what are takeaways were.
Footnotes would substitute someone else’s interpretation and deprive the reader of the exploration of the text.
The language is different enough that most readers will come to a misinformed understanding of the text absent some bit of explanation. You can read it, misunderstand it, and then discuss in class,…or you can read it and inform your understanding through footnotes and/or scholarly work and then discuss in class,…or both.
sure, but did it get granular with stuff like bodkin?
The awl or pin type thing for I want to say barrel making or wood work or something?
My parents were big into words.
I’ll look it up. Could I have deduced the meaning from context? If not would have looked it up.
Why does Shakespeare need footnotes?
“so readers could understand what intended to say”
are you tendering the idea that all of Shakespeare’s terms, usage, and intent are crystalline? He was meant to be played, not read.
A good Shakespearian actor can get you through the thickets (or more likely the director cuts them out) but much of it is inscrutable when read
The understanding of the reader is idiosyncratic. I understood Shakespeare when I read it and came away with what I perceived his message. Then in class we all discussed what are takeaways were.
Footnotes would substitute someone else’s interpretation and deprive the reader of the exploration of the text.
The language is different enough that most readers will come to a misinformed understanding of the text absent some bit of explanation. You can read it, misunderstand it, and then discuss in class,…or you can read it and inform your understanding through footnotes and/or scholarly work and then discuss in class,…or both.
That’s a fair point but I think you lose some of the intellectual discovery. I guess it also depends in why you are reading it, for entertainment or to delve into the meaning of talking to Yorick.
Why does Shakespeare need footnotes?
“so readers could understand what intended to say”
are you tendering the idea that all of Shakespeare’s terms, usage, and intent are crystalline? He was meant to be played, not read.
A good Shakespearian actor can get you through the thickets (or more likely the director cuts them out) but much of it is inscrutable when read
The understanding of the reader is idiosyncratic. I understood Shakespeare when I read it and came away with what I perceived his message. Then in class we all discussed what are takeaways were.
Footnotes would substitute someone else’s interpretation and deprive the reader of the exploration of the text.
The language is different enough that most readers will come to a misinformed understanding of the text absent some bit of explanation. You can read it, misunderstand it, and then discuss in class,…or you can read it and inform your understanding through footnotes and/or scholarly work and then discuss in class,…or both.
That’s a fair point but I think you lose some of the intellectual discovery. I guess it also depends in why you are reading it, for entertainment or to delve into the meaning of talking to Yorick.
I’m not sure how you lose any intellectual discovery. The footnotes simply provide context or explanation that you might or might not have had to get from a dictionary or teacher or some other source. They’re just another source of information along that path of discovery and learning.
Regardless, to bring it back to the topic, we provide footnote or scholarly explanation when Shakespeare said something we don’t understand or that doesn’t conform to modern sensibility. We don’t just change his words.
Why does Shakespeare need footnotes?
“so readers could understand what intended to say”
are you tendering the idea that all of Shakespeare’s terms, usage, and intent are crystalline? He was meant to be played, not read.
A good Shakespearian actor can get you through the thickets (or more likely the director cuts them out) but much of it is inscrutable when read
The understanding of the reader is idiosyncratic. I understood Shakespeare when I read it and came away with what I perceived his message. Then in class we all discussed what are takeaways were.
Footnotes would substitute someone else’s interpretation and deprive the reader of the exploration of the text.
The language is different enough that most readers will come to a misinformed understanding of the text absent some bit of explanation. You can read it, misunderstand it, and then discuss in class,…or you can read it and inform your understanding through footnotes and/or scholarly work and then discuss in class,…or both.
That’s a fair point but I think you lose some of the intellectual discovery. I guess it also depends in why you are reading it, for entertainment or to delve into the meaning of talking to Yorick.
Your intellectual discovery was assisted by your mama. Maybe other people enjoy/ require intellectual discovery without their parents holding their hands.
So any Roman, French, Italian, German, Greek, Spanish, Nordic or Old English author is now off the market? //
Were they just translated, or translated and edited?? I dont think we are talking about translation here, but editing, which of course many religious texts has been through, many, many times in their history.
pointing out that unless the original was dead simple language, like an instruction manual, there is always a degree of editing and choice involved in translation – many words and concepts in the original won’t have exact equivalents in the target language.
I listened to a podcast recently about the challenges of translating the New Testament. One example they talked about is in one of Paul’s letters he’s laying out some insults or something along those lines and he has a Greek word that translates (IIRC or heard it right) as something like “men’s beds”. Whatever it literally means, it’s translation is a mystery because it’s the only time the word occurs in any ancient writing, so there’s no other contexts to figure out it’s meaning. At times it’s been translated as homosexual, which of course has implications for modern Christians positions. The scholars both agreed whatever it meant, it wasn’t homosexual, because there was no such concept in the ancient world.
There is even a documentary, 1946, about this, though I haven’t had the opportunity to see it. Becket Cook does a pretty thorough critique of the film’s premise on YT by pointing out that the entire argument relies on intermediate translations instead of going back to the source documents in Greek and Hebrew. What a novel idea. Tying in to the OP’s original point, this attempt to change the original meaning is intended to increase inclusivity.
Replacing “N****r Jim†in Tom Sawyer, for example, is reasonable, though I think a footnote should be included with an explanation of how it was originally written and to provide context for the original language.
I’ve always been a fan of realism. That seems to be one of the more egregious examples of “white washing” history that suggests race relations were something other than what they were.
My university lit professor stated that the first three-fourths of *Huckleberry Finn *was American literature at its finest. Having read it, I agree it is an excellent work. It would certainly lose its impact if edited to modern sensibilities.
not a fan of the changes
I have a near-complete collection of his books, kids’ and adult. I started reading his stuff in 3rd grade, went through the kids books fast, found “switch bitch” in the bookstore not knowing what it meant and then my parents started censoring my third grade reading.
I don’t have The Gremlins, which is a very rare one. I have everything else. Looks like it’s about to become more valuable.