Slowedayz in the Pasture

The Editing of Huck Finn January 9, 2011

I write this knowing that not everyone will agree with my view of the upcoming changes to the great American novel, “Huckleberry Finn.” I do respect the views of the people who feel that altering this novel to hopefully allow more institutions to use this great work in the classroom to help educate the youth of today about some of the views of race and the world. I have pasted a few excerpts from answers.com and Wikipedia. My thoughts are written below the excerpts. Once again, this post is just about my view on the re-editing of the above mentioned novel.

History

Quoted from Answers.com
“Ernest Hemingway wrote that “all modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn. …All American writing comes from that. There was nothing before. There has been nothing as good since.”
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was published in 1885, and in that year the public library in Concord, Massachusetts, became the first institution to ban the novel. Twain’s use of the word “nigger” later led some schools and libraries to ban the book. Huckleberry Finn was first attacked during Twain’s day because of what some described as its indecency; later, it would be attacked as racist. But by the end of the twentieth century, its status as one of the greatest of American novels was almost universally recognized.
Read more: http://www.answers.com/topic/huckleberry-finn#ixzz1AZ4bq3a8 ”

Me
Anyone who has read this book knows that that it makes the reader think about race and how certain races were viewed during the scope of the writing of this book. Ever since the first publication of the book, it has faced controversy. This book made me and others who read the book in high school address some topics about race that would not have been talked about in other circumstances. The book also brought some understanding to the way the world was back in the day of the writing of this book.

Today

Quoted from Wikipedia.com
‘A 2011 edition of the book, published by NewSouth Books, replaced the word “nigger” with “slave” and did not use the term “Injun”.’

Me
Is the word “slave’ any better than using the ‘n’ word? To drop the “Injun” in Injun Joe’s name is just as bad in my eyes. This is a character of the book. How can you alter the name of a character of a published book? Does the word ‘Injun,” really cause such uproar with the Native Americans that it should be dropped from the book?

Quoted from Wikipedia.com
‘The initiative to update the book was led by Mark Twain scholar Alan Gribben, who said the change was made to better express Twain’s ideas in the 21st century.^[29] Gribben said he hoped the edition would be more friendly for use in classrooms, rather than have the work banned outright from classroom reading lists due to its language.^[30] intended to counter the “preemptive censorship” that Dr. Gribben observes has caused these important works of literature to fall off curriculum lists nationwide.’

Me
“Preemptive censorship” is rather funny to call it. Why not be preemptive with all the other great works of literature. “The Diary of Anne Frank” – Lets take the holocaust out of the book is a good example of being preemptive.

Quoted from Wikipedia.com
‘According to publisher, Suzanne La Rosa, “At NewSouth, we saw the value in an edition that would help the works find new readers.’

Me
If the 219 times that the ‘n’ word is written in the book makes institutions take the book off the reading list in schools, then they need to look at other books that may be offensive to the students overall.

Quoted from Wikipedia.com
‘If the publication sparks good debate about how language impacts learning or about the nature of censorship or the way in which racial slurs exercise their baneful influence, then our mission in publishing this new edition of Twain’s works will be more emphatically fulfilled.”^[31] Another scholar, Thomas Wortham, criticized the changes, saying they did not adequately convey the connotations of the original book’s harsh language.’

Me
I look forward to see how this altered version of “Huckleberry Finn” educates today’s youth. I personally feel sorry for the up and coming children of society when it comes to reading and learning about literature of the past.

In closing, I pose a simple question…what’s next in the Politically Correct front?