The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug. -Mark Twain
Just as bad as the news contained in the story itself is that the person reporting on it — Entertainment Weekly’s Keith Staskiewicz — actually uses the phrase “on the other hand” to excuse the censorship and outright vandalism of one of the all-time classics in American literature.
This is what happens when no on watches the pop culture Watchmen, they become as corrupted as those they’re charged with holding accountable:
According to Publishers Weekly, NewSouth Books’ upcoming edition of Mark Twain’s seminal novel Adventures of Huckleberry Finn will remove all instances of the “n” word–I’ll give you a hint, it’s not nonesuch–present in the text and replace it with slave. The new book will also remove usage of the word Injun. The effort is spearheaded by Twain expert Alan Gribben, who says his PC-ified version is not an attempt to neuter the classic but rather to update it. “Race matters in these books,” Gribben told PW. “It’s a matter of how you express that in the 21st century.”
Unsurprisingly, there are already those who are yelling “Censorship!” as well as others with thesauruses yelling “Bowdlerization!” and “Comstockery!” Their position is understandable: Twain’s book has been one of the most often misunderstood novels of all time, continuously being accused of perpetuating the prejudiced attitudes it is criticizing, and it’s a little disheartening to see a cave-in to those who would ban a book simply because it requires context. On the other hand, if this puts the book into the hands of kids who would not otherwise be allowed to read it due to forces beyond their control (overprotective parents and the school boards they frighten), then maybe we shouldn’t be so quick to judge
Staskiewicz wouldn’t think of judging, but he’s sure not above the snark that’s come to define his profession — not above the snark employed to immediately dismiss and make light of those who might disagree. After all, we just don’t understand how this is all for the greater good, how timeless classics must be edited and altered in order to be more appropriate and appreciated in these sensitive times of ours.
First question: Why is Mark Twain’s name still on the cover of a novel he didn’t write?
Second question: Now that the “Newspeak” door has been successfully opened with no less than Entertainment Weekly’s approval, what’s next? Don’t underestimate what it means to the PC-police to have the approval of a major voice in popular culture stand by this kind of word-policing. And you can bet that if it were sex or drug abuse being edited out of “On the Road,” EW would be at the front of the bitch-pitching brigade.
As would I.
But what’s happened here with “Huckleberry Finn” and the acceptance of it is going to be precedent setting. As with everything when it comes to the left, we are merely seeing the tip of the PC iceberg.
What’s next? Blazing Saddles? Rap albums?
You don’t update and whitewash Mark Twain, you teach Mark Twain. You have your students read the novel and then teach them the context of the times and the context of the words. Twain was no racist and the words he used were deliberate. But again, what’s most troubling isn’t one idiot publisher making a moronic decision, it’s that those like EW who should be at the head of the line protesting this are instead the primary PC Palace Guards defending it.
Didn’t anyone teach Orwell’s “1984” to the Entertainment Weekly staff or to NewSouth Books? Sadly, I think they did. They just see it as more of a blueprint than a warning.