The censorship of Roald Dahl

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's very "we have always been at war with Eastasia." History is what it is and sanitizing stuff like this is absurd. Books are a product of their time and there is value in examining them as they were. What's next, should we rewrite the last movement of Beethoven's 9th because of choral lines about Alle Menschen werden Brüder that aren't gender neutral? Where does it stop?

Obviously you haven't been to church lately because a lot of hymns have been rewritten for just this reason. References to "brothers" are changed to "neighbors", "man" to "one" or "human", "men" to "all".

Come, Thou long expected Comrade

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's very "we have always been at war with Eastasia." History is what it is and sanitizing stuff like this is absurd. Books are a product of their time and there is value in examining them as they were. What's next, should we rewrite the last movement of Beethoven's 9th because of choral lines about Alle Menschen werden Brüder that aren't gender neutral? Where does it stop?

Obviously you haven't been to church lately because a lot of hymns have been rewritten for just this reason. References to "brothers" are changed to "neighbors", "man" to "one" or "human", "men" to "all".

Nope. I'm Orthodox Jewish. There are piles of works for the last 150 years criticizing us because we resolutely don't do this.

[Anonymous]

His works are not going to stand the test of time. I have read them now as an adult to my kids, and they aren't that good nor do my kids really like them.

I did read Dahl's antisemitic comments and they were fairly gross and horrific.

I don't think the language should be changed in the books. They should be preserved as they are. I just don't think they will be in wide circulation in the next 20 years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:His works are not going to stand the test of time. I have read them now as an adult to my kids, and they aren't that good nor do my kids really like them.

I did read Dahl's antisemitic comments and they were fairly gross and horrific.

I don't think the language should be changed in the books. They should be preserved as they are. I just don't think they will be in wide circulation in the next 20 years.

Yeah, sure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My favorite author changed something in a book they wrote about years ago. I’ve read the book so many times that I noticed it when I borrowed an ebook version instead of reading my physical copy.

The edit removes something that some would see as culturally insensitive. Doesn’t change the story at all. I’m glad they made the change. The scene always struck me as odd.

What was the book?

Lisa Kleypas and she edited a bunch of her books. Revisions and edits are common. You all are getting up in arms about something that happens all the time.

https://www.reddit.com/r/romancelandia/comments/nkzwqm/how_do_we_feel_about_authors_revising_published/

[Anonymous]

One of the examples in the thread above is removing a word describing some as fat. Another is removing the word “gypsy.”

Doesn’t affect the story at all.

[Anonymous]

Wait til y’all hear what Disney did the Brothers Grimm.

[Anonymous]

Lisa Kleypas and she edited a bunch of her books.

Yes, she edited a bunch of HER books. Roald Dahl did not edit his books after they were published.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's very "we have always been at war with Eastasia." History is what it is and sanitizing stuff like this is absurd. Books are a product of their time and there is value in examining them as they were. What's next, should we rewrite the last movement of Beethoven's 9th because of choral lines about Alle Menschen werden Brüder that aren't gender neutral? Where does it stop?

Agreed. It’s galling.

[Anonymous]

Publishers don’t seem relevant anymore. They don’t produce new books people want to read, and now they are censoring the old books.

It’s another win for self-publishing. Self-publishing can mean the authors own their own publishing company. You can’t always tell it’s self-published.

Is it possible to buy the original books elsewhere when a publisher censors?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wait til y’all hear what Disney did the Brothers Grimm.

Disney used unoriginal characters from the public domain and then copyrighted the hell out of them. That is wickedly clever, but it's not what we're talking about.

[Anonymous]

Cultural censortivity.

[Anonymous]

I have to imagine the people commenting on this thread aren’t regular book forum people. The comments are too ridiculous to be the regulars here.

This does happen regularly. Common example: translation of historical works.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone catch this in the news? Puffin is censoring Roald Dahl's books:

https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/critics-reject-roald-dahl-books-censorship-97322797

I am both shocked and not shocked.

I agree with Hackett:

Laura Hackett, a childhood Dahl fan who is now deputy literary editor of London’s Sunday Times newspaper, had a more personal reaction to the news.

“The editors at Puffin should be ashamed of the botched surgery they’ve carried out on some of the finest children’s literature in Britain,” she wrote. “As for me, I’ll be carefully stowing away my old, original copies of Dahl’s stories, so that one day my children can enjoy them in their full, nasty, colorful glory.”

Thankfully, I own all Dahl's books in my home library and am pleased to have the originals for my grandchildren.

It’s like saving Christie’s “Ten Little N******” for your grandkids so they get to read that instead of a book titled “And Then There Were None.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Publishers don’t seem relevant anymore. They don’t produce new books people want to read, and now they are censoring the old books.

It’s another win for self-publishing. Self-publishing can mean the authors own their own publishing company. You can’t always tell it’s self-published.

Is it possible to buy the original books elsewhere when a publisher censors?

Most self-published authors are using KDP (Kindle Direct Publushing), which is Amazon and you could say the Big 5 is the Big 6, with Amazon added. They aren’t self-publishing…they’re publishing with Amazon.

Traditional publishing is bigger than ever. Have you noticed your Target has a book section that keeps growing? That B&N has record profits? That BOTM and special edition book boxes are wildly popular?