Next month a new edition of the adventures of Huckleberry Finn is being published. This book has always been surrounded by controversy and is the fourth most banned book in US schools because of its racially charged content and in particular for use of the N word. The decision to create a new version was made by Alan Gribben of Auburn University who is editing the book for Alabama based New South. Mark Twain is considered a literary genius and his books were written in a different century. Many people are critical of this censorship and sanitisation of the past. My own thought are that history should not be censored but should reflect the thinking and actions of people of the time warts and all because only then can school children learn about the past however unsatisfactory and thoroughly racist it was.History and the times can not be rewritten
however unsavoury and racist it might seem
I think i disagree with this jon, as i understand your viewpoint and where your coming from, one must bear caution to the fragility and ease of childrens minds that at a young age can pick up new words and not understanding their meaning can throw them around in the playground unknowingly. True, the book is a timeless classic, and one must consider the time in which it was written, but the areas of the US you mention that had banned this book are still licking wounds from the past of a segregated society, its only been 50 or so years since Rosa Parks stood up for black freedom, and yet there is still conflict and ongoing race wars, if one were to casually dismiss this classic novel purely for the age in which it was born, can one say the same for such books as mein kampf? only written ten or so years before, that book is also rascist, yet a classic of the time and a bestseller, should we forgive rascism down to ignorance of the era's?
ReplyDeleteAt least by censoring these books, people are understanding and admitting they are wrong to be rascist, surely its better for them to be censored then off the shelves completely?