Reports of Mark Twain’s death have always been greatly exaggerated, even after the real event happened in 1910. Despite mocking religion, exalting adolescent runaways, and wreaking havoc with the Arthurian legend, Twain has only kept bouncing back higher with every red-faced attempt to censor him. Until now.
In 2009, Auburn University English professor Alan Gribben was asked by NewSouth Books (a small publishing house in Montgomery, Ala., which specializes in books on Alabama history and civil-rights politics) to create a new combined edition of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn for Alabama’s state-wide “Big Read Alabama” project, funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. Gribben, a UC/Berkeley Ph.D. and co-founder of the Mark Twain Circle of America, was troubled about the invitation, or at least about one aspect of it — Twain’s unabashed use of the N-word, 219 times in Huckleberry Finn alone.
Twain’s ubiquitous use of a racial slur has made demands for sweeping Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer off the shelves something of a yearly carnival in schools and public libraries. Gribben’s, and NewSouth’s, solution? Rewrite Twain. Eliminate the N-word and replace it with “slave.” For good measure, eliminate “injun,” too. Like Capt. Bixby in Life on the Mississippi, Huck Finn will be so emptied of offense that you will be able to draw “a seine through his system” and not catch anything “to disturb your mother with.”
Is this kindness or silliness? Granted, the N-word is a vicious racial slur. It is intended to be mocking at best and demeaning at worst. But so is a great deal else in our literature and entertainment. The F-bomb and the C-word blip past on screens and in books without any reckoning of who is liable to be “offended” by them — especially since those who are, are generally of no account to the Spielbergs and Camerons. And where do we draw lines? The N-word sits, preening itself, 56 times in black novelist (and Twain contemporary) Charles W. Chesnutt’s The Conjure Woman (1899) and 31 times in his The Marrow of Tradition (1901). It bobs up in the work of black women writers, too: in Octavia Albert’s The House of Bondage (1891) and Frances Harper’s Iola Leroy, or Shadows Uplifted, her 1893 novel which William Still thought would be useful reading in “thousands of colored Sunday-Schools, in the South . . . casting about for an interesting, moral, story-book, full of practical lessons.” They treated it as a slur, but it was an artifact of common language, and so they used it all the same.
What begins as tragedy gets repeated as farce. The tragedies the N-word symbolized in Twain’s day now come back as moments for the expression of unctuous sanitization. If there are demons in the N-word, we would be better teachers if we fought them in the open, like Chesnutt and Harper, rather than sweeping them genteelly under our academic carpets.
— Allen C. Guelzo is the Henry R. Luce professor of the Civil War Era and director of Civil War Era Studies at Gettysburg College.
I think I will just have to disagree. I am glad they are editing the books. The N-word is an archaic term. By using a different word teachers are more likely to assign the books and read the novels aloud to their class.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThere are only Demon Whites vis-a-vis the N word.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI doubt it is accurate to replace it with "slave" every time. At least one of the references must be to a free African-American. Of course, replacing it with "African-American" or "black" probably misses the point, too. I think they should have found a better term that, while still recognized as a word of ill-repute, is still allowed in literature.
I suggest "Voldemort".
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAnd Ellen shows the wonderful hypocrisy behind this edit. Can you even BUY a hip hop/rap CD without the word being said multiple times? Is there a role where Samuel L. Jackson DOESN'T say the same word on the big screen? Ellen and her ilk say it's wonderful that the word is being exorcised from Mark Twain's work but are completely silent on the current use of the same word.
Pure hypocrisy that needs to be pointed out and ridiculed at every step.
By the way, when does the editing end? Do we extend the editing to photos too, exorcising "archaic" things that offend some people regardless of context? Does THAT sound familiar?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseRidiculous.
Will they be attempting this with any other books? "Their Eyes Were Watching God," perhaps?
This is why, although I love my Kindle, I snap up hard copies of the classics. I'm wary of converting entirely to digital copies that can be edited via wireless signal.
A little too repainting-the-rules-on-the-barn-wall for me.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI figure as long as ability to use this word depends on the color of your skin, it still represents racism. A sort of segregated language water fountain at the library.
All of this emanates from the childish and foolish belief that you can deny something exists if you merely avert your eyes.
Here's a question: If I don't turn in my old copy of the book to the "authorities", what does that make me? If you really believe that this is necessary, then you are compelled to not just change future books, but to confiscate all prior printings. We can't have language like that sitting on bookshelves where someone might get hurt!
I always liked how the late George Carlin talked about words:
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseExternal Link
It is an archaic term, and it should be replaced. It should not be replaced merely with slave. It should be replaced with a less pejorative and less archaic term like Negro or colored. When Twain was righting the N-word was not so pejorative.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHow about calling him "Negro Jim," or is that forbidden, too?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDennis Miller said the new version is Huckleberry Fi by Mark Twai.
Should they also clean up usage of "ain't" and the like? "You don't know me unless you've read a novel by Mark Twain entitled The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, but that's not relevant...."
BTW Since the term "colored people" is also frowned upon by the PC crowd, does the NAACP need to change its name? Jus' sayin'...
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseTristan,
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWhile I think that removing the 'n' word from Twain's work is silly calling Ellen a hypocrite is a tad much. (I find it amusing that I cannot use that word in the comment section to an article ridiculing the proposed removal of that word) Do you know in fact she has not protested the use of the word in popular culture? Perhaps she has. There are lots of people who do.
Ellen: "It is an archaic term, and it should be replaced."
Both "Negro" and "Colored" are offensive, unacceptable to the grievance machines (Use Google to see how unacceptable), and are not accurate for the time period. What do you propose that would provide the appropriate level of "pejorative" AND still be accurate for the time period?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAll publications in their original format should be protected by copyright laws that disallows any publisher from issuing revised copies without the express written permission of the author. In Twain's case my guess it would be a bit problematic. The government is not the book police and should it decide to become one we must be reminded what the response was to the Nazi bonfires. No there weren't roasting chestnuts either. People read not only to become more thoughtful but to be entertained by a great storyteller. That is why we have the first ammendment to protect our freedom of speech from government influence. Nuff Said!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseSince these books were written over 100 years ago they are confusing and hard to understand. So, I guess, at least according to Erza Klein, they shouldn't be read at all anymore.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse“And Ellen shows the wonderful hypocrisy behind this edit. Can you even BUY a hip hop/rap CD without the word being said multiple times? Is there a role where Samuel L. Jackson DOESN'T say the same word on the big screen?”
Well I do not know if the editors are hypocrites, but I am not. I am a Black American and I do not buy hip hop/rap CDs. I do block BET and MTV in my home. I am also a former schoolteacher. My view is with properly edited edition of the books teachers will be more comfortably using them in their classrooms. Children should be exposed to Twain. Arguing that we have d coarse culture therefore we should not edit an archaic term is silly.
The word is not used the same way in Twain’s writing as it is used in our culture today. Moreover, it does not need to be edited from every addition of Twains novels. Many books with archaic language have different types of editions for different audiences.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseGribben's preface is worth reading. He is a reasonable man, even if you disagree with his reasoning.
External Link
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"Both "Negro" and "Colored" are offensive, unacceptable to the grievance machines (Use Google to see how unacceptable), and are not accurate for the time period. What do you propose that would provide the appropriate level of "pejorative" AND still be accurate for the time period?”
Who cares? No is suggesting a book be edited so it does not offend a grievance machine. No someone is asking NewSouth Books to put out an edition of a book for a particular use. Goodness if you do not like that edition just by another.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseEllen, please. An archaic term? Removal of archaic terms would excise much of Shakespeare, Milton, Dante, Chaucer, etc. etc. etc.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe edited Dante is next: Circle Eight, Bolgia Nine, the Sowers of Discord, “A wine tun when a stave or cant-bar starts does not split open as wide as one [Dante] saw split from his chin to the mouth with which man f***s. Between his legs all of his red guts hung with the heart, the lungs, the liver, the gall bladder, and the shriveled sac that passes s*** to the b***. [Dante] stood and stared at him from the stone shelf; he noticed me and opening his own breast with both hands cried: “See how I rip myself! See how Mahomet’s mangled and split open! Ahead of me walks Ali in his tears, his head cleft from the topknot to the chin. And all the other souls that bleed and mourn along this ditch were sowers of scandal and schism: as they tore others apart, so are they torn."
Dante was not terribly supportive of the "religion of peace", either. We read that in high school with no notable damage, and I probably made brilliant comments like "wow, man, heavy".
Don't edit out history and culture.
I find it interesting that we are all afraid to use the word that is the subject of the controversy. I don’t think the text of Mark Twain’s books should be changed. Writers use words for a reason, to carry a specific meaning. So, if over a century ago, Mark Twain used the word (I tried to use it here, but the filter on this web site wouldn't allow it) to describe a person or make a point –that’s part and parcel of the book.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWhen I use a word that is unfamiliar to my children, they ask me what it means. When I define the word in terms they know, they ask the obvious question –“Well why didn’t you say so in the first place?” And I always respond with the same answer: The English language is so expressive and so inclusive, why not reach out and explore all of its beauty?
If we keep editing the past, we will have none.
"When Twain was righting [sic] the N-word was not so pejorative."
I disagree with this. Twain knew exactly what he was doing when he used that word. You rob the book of the power of its depiction of racism (and the ability of this ignorant poor white kid to finally rise of above it) when you remove the word.
I can see the point about the problem of using the book in classes with younger children (especially reading aloud), but this urge to sanitize this one word from literature disturbs me.
Racism is an important part of our history (as the Left always emphasizes). It's our responsibility as educators to teach kids about it, not wrap them up in politically correct cocoons (as if that could really be done today). Slave narratives used in classes use the word, Uncle Tom's Cabin uses the word, history books that quote primary sources the word. Must the word now be eliminated from all these texts because some young person might be "ruined for life" if she sees it? This is absurd.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHЫГГР. Spelled it, roughly, in Cyrillic. Maybe they could just do that. Most ЏЫГГЎБYЗ, CПYКS, or PACКЫCT КPAКPЗ won't get it, anyway, so there's no danger of hurting someone's feelings. Better still, let's remove all language remotely hurtful to any race, religion, gender, species, element, or molecule. Then no one could possibly have their feelings hurt, because there would be no literature.
Look, I'm a Charles Schulz kind of person, "I have a strong dislike for vulgar phrases, and I find that the terms 'good grief' and 'rats' will cover virtually anything that happens." I don't advocate bad language, or offensive speech. I don't use it, don't like it and do my best to discourage it among those with whom I associate, but it will always be there. It will always exist and the coercive exercises of the fascist left to excise words it deems offensive will do nothing but harm. Furthermore, I don't particularly like Mark Twain, or his writings, but one must consider the historical context of his works. Our record of history must be true to the past, so we can learn effectively from it, so we can understand the past, our past.
This is ridiculous and demonstrates the monstrosity that is political correctness. ДЭMH! I'm tired of it.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse