Autre temps, autre moeurs
Wikipedia sheds light on what is is about Thank You, Jeeves that would make a publisher anxious.
The book uses the dated and now derogatory term “nigger minstrels” which was once a common term for white performers in blackface. Blackface minstrels were a staple of British seaside resorts until World War II.[19] The term “nigger minstrels” was historically used to differentiate blackface minstrels from “colored minstrels” who were actually black performers.[20]
Blackface performances, widely considered offensive today, were popular at the time Wodehouse was writing this novel. During this period, Al Jolson, Bing Crosby and Shirley Temple were among the many actors who performed in blackface.[21]
What’s a publisher to do?
Maybe there’s no answer to that question; maybe there’s no good option.
Plan A: gloss the term for modern readers
Plan B: replace the term with some equivalent that modern readers will understand (“blackface minstrels”?)
Plan C: delete the term and all references to it; patch up the text as best you can :(
Either don’t read it. or read it and wince at those bits. I watch Casablanca, I love that film, but when Ilsa asks who the boy at the piano is, I wince, I know I’m going to wince, I watch the film anyway.
Those who would wince or avoid the film are unlikely to be harmed by it, those who aren’t bothered… well they are already people who don’t care, I don’t see that they can be made ‘worse’ by it.
It’s interesting that there seems to be a fad in altering things so that it is still ‘okay’ to enjoy them; but no one is suggesting we ‘edit’ The Birth of A Nation, because there is nothing in there to enjoy! So simply enjoy what is enjoyable, life is never perfect, always annoying in someway. This editing fad seems like a quest for perfection that can never end, I worry that we are bringing up new generations that lack resilience in their intake of information, art, etc.
And in editing the old to sell to a new audience, we take away the opportunity for new art to come along for that audience. Art that will itself one day be problematic, and should then become the past and make way for the new; with only old codgers like me pretending there is something in my eye when Rick lies to Ilsa to make her get on that plane:)
Steven, it’s not a question of simply glossing the term though. If that Wikipedia article is accurate, the blackface minstrels and their makeup are integral to half the plot. Hmmm, perhaps make them drag queens instead?
Let the publishers realize some sort of tax break for donating obsolete literature to the public domain. If somebody subsequently wants to download the PDF to read, so be it.
I wonder what will happen when someone becomes aware of the ‘Chigroes’ in Dr No’, who are described in terms of racial disgust. I remember being shocked by Fleming’s obvious attitudes in my teens, and after that experience ceased to bother with him. There were plenty of other, and far better, writers around.
I’m with bascule.
I guess I just fundamentally don’t understand the assumption that anything need be done at all.
(By chance, I just rewatched Casablanca last week, and I did wince at “boy”.)
Well there you go. It would be nice if that line had never been there.
I don’t think I actually agree with that.
I’d agree that it would be nice if that hadn’t been something people said at the time, and in that sense it would be nice if that line had never been there, but … In the same sense, it would be nice had Hitler never come to power, and therefore it would be nice if books and films about the Holocaust had never been written, but there’s something there that’s different from just saying that it would be nice if books and films about the Holocaust had never been written. One is a wish that history had been different; the other, a wish that reminders of history disappear.
It’s worth noting that this is nothing new. The title of Agatha Christie’s novel Ten Little Niggers was bowdlerized almost from day 1 in the USA and a bit later in the UK. Even the very first film version was called And Then There Were None.
Publishers did the same with some of the work of Robert E. Howard.
When REH’s Solomon Kane stories were republished in book form in the 1960s, the publisher (Donald M. Grant) edited them to remove offensive references from the 1920s originals, especially to Black Africans. This included a scene where a white character discovers a city in Africa and thinks that no Black Africans could have possibly built such a place – clearly Howard didn’t know about Djenné ,Gao or Kerma.
@Athel – I had the same idea. The rhyme in the novel changed to Ten Little Indians, and now it’s Ten Little Soldier Boys. I did have the original at one time, but I doubt I’d leave it on my bookshelf now.
The book isn’t really affected by this. It one of Christie’s best.
‘Nigger’ vs ‘colored?’ Bullshit.
W.C. Handy–father of the blues–led minstrel-show orchestras for years. He tells a tale of visiting a Black church while on tour and dropping a large bill in the collection plate as a gesture to the locals. The minister pocketed the bill and launched into a diatribe about ‘nigger minstrels.’