Roald Dahl's Books Being Altered

[Artaxerxes]

do you mean the tv series? i think it went a bit shit when they ran out of the books to adapt and it got handed over to staff writers to come up with the plot

you are likely very right about the author power thing, though there are some editors who wield as much power as authors and also have a long working relationships with certain authors

The book, Grr had a plan 30 years ago and the books got increasingly long winded as he went

 

[Wolveryeti]

theyre called Editors and they are appointed by others in a publishing house. A good publisher builds up a strong culture and becomes a branding that can be trusted in because of the editorial work (including commissioning).

Editors play a massive role in any published book. We think of books as the work of one person but there are many great editors behind the scenes whose work at times can be highly creative and artistic

The books had already gone through an editing process.

 

[frogwoman]

Some of the nursery rhymes as a kid were crazy. I remember I had a tape with a whole load including one with 'tell tale tit, your tongue will be slit and all the little puppy dogs will have a little bit' along with more innocuous ones like 'jelly on the plate' 'oranges and lemons' and 'the wheels on the bus'

 

[hitmouse]

does anyone even know they're being rewritten? I didn't
now i know id quite like to read the original hardcore uncensored shit
i reckon carefully redesigned and labeled as the HCA texts they tried to supress would sell quite well

Have you read The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter? Probably worth looking at Jack Zipes' stuff as well - my parents had a copy of The Trials and Tribulations of Red Riding Hood, which I remember being great as a curious (older) kid.

Baddies not getting a comeuppance is confusing, though. Bad storytelling imo.

Well, if we want to be preparing kids for the real world...

 

[kabbes]

I suspect that many of our notions of the innocence of childhood are rather modern notions.

As I understand it (and I am no historian), we didn't even really have a concept of childhood at all (at least, childhood as we understand it now) before something round about the 18th century-ish. There's an explosion of late-18th century books on parenting, which was the result (downstream) of the state deciding that it has an interest in its population beyond taxes and bodies for wars. Go back to the 16th century and prior and once you were basically capable of working and answering for yourself, you were just part of the community.

 

[frogwoman]

I don’t think that's true at all times though. I was surprised to find that William of Norwich who was usually described as a child, who the Jews were supposed to have killed in the middle ages and what led to them being kicked out of the UK, was about 16 at the time of his death

 

[kabbes]

Bit of a myth about children not being seen as different and special in the past afaik, even the making and giving of toys suggests otherwise. Maybe it was a few particularly dark decades in early years of industrialism coloured later impressions.

I think the disconnect might be in terms of the age that is considered to need special attention. Go back a few hundred years and you were expected to contribute and behave as an adult once you were hitting something like 8-11, as I recall.

And it is also true that even up to the beginning of the 20th century, child development was basically considered as being a linear development from being nothing to being an adult. Children were just stupid adults. It was the likes of Piaget and Vygotsky starting in the 1920s who identified that children have fundamentally different cognitive processes to adults, and that stages of development add new modes rather than replace these processes.

 

[kabbes]

I don’t think that's true at all times though. I was surprised to find that William of Norwich who was usually described as a child, who the Jews were supposed to have killed in the middle ages and what led to them being kicked out of the UK, was about 16 at the time of his death

Ah, but wasn't there also always a very different way of thinking about the nobles compared with ordinary people? They would certainly happily marry at age 12 or 13 but be viewed as some kind of "callow youth" without the wisdom of their elders and thus needing advisors etc.

 

[frogwoman]

Ah, but wasn't there also always a very different way of thinking about the nobles compared with ordinary people? They would certainly happily marry at age 12 or 13 but be viewed as some kind of "callow youth" without the wisdom of their elders and thus needing advisors etc.

Nah some of this kids family were rich, and definitely above average for the time, but he was an apprentice and his immediately family were not exactly noble according to a book i read on the topic. I think it's something that varies depending on time period and class tho definitely.

Yeah they could marry very young but couldn't make decisions like going to war etc lol. A lot of the noblemen just fucked about till their mid 20s in any case, especially eg Henry VIII

 

[frogwoman]

Also part of the legend of Joan of Arc is that she was a teenager (and a girl) yet had all these military/religious visions, which ultimately led to her dying which led to her being viewed as a martyr and symbol of France. The violent death of a child or young person was still viewed in a different way to that of adults even if in other respects they were supposed to eg help on running of the farm etc imo. There's also stuff like 'the legend of the Princes of the Tower' which I had a very graphic victorian children's book about at one point

 

[A380]

saw a P&J show on a beach last summer. Toddler loved it, and I don't mind him being exposed to a bit of casual violence / slapstick / theatre. It's probably not too far off him getting into wrestling when he's a bit older.

What I found a bit more dubious was the puppeteer working himself into a proper rant in the end - started off with the need to preserve P&J shows, got quickly into Great British values and traditions, followed by an anti-vegetarian speech (vegetarianism being non-British and should be left to cultures who are comfortable with it).

I was a bit worried about him, in the blazing sun in his puppeteering outfit, sweating streams and ranting away.
But I also found his rants a bit out of place, as surely his job was to entertain the toddlers around him, rather than educating the adults, who, unfortunately, seemed to largely agree with him and gave generously when the hat was passed around.

Sounds like someone who knew how to work his audience for maximum tips…

 

[A380]

I grew up with children’s literature (and television based on that literature) that did not reflect my life at all…

Me too, there was nothing about the trials and tribulations of being a student wizard back then.

 

[dshl]

Shit poll - where is the option for 'leave stories as the author intended'? All this sensitivity reader bullshit can get in the bin, thanks.

The last option.

 

[JimW]

I think the disconnect might be in terms of the age that is considered to need special attention. Go back a few hundred years and you were expected to contribute and behave as an adult once you were hitting something like 8-11, as I recall.

And it is also true that even up to the beginning of the 20th century, child development was basically considered as being a linear development from being nothing to being an adult. Children were just stupid adults. It was the likes of Piaget and Vygotsky starting in the 1920s who identified that children have fundamentally different cognitive processes to adults, and that stages of development add new modes rather than replace these processes.

Heaven lies about us in our infancy!
Shades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing Boy,
But he beholds the light, and whence it flows,
He sees it in his joy;
The Youth, who daily farther from the east
Must travel, still is Nature's Priest,
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended;
At length the Man perceives it die away,
And fade into the light of common day.

That's published 1807. I was just looking up Du Fu's poems about his son from a thousand years before that, e.g.:

Jizi is a fine boy,
last year was when he learned to speak.
He asked the names of our visitors
and was able to recite his old man’s poems.
I pity his being so young in the turmoil of the times,
the household poor, he looks to his mother’s love.
I didn’t succeed in taking him to Deergate,
8 and I can’t expect something tied to a wild goose’s foot.

I realise these don't address your point directly but I must have come across countless examples from various cultures of people having a far less crude attitude than in your second para; it would be surprising if not really, given the number of loving mothers and fathers who've raised children and will have noticed the kind of things that maybe were only expressed in a scientific idiom later.

 

[Artaxerxes]

As I understand it (and I am no historian), we didn't even really have a concept of childhood at all (at least, childhood as we understand it now) before something round about the 18th century-ish. There's an explosion of late-18th century books on parenting, which was the result (downstream) of the state deciding that it has an interest in its population beyond taxes and bodies for wars. Go back to the 16th century and prior and once you were basically capable of working and answering for yourself, you were just part of the community.

One of the most poignant things I read last year was Gilgamesh asking if Enkidu had seen his child on a trip to the netherworld.

‘Did you see my small stillborn who never knew their own name?"
"They take pleasure in syrup and ghee at tables of gold and silver’"

Kids were important and while it drags on longer and we expect them to do less now they absolutely were important and special to their parents.

Attitude and epitaphs: the death of children in Imperial Rome

“Solacia expectas? Convicia accipe. Molliter tu fers mortem filii; quid faceres, si amicum perdidisses? Decessit filius incertae spei, parvulus; pusillum temporis periit.” Seneca, Epistulae 99.2 Gr…

deathinantiquity.wordpress.com

I suspect based on my own reading and the above the idea that there was no childhood is at least partly myth mostly invented and coloured by Victorian attitudes to raising kids and the need to cram as many workers in as possible,

We also have to remember who is writing a lot of these sources and manuals. The stoic virtue seeking aristocracy on Rome (Cicero was absolutely broken when his daughter died btw) the monks in the early to late medieval then various shades of quite well off men up to the Victorian era

 

[ska invita]

Just asked ChatGPT what the darkest Anderson story was - this the reply - I dont remember this in the Disney film!!!

one of his darker stories is often considered to be "The Little Mermaid". In this story, the mermaid gives up her voice and endures great physical pain in order to become human and win the love of a prince, but ultimately finds that he does not return her love and must choose between killing him or sacrificing herself. The story ends with the mermaid dissolving into sea foam, without finding the happiness she sought.

 

[frogwoman]

Tarka The Otter as well. Very effective (and righteous) anti hunting propaganda but should it have been read by 8 year olds? Idk

 

[scifisam]

Re: the original topic, my instinct is to keep books the same and either put a warning label in or just choose or suggest other books for your kids to read - it feels like Victorians painting over body parts they found objectionable. I'm somewhat on the fence now, though - arguments about "Dahl changed his own works on the advice of editors" are meaningless, because that was pre-publication, but when it comes to Grimm's fairy tales, for example, I like having multiple different versions available, so why not for these too? It's not as if the actual story really changes, which I guess is mainly because he did take on the advice of his editors and there isn't actually much that does need to be changed.

I also wonder if they made stupid changes like the "black cloak" and a couple of others mainly to, basically, troll people into responding for extra publicity. It definitely has worked.

What was the murder in Cinderella? I remember the part about the sisters cutting off their toes being much more gruesome but can’t remember a murder.

I don't remember a murder either, but this part was actually included in one panto version of Cinderella I went to at the Hackney Empire a few years ago! It was a bit much, TBH - glad it's not usually in there for panto. Pantos play fast and loose with every single aspect of the story so it's not somewhere you go expecting Grimm-purist ideology in amongst a drag queen wearing a foot-high castle as a hat making jokes about politicians and Love Island and singing along with a cow made of two people.

Some of the nursery rhymes as a kid were crazy. I remember I had a tape with a whole load including one with 'tell tale tit, your tongue will be slit and all the little puppy dogs will have a little bit' along with more innocuous ones like 'jelly on the plate' 'oranges and lemons' and 'the wheels on the bus'

Oranges and Lemons isn't that innocuous. It ends with "here comes a candle to light you to bed, here comes a chopper to chop off your head. The last man's head is off!" And we used to act that part out my forming an arch and catching kids under it at infants' school when I was a kid.

interesting....thinking of the stories that have "scarred" (stayed with) me its injustices that really stick in the mind

that thomas the tank engine one mentioned, i didnt read or see that, but i did see a similiar Canadian (?) kids film about an alternate universe where there was only one sunny day a year on a planet of rain and one kid gets locked in a cupboard on that day while the other kids run outside and play.
the kid may or may not have deserved it, i cant remember, but its still felt unfair.
#JusticeForTheCanadianCupboardOne

That's based on a short story by Ray Bradbury. I read it as a kid, most likely one of the Asimov-edited sci fi for kids' compilations. Loads of those stories have stuck in my mind all my life, and that one particularly did. The kid (a girl in the story) did not deserve it at all - the other kids were bullies. They did feel guilty, but she'd still lost her only chance at seeing the sun while still a child.

All Summer in a Day - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

It's quite a traumatic read, TBH, especially for kids that have been bullied, which probably includes a lot of kids who are into scifi, but that obviously doesn't mean kids shouldn't read it.

GK Chesterton: “Fairy tales do not tell children that monsters exist. Children already know that monsters exist. Fairy tales tell children that monsters can be defeated.”

But of course that depends on the fairy tale. In a lot of the original Grimm and even HCE ones, the monsters won.

 

[belboid]

Cinderella is an incredibly old story, versions of it date back to 1AD and are found all over the world, some a lot darker than others (the Tibetans cut the WickedStepmothers breasts off!). Later versions have referenced Queen Fredegund, a Frankish Queen from 600ish, who was very much a WS figure:

Fredegund waited her opportunity and under the pretense of magnanimity took her to the treasure-room and showed her the King's jewels in a large chest. Feigning fatigue, she exclaimed "I am weary; put thou in thy hand, and take out what thou mayest find." The mother thereupon forced down the lid on her neck and would have killed her had not the servants finally rushed to her aid.

 

[ska invita]

That's based on a short story by Ray Bradbury. I read it as a kid, most likely one of the Asimov-edited sci fi for kids' compilations. Loads of those stories have stuck in my mind all my life, and that one particularly did. The kid (a girl in the story) did not deserve it at all - the other kids were bullies. They did feel guilty, but she'd still lost her only chance at seeing the sun while still a child.

All Summer in a Day - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

It's quite a traumatic read, TBH, especially for kids that have been bullied, which probably includes a lot of kids who are into scifi, but that obviously doesn't mean kids shouldn't read it.

thank you so much, ive wondered about that for years! im going to watch it!



i was heartbroken as a kid by it

cuntish kids

 

[ska invita]

i think we were shown this at school

 

[scifisam]

TY, back, just watched it. It's pretty different to the short story, which is a lot darker (in that it's all the kids who lock her in, and there's no even slightly positive ending), but it's also brilliant and sad in complex ways.

 

[8ball]

One of the most poignant things I read last year was Gilgamesh asking if Enkidu had seen his child on a trip to the netherworld.




Kids were important and while it drags on longer and we expect them to do less now they absolutely were important and special to their parents.

Attitude and epitaphs: the death of children in Imperial Rome

“Solacia expectas? Convicia accipe. Molliter tu fers mortem filii; quid faceres, si amicum perdidisses? Decessit filius incertae spei, parvulus; pusillum temporis periit.” Seneca, Epistulae 99.2 Gr…

deathinantiquity.wordpress.com

I suspect based on my own reading and the above the idea that there was no childhood is at least partly myth mostly invented and coloured by Victorian attitudes to raising kids and the need to cram as many workers in as possible,

We also have to remember who is writing a lot of these sources and manuals. The stoic virtue seeking aristocracy on Rome (Cicero was absolutely broken when his daughter died btw) the monks in the early to late medieval then various shades of quite well off men up to the Victorian era

Lovely post.

From my readings; while there wasn’t the weaponised sentimentality surrounding childhood that we have these days, there were still parents who loved their children to bits and some parents who treated them like crap.

 

[CNT36]

Just asked ChatGPT what the darkest Anderson story was - this the reply - I dont remember this in the Disney film!!!

one of his darker stories is often considered to be "The Little Mermaid". In this story, the mermaid gives up her voice and endures great physical pain in order to become human and win the love of a prince, but ultimately finds that he does not return her love and must choose between killing him or sacrificing herself. The story ends with the mermaid dissolving into sea foam, without finding the happiness she sought.

We have that version at home. My daughter loves the Disney one but no comment was made.

 

[dshl]

Sorry, what's the kind of thing conservatives hate? Censorship? As said above, conservatives historically have been the censors.

But this isn't censorship. It's an estate and publisher deciding to change books in order to sell them in today's market. I think we need to be clear about the distinction here. Censorship is something that used to happen extensively in this country up to fairly recently - and it was censorship from a conservative viewpoint. For example, all plays were censored up to 1968. And they were censored - loads of stuff got banned/changed.

Sorry, I earlier said you may have a point re. the word 'censorship' but that largely was my brushing it off as didn't want to get side-tracked.

Puffin Books is owned by Penguin and in today's world where access to global information is in the hands of giant corporations - we're just splitting hairs when we say: 'Well, it's not officially censorship'.

For all practical purposes they're stopping many millions from reading the words that RD wrote - a megalithic and one of the most important kid's writers - and replacing those words with some of their own and inline with ideological reasons to boot!

Let's move with the times. Things don't have to match old-school government-sanctioned censorship to in effect result in basically parallel restrictions.

 

[kabbes]

Penguin are also stopping many millions from reading my words. The bastards!

 

[JimW]

Sorry, I earlier said you may have a point re. the word 'censorship' but that largely was my brushing it off as didn't want to get side-tracked.

Puffin Books is owned by Penguin and in today's world where access to global information is in the hands of giant corporations - we're just splitting hairs when we say: 'Well, it's not officially censorship'.

For all practical purposes they're stopping many millions from reading the words that RD wrote - a megalithic and one of the most important kid's writers - and replacing those words with some of their own and inline with ideological reasons to boot!

Let's move with the times. Things don't have to match old-school government-sanctioned censorship to in effect result in basically parallel restrictions.

Though in the Internet age should imagine the originals will remain readily available, or at least a list of revisions.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

Penguin are also stopping many millions from reading my words. The bastards!

Unfortunately some of us are still obliged to.

 

[dshl]

Sorry, what's the kind of thing conservatives hate? Censorship? As said above, conservatives historically have been the censors.

But this isn't censorship. It's an estate and publisher deciding to change books in order to sell them in today's market. I think we need to be clear about the distinction here. Censorship is something that used to happen extensively in this country up to fairly recently - and it was censorship from a conservative viewpoint. For example, all plays were censored up to 1968. And they were censored - loads of stuff got banned/changed.

Sorry to quote your very same post again but - just to add:

I don't believe there's anything in the definition of 'censorship' which confines it to the actions of governments rather than other entities - which is what I think you're driving at when you say censorship only existed here in the past.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Sorry to quote your very same post again but - just to add:

I don't believe there's anything in the definition of 'censorship' which confines it to the actions of governments rather than another entity - which is what I think you're driving at when you say censorship only existed here in the past.

What is missing in this instance is authority and compulsion. An official censor has authority to ban or alter certain works - ultimately they have the authority of the state and the law behind them. In the case of a publisher changing works, they do so with no such authority - there is no obligation to make the changes, it is a choice.

Now you're right that self-censorship by the gatekeepers of a medium potentially serves a purpose in restricting what is available, but I'd still argue that there are important differences. Given in this case that the estate is involved, it's hard to make the case that this is anything other than voluntary. The word 'censorship' implies coercion. But where books are in copyright, the estate's express permission is required. Where they're out of copyright, anyone is free to make whatever changes they like.