The Political Fate/State of Huckleberry Finn

[desiresjab]

I support your right to hold and express any opinion. However, I am free to call such opinions illogical, ill-informed, and ill-considered, and your expression of them ill-mannered and ill-tempered.

I appreciate your clear affection for me, expressed when you call me "my dear", but I'm afraid your love is unrequited. You are not gay (i.e merry and carefree) enough to be attractive. Instead, you whine about changing language (Oh no! Language evolves! Hide the women and children!), complain when other people dislike the books you like, and object to "fringe groups" (why can't everyone be a white man, like dj and Donald!?).

Getting back to Huckleberry Finn, I'm amazed that any teachers assign it in school. American public (state) schools are designed to acculturate children into mainstream, adult society. IN addition to learning how to read (and a little about literature) American school children learn to attend class regularly, to be on time, to respect authority, to follow the rules, and to avoid brawling with others. These skills are no longer taught to the tune of a hickory stick, but they are still taught, and many teachers are probably more concerned with maintaining law and order in the class room than with introducing children to great literature.

Huckleberry Finn is a subversive novel. One of its primary themes is that "natural man" is (or can be) basically good, and "civilized" man is essentially wicked. American schools attempt to civilize children. This is anathema to Huck:


Why would a teacher (whatever his opinion of the "N" word) assign a novel so clearly in conflict with his or her role of civilizing children?

Fair enough, my dear, but for a few exceptions. First, I am not against language evolving, so please make sense. What I am against is any ersatz political or cultural movement claiming exclusivity for certain words. It does not really matter if the word is chink, nigger, injun or honky. I am betting the sensorship machine on this site disguises the first two words and leaves the second two undisturbed. They must be racists around here.

I am not going to argue too hard, my dear, to teach Huck to high schoolers in this country, for the simple reason that they cannot take it. For a fact, I do not believe even the majority of college students can take it anymore. Grammar school kids used to take it just fine, but now it is too much for even college students to endure. This is what we have come to.

When the gays commandeered the word gay for their movement there was no tacit warning and understanding that no one else had better use that word. I feel I am allowed to use any word that members of some cultural group use frequently. No exclusivity of words. That is one of my points you fail to acknowledge.

Every other cultural group with their own agendas should look at what the gays accomplished and how they did it. I do not remember them burning any neighborhoods. Am I forgetting something? No, they did it right, that is all. Now they have their rights and are well on the way to what they wish for. Had they been burning neighborhoods and shooting police, they would not have those rights yet. Look at the time frame, too. Once they began in earnest, things happened relatively quickly in their favor, as political time frames go. Sure, there was plenty of resistance, but it was gently swept aside. Sometimes maybe not so gently did the opponents of equality go into their good night, but they went anyway. Now, for all practical purposes, it is done.

Back to Huck. Bowdlerization, my dear, is an awfully polite euphemism for censorship. Of course anyone has the right to make one, and I could not stop them and would not try any means other than persuasion. These already extant bowdlerizations of Huck are in the service of a cultural movement whose insistence on sanitary language I find an offense against literature. It is not likely that someone who finishes a watered down version will have enough interest to then pursue the original text. That is not how the generation of instant gratification works. They are lucky to finish the watered down version at all, let alone move on to the real one. So they miss it entirely, don't they, except for some crappy diluted version? Oh, I read that in the sixth grade for class, I will not have to read it again. Now that sounds more like the people I know from all over this country. And if knowing in advance everything that is going to happen does not kill the joy of reading, I don't know what does.

[desiresjab]

They left all the bad words.

[desiresjab]

Now those are not four words I am dying to use. It is not like the N-word, the C-word, the I-word or the H-word are on the tip of my tongue at all times. Each one is quite a beautiful word, in my view, however, for they are very expressive.

Whereas Chinese is a piss poor word for singing value in our language, chinaman is beautiful and graceful.

What's that Chinese up to? No poetic value.

What's that chinaman up to? Rolls out of the mouth smoothly.

It is a shame that we kept the ugly word that rhymes with cheese and got rid of the good one that feels so graceful in the mouth.

Hardly anyone shares my idiosyncratic notions on language. An anonymous author did, though, who said: Sticks and stones may break my bones... , well, (It seems like a month since I kissed my baby goodbye) you know the rest of the nursery rhyme.

Of course, if a word like chink did not disturb or hurt someone, it would not be as effective when used for effect in literature, would it, my dears? What a catch-22 that is. These words are great tools for the right job. Not only do they offend some, but because they offend some they make points and suggestions the sanitized versions cannot. As poets we like it when a word brings lots of baggage with it. Yeah, we love baggage.

[Eiseabhal]

Cathartic rants are a tree mendous release ain't they. Teachers have to make sensible judgements based on who sits in front of them and the population served by the school. It's ok for me to call myself a Teuchter but you - no way. And the reason is simple. But the brain dead reactionary will always pretend not to understand why he cannot gratuitously insult someone.

[ennison]

Speaking one Teuchter to another Eiseabhal I am giving you some warning that I may not be at the Northern Meeting next month.

[OrphanPip]

I don't think Mark Twain is particularly under attack anyway. According to the American Library Association, the ten most challenged books are the following:

Looking for Alaska, by John Green
Reasons: Offensive language, sexually explicit, and unsuited for age group.

Fifty Shades of Grey, by E. L. James
Reasons: Sexually explicit, unsuited to age group, and other (“poorly written,” “concerns that a group of teenagers will want to try it”).

I Am Jazz, by Jessica Herthel and Jazz Jennings
Reasons: Inaccurate, homosexuality, sex education, religious viewpoint, and unsuited for age group.

Beyond Magenta: Transgender Teens Speak Out, by Susan Kuklin
Reasons: Anti-family, offensive language, homosexuality, sex education, political viewpoint, religious viewpoint, unsuited for age group, and other (“wants to remove from collection to ward off complaints”).

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, by Mark Haddon
Reasons: Offensive language, religious viewpoint, unsuited for age group, and other (“profanity and atheism”).

The Holy Bible
Reasons: Religious viewpoint.

Fun Home, by Alison Bechdel
Reasons: Violence and other (“graphic images”).

Habibi, by Craig Thompson
Reasons: Nudity, sexually explicit, and unsuited for age group.

Nasreen’s Secret School: A True Story from Afghanistan, by Jeanette Winter
Reasons: Religious viewpoint, unsuited to age group, and violence.

Two Boys Kissing, by David Levithan
Reasons: Homosexuality and other (“condones public displays of affection”).

Now out of those books I've read Habibi, Fun Home, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime and The Bible. They're all actually quite good but I can see why parents probably complain about Habibi and Fun Home since they assume graphic novels are for children. Anyway, it seems Americans are more concerned with censoring sex, religion and homosexuality than the N word.

Edit: From my personal experience as a teacher at college I didn't shy away from assigning controversial works that might offend. However, teaching children is another matter and there is a world of difference between asking a 20 year old to dissociate their personal experience of racism from their appreciation of a book and asking the same of a 14-15 year old.

[ennison]

Quite right OP. He is immune to fashion and trendiness. Swinburne (Of all people) praised Bowdler for placing editions of Shakespeare in thousands of homes where his works would otherwise have been absent so even a scrubbed up Huck is valuable. He'll be allowed back in his barrel soon. No decent text stands or falls on the inclusion or exclusion of a few grubby words.

[Jackson Richardson]

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, by Mark Haddon
Reasons: Offensive language, religious viewpoint, unsuited for age group, and other (“profanity and atheism”).

Eh? I read it a few years ago and saw the West End stage adaption. I thought it was a moving and humane work. The Christian faith is very important to me and I am very sensitive to religious issues in books. I can't remember any significant references to any religious viewpoint in the book nor any profanity or atheism. What was the problem?

[OrphanPip]

Eh? I read it a few years ago and saw the West End stage adaption. I thought it was a moving and humane work. The Christian faith is very important to me and I am very sensitive to religious issues in books. I can't remember any significant references to any religious viewpoint in the book nor any profanity or atheism. What was the problem?

I can't recall any either, but I read the book over 10 years ago I think. According to wikipedia the book is criticized by parent groups in America because of the inclusion of the F word and at some point the main character says there's no God and no afterlife.

I similarly can't recall any incidence of explicit violence in Bechdel's Fun Home, which is an autobiography about Bechdel's relationship to her father who committed suicide.

[ennison]

A good number of years ago one of my daughters came home from school with the novella, "Of Mice and Men". I had never read it. As a well-brought up girl she was a bit worried about the blasphemy. I read it aloud with her, missing out all the blasphemy. We watched three film versions and were in agreement that it was a fantastic piece of writing. Is there a lesson here? Maybe. I do not want to preach ... Not too much. I never swear in front of anyone I love, seldom in front of anyone I like but those I hate well ..

[Eiseabhal]

Now Ennison how much of THAT is tongue-in-cheek? I agree though that it is a good piece of work. He wrote best when he was succinct.