I find it all quite disturbing at how many books have been banned or burned.
http://www.ala.org/ala/oif/bannedboo...dbooksweek.htm
I don't need the gubbmint or anyone else telling me what I can and cannot read.
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I find it all quite disturbing at how many books have been banned or burned.
http://www.ala.org/ala/oif/bannedboo...dbooksweek.htm
I don't need the gubbmint or anyone else telling me what I can and cannot read.
Hello, lizzz, welcome to the forum. :)
Yes, unfortunately, libraries in the U.S. (and other countries) have banned many classical pieces of literature, due to its offense to others.
Calling Mark Twain's The Adventures Of Huckleberry Finn racist, I would have to disagree with you, lizzz. If Twain's other material seems available, he readily admits not feeling racist, as his contemporaries of his time. The plot of Huck Finn explains much: a rebellious boy, beaten by his father attempts helping his friend (a slave of African origin) escape to the North for freedom; on the way, he encounters the Duke and King, who he knows consist of nothing besides lies, but carries on, unaffected. True, Huck Finn lies to get his utilitarian way through problems, but he shows respect toward every character, even those who lie to him, like the Duke and King. He realizes the equality of every being, but disagrees with others' ideals of morals and ethics. That he insists on using a specific six-letter word, beginning with an 'n,' I find entirely due to the era, though you deny it, lizzz; every era in time owns a certain vocabulary, and each following era decides whether to retain or refuse it - many teenagers and young adults, for example, in the mid 20th century, insisted on calling each other 'cats,' a less vulgar term, but something rarely seen in the 21st century.
Very true, lizzz, Mark Twain does exhibit some tendencies that sound racist to someone in the contemporary time, but focusing on the plot of Huck Finn, I think, seems immensley important, considering that most people who make complaints of Twain have never read his work, but heard the details of it. In essence, I recommend viewing this work more holistically (in plot) than analytically (in details, vocabulary, etc.).
Absolutely no book deserving banning or burning, in my opinion. Just like watching television, using the Internet, and having access to newspapers and magazines, books offer a form of free expression. I cannot call myself a fan of every genre of literature, but I would never attempt erasing some of the literary art's history that formed it into what it has evolved to today. By banning and burning, one ***umes what sounds in the best interest of readers, when that proves impossible to determine. If art has no freedom, then banning and burning it all sounds most preferable, followed by creating (yes, creating) new forms, so others can get easily offended and ban and burn it all again.
Tom Sawyer was not banned from our school library and Mark Twain always stated it was based on his childhood experience's with a dash of fiction thrown in. His words best discribes why he wrote Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn.
Quote:
Quoted from Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain:MOST OF THE ADVENTURES recorded in this book really occurred; one or two were experiences of my own, the rest those of boys who were schoolmates of mine. Huck Finn is drawn from life; Tom Sawyer also, but not from an individual- he is a combination of the characteristics of three boys whom I knew, and therefore belongs to the composite order of architecture.
The odd superstitions touched upon were all prevalent among children and slaves in the West at the period of this story- that is to say, thirty or forty years ago.
Although my book is intended mainly for the entertainment of boys and girls, I hope it will not be shunned by men and women on that account, for part of my plan has been to try to pleasantly remind adults of what they once were themselves, and of how they felt and thought and talked, and what queer enterprises they sometimes engaged in.
lizzzzzzz these are his words and I feel perhaps you should re-read the book once again with a different perspective. I hope you do not feel as if I am being harsh with you or that I favor racism because I do not. People today do not want to look beyond what they see and often beauty is hidden deeper then the surface be it a person or a book. Words are so easily misinterupted that we forget to re-read and re-read again to see if we truly understand. Believe me I know what racist sounds like and I have seen what it can do. I hope that I did not offend you and is so my apologies.Quote:
Mark Twains explantory from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
EXPLANATORY
IN this book a number of dialects are used, to wit: the Missouri negro dialect; the extremest form of the backwoods Southwestern dialect; the ordinary "Pike County" dialect; and four modified varieties of this last. The shadings have not been done in a haphazard fashion, or by guesswork; but painstakingly, and with the trustworthy guidance and support of personal familiarity with these several forms of speech.
I make this explanation for the reason that without it many readers would suppose that all these characters were trying to talk alike and not succeeding.
Lizzzzzzzzzzz your complaint against racism falls on my completely apathetic ears. If people want to be racist, books are the place to do it. People have a right to believe whatever they want. BUrning books because they are racist or intolerent makes just as much sense as burning books because they are not in compliance with the communist/nazi/insert repressive, book burning regime here/ view.
I know you didn't say 'lets go burn books'. But your post had an unspoken complaint. The posted complaint was, "this book is racist" the unposted complaint was, "it's on your web page and it shouldn't be because it's racist!"
Also something i want to throw out there. Just because a book is racist or wrong doesn't make it not worth reading... (double negative in my sentence but deal with it)
Just to be clear: those of you who claim to abhor censorship in all its manifestations would defend The Turner Diaries just as vigorously as you defend Huckleberry Finn?
http://www.dnsb.info/The%20Turner%20...s%20(eng.).gif
Nowhere is Pierce's promotion of violence clearer than in The Turner Diaries, a novel he wrote under the pseudonym Andrew Macdonald. Considered required reading by virtually every member of the white supremacist movement in the United States and by many extremists abroad, the book describes the world takeover of an all-white guerilla army called the Organization, and the army's systematic extermination of blacks, Jews and "race traitors."
The Turner Diaries is thought to be the inspiration behind a number of violent crimes, most notably Timothy McVeigh's bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in April 1995. The bombing, which killed 168 people, was the worst terrorist act ever committed in the United States. McVeigh was so impressed with the Diaries that he sent copies of the novel to friends, with notes encouraging them to read it, and sold the book at weekend gun shows. In addition, in a search of the car McVeigh drove on the day of the bombing, F.B.I. agents found a copy of a highlighted passage from the Diaries, which focused on terrorist bombings of the United States Capitol and an airliner bound for Tel Aviv.
The Diaries also inspired a crime spree in the early 1980s perpetrated by a white supremacist gang called The Order (the inner circle of resistance fighters in the Diaries was named The Order). Led by Robert Mathews, the Order attempted to bankroll an Aryan revolution; its crimes included murder, robbery, counterfeiting and the bombing of a synagogue. More recently, inspired by The Order and The Turner Diaries, members of a white supremacist gang calling itself the Aryan Republican Army committed 22 bank robberies and bombings across the Midwest between 1992 and 1996.
The activities of The Order have also been cited as a role model for an alleged conspiracy by a group of white supremacists in East St. Louis, Illinois, who called themselves The New Order. In March 1998, federal authorities arrested three men in the group who planned to bomb the Anti-Defamation League's New York headquarters, the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Alabama, and the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles. They had also talked of bombing state capitols and post offices and poisoning public water supplies with cyanide. Like other admirers of The Order, members of the group were reportedly heavily influenced by The Turner Diaries.
(from the Anti-Defamation League website)
Basil, are you saying that anything containing violence in it is going to have a bad influence on society? Because before man started writing books and long before tv was invented there as been violence upon the Earth. I am tired of hearing how this book influenced this person to kill someone. The instinct to kill does not need a book to fulfill the act. Yeah, I will admit anything can influence someone to do something horrible but in the end the person committed the act all on their own. We too must take the responsibility for our own acts instead of conveniently placing blame onto another.
"scarred," i said. "scarred."Quote:
Originally Posted by Ancestor
Imho......One does not have to agree with the message written in order to impart value to any written word. Words are naturally doubled edged, and interpretation or action taken by anyone because of a few printed words in no manner dictates the word's inherent goodness or evil. Instead, it only indicates a pathology in the limited range of thought and intrepretation of those digressing from a path honouring the realities of social enlightenment. Inanimate objects cannot perform dastardly deeds. That honour is left up to the only animal that kills for reasons other than hunger, or perceived imminent danger to self, human beings.
An art form should not be judged on the merits of its bad art, nor should inferior pieces be disposed of, as they have the potential to impart as much knowledge of the art form as do masterpieces.
Forgive me I left out a r I knew it was scarred and meant no offense. If you do not wish to talk about that is fine. I have been scarred myself but not by a book and I survived that ordeal. I was just curious if the book scarred you then why have that kind of book in a library where children can check it out. Again I am sorry.Quote:
Originally Posted by underground
Basil. That book shouldn't be banned from libraries either, or burned. Mein Kampf or however you say it shouldn't be banned either.
In fact there should be nothing banned from public libraries. There should be no government censorship for adults.
First of all, I will move this thread to Mark Twain subforum so that other people who are interested can view it, too.
Second, I agree with most of what has been said so far regarding Twain and racism (I think Tal has put it nicely). While reading books, we need to take into consideration the time and place they were written and/or the story takes place. For Twain to reflect the events in his time, it was necessary for him to include words such as 'nigger' in his book because that is simply how things were. How credible would we consider him as an author, for example, if his stories included a mayor/judge of black origin considering the times it was written?
Moving on to the censorship issues... I think we need to draw a line between the books which, like Huckleberry Finn, are simply reflection of the times and/or societies they write about and the books which aim to create/aggravate/inflame negative feelings such as racial hatred and advocate violence.
Basil raises a valid point: Would you not be concerned at all if books like he posted were freely circulating? It would not bother you at all if your children/siblings were reading these? And those who are dead against all sort of censorship, would you have felt the same if one of your dear ones had been a victim of Oklahama City Bombings? Not to bring in politics into this discussion but do you feel the same way about say the 'literature' published by Al-Qaeda, which openly encourages and justifies killings of Americans?
As a parent, I would be VERY worried if I found my child reading some of these books and I somehow feel relieved that they are not freely available in the market.
Ironically, I have managed to read The Turner Diaries and, as imthefoolonthehill mentioned, Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf. Do these works corrupt all minds? No. Do I consider myself a white-supremacist, striving for a cruel form of eugenics, and eliminating anyone hindering me? Definitely no. Nonetheless, though I disagree with several ideas in both of the books, I have the right to disagree with those thoughts, reject them, which, in turn, only strengthens my own ideas.Quote:
Originally Posted by Basil
People's minds do not consist of blank slates that get filled with what they read; otherwise, I would find my mind corrupted by reading these two particular books, among many others. Restricting the viewing of certain pieces of literature, I find entire nonsense, preventing minds from growing independently, away from so-called libraries' norms of what society should or should not read. As I said, I have learned much from disagreeing with many works of literature (such as the two mentioned); one can perhaps learn more from disagreeing than agreeing with something read. The concept that all readers and libraries will agree what seems suitable to read sounds entirely unrealistic and utopian - something that will never occur. Any mind corrupted by reading certain works, I think, sounds like an unsound, weak mind with absolutely no development of autonomous cognition; perhaps this just seems my opinion.
Both Mono and Scheherazade made excellent points which I agree with both. We need to realize the not everything written is going to be suitable for some people. A number of things can cause a person to turn into a violent person we may never know for sure whether it is from influence from a book, person, or if our DNA has a violent strand. We can study the causes for centuries and may never know the true cause. If you do not want your children exposed then make sure they are not. Perhaps that is all we can do without stepping upon someone's rights.
Your post makes me wonder if the most dangerous form of literature isn't chatroom posts in colours that create blinding optical effects.Quote:
Originally Posted by lizzzzzzz
As for your objections to Huck Finn, the key point you seem to be missing is that the book is fiction written in the first person. The author does not write in his own voice - which would allow him to express his own views clearly - but in Huck's. Yes, Huck could be described as racist, but since the book is fiction that is not evidence that the author is racist too. Furthermore, Huck's racism is solely a result of ignorance. When he expresses racist views or assumptions, they are simply the opinions he has been brougt up with.
Why would Twain do this, rather than writing in a more direct way that would allow him to clearly oppose racism? He probably had many reasons. But, in terms of communicating an anti-racist message, one can see that writing in the voice of of a racist was pretty cunning. Imagine the effect on a racist. Although he is ignorant enough to be racist, Huck is a person of great feeling, intelligence, wit and charisma. His feeling for Jim overrides his racism and, as the examples in your post all show, he spends the book learning to see that his racist assumptions are unfounded. For a racist reader, there is good reason to hope that reading this would make them less racist. One can imagine this reader beginning the book relating to Huck's racism and then, as the book progresses, changing his views along with Huck. Whereas, if Twain had simply begun by saying 'Racism is a blight on humanity', his racist readers might not have bothered to read any further.
Sorry, but I was reading Twain when others my age were still struggling with Dick and Jane, and Huck Finn has been one of my favorites. What I see is a white boy raised in a age where blacks were considered below whites coming to respect his friend and consider him an equal. He had to struggle to go appoligize, yes, but never regretted it and when it came down to him getting Jim out of slavery, having been taught that it was wrong, he was willing to risk his immortal soul. "All right, then, I'll go to hell!" And he tears up the letter telling the widow where Jim is. You should read some of Twain's scathing editorials of the period before calling him a racist. Especially the one he wrote when a black man was hanged by mistake for a crime he didn't commit. Twain was merciless in his denouncment of the ones responsible. :flare: