Welcome to Friday,
This week I was surprised to hear the British publisher of Roald Dahl’s books has made ‘hundreds’ of changes to the texts of such classic titles, as Matilda and The Witches.
“Hundreds of changes were made to the original text – and some passages not written by Dahl have been added. But the Roald Dahl Story Company said “it’s not unusual to review the language” during a new print run and any changes were “small and carefully considered”.” (emphasis mine, source.)
To change words and meanings with zero input from the author, after the manuscript has been published, is flat wrong. Editing an author’s work to be “more palatable” after the author’s death and after the books have been published and sold for decades is morally reprehensible.
The best from around the Internet this week:
Our first link is a follow-up piece on the Roald Dahl story. Authors are weighing in, furious to see work rewritten under the guise of being more ‘palatable’ for today’s audience. “The changes to Dahl’s books mark the latest skirmish in a debate over cultural sensitivity as campaigners seek to protect young people from cultural, ethnic and gender stereotypes in literature and other media.” This is beyond the point; an author can choose whether to make “cultural sensitive” changes, or not; to do so to the work decades after the fact and without the author’s input is to pass off someone else’s thoughts and words as Roald Dahl’s. It is quite literally, putting words into his mouth. The stories and phrasing of Roald Dahl – with their surprising themes and outrageous depictions – are part of Dahl’s appeal. They will not appeal to everyone, and it is no one’s job – or right – to try to ‘fix’ them to be more appealing to more people.
This deep dive into how Thomas Edison ended up contributing to standardizing the handwriting used by librarians across the U.S. is fascinating and sent me down a handwriting rabbit hole myself.
Jonathan Haidt responds to critiques of his working theory that the current mental health epidemic started around 2012 with the rise of social media and smartphone notifications. I do think smart phones have an impact on this mental health crisis, especially for adolescent girls, but I am hesitant to name social media as the sole cause. It’s an interesting, short piece, and Haidt is of course, refining and correcting this theory in real time. It is a conversation certainly worth paying attention to.
A British architect’s iteration of Pliny the Younger’s villa, where the lawyer was happiest doing his reading and writing. (h/t to Cal Newport.)
“The question for Austin is whether the city really wants to have neighborhoods that normal people can live in. Because we’re becoming a place that caters to a transient population and to extreme wealth—a theme park, if you will.” A disappointing and disgusting – though not surprising – story from the Lone Star State; Austin’s reputation as a party town for hard-partying self-imagined tycoons is proving a headache for the city’s residents, and causing many to leave the neighborhoods they’ve lived in for decades.
Currently reading: The Book of Five Rings by Miyamoto Musashi
Have a creative weekend.
Image: Pink Roses in a Vase. Redouté, Pierre Joseph. 1838.
