As the debate about updating (aka bowdlerising) Roald Dahl’s children’s books had bounced around, I came across this letter in one of the newspapers:
“I read an unedited edition of Robinson Crusoe as a child, at my grandma’s house. It included a gruesome account of the launching of canoes over the trussed, living bodies of prisoners. An asterisk directed that “when reading aloud to children, this passage should be omitted”. Of course I then read it with very close attention.
Valerie Smith
Harrogate, North Yorkshire”
There’s nothing quite like forbidding something to make it seem attractive.
And here’s David Mitchell ranting about rewriting, re-editing, republishing (as as way of making more money for publishers, especially of dead authors) and about spin-offs from successful TV series - themselves usually adaptations of books.
His particular gripe seems to be about a series called “Endeavour”, which apparently gave the background story to “Inspector Morse”. He prefers to have the Morse he knew from the original series as an established character, without needing to know how he was formed, as it were. Fair enough.
I tend to agree with his gripe about re-makes of old and successful films and TV series. I feel much the same about English language versions of series I have watched in a foreign language, or American versions of English series. Having said that, I confess to thoroughly enjoying the remake of “West Side Story”.
But I do wonder, along with David Mitchell, if we have run out of new stories. Although there seem to be plenty of stories about vampires and zombies around. Not my thing at all. So it goes.
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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