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>So have you guys heard about the new “N-Word Free Version” of Huckleberry Finn? Apparently Twain Scholar Alan Gribben (editor of the volume) got sick and tired of changing the word “nigger” to “slave” when he read the book aloud to his students, so he just went through with a red pen and adjusted it in the text. NewSouth thought this was a great idea and so the edition was born. Having already made a media splash as you can imagine (Publisher’s Weekly, CNN, Editor’s Weekly, and The New York Times being among  more reputable sources), the book is currently available for kindle via amazon and is set to be on regular shelves February 1st.

What do I have to say about this?

Shit, Piss, Fuck, Cunt, Cock-sucker, Mother-fucker and Tits.

There, are we better now? Seriously, folks? We’re back to censoring literature? Never mind that the so-called “N Word” has a huge impact on the way audiences (of the time or modern) read the book, never mind that it opens a door to critical theory otherwise inaccessible to us, never mind that the average rapper can use the word about fifteen times a second and nobody seems to care. Nope. This is clearly a word too dirty, too scandalous, too dark (forgive the pun) to be used in our college classrooms.

Maybe it all hits a little close to home because efforts to censor my man Will have been attempted since he wrote and performed his plays back in Elizabethan England. If we can learn anything from history about literature it is that censorship simply doesn’t work. All it does is create a stir and cause quizzical students to wonder what exactly it is that they are missing and look up the real version of the book anyway. If an author, especially an author as celebrated as Twain, meant to use another word, he would have. It wasn’t like he didn’t have a grip on the English language. It wasn’t like he didn’t have Gribben’s alternative (the word “slave”) at his disposal. If he had meant the book to be read a different way, he would have written it differently. And we, as readers, need to respect that.

Gribben’s argument is that “nigger” was an acceptable slang word of Twain’s time whereas it is a shock to enlightened twenty-first century readers. It is needlessly vulgar and offensive to a modern audience and serves to turn readers away from the book rather than arousing critical interest. But isn’t any work of art a statement of the time in which it was written? Calling Twain a racist is like calling Austen an anti-feminist. How can these writers ascribe to beliefs that weren’t birthed until after their respective deaths? Would you re-write Mansfield Park to empower its women simply because the way they are treated by the men is shocking to a modern audience? Nobody would even think of it. Proverbial individual would be tarred, feathered, shot then stoned by the collective members of JASNA before he could say “Fanny Price”. So why, if we treat our literature as history, do contemporary editors feel the need to re-write it?

Failure to impress upon a class the importance of “The N Word” in reading Huckleberry Finn is a matter of bad teaching, not a matter of a book that needs to be changed. Just because it doesn’t fit into your neat little lesson plan does not give you license to change the literature. I respect your scholarship, Dr. Gribben, but how would you have ever written critical inquiries into Twain’s work if some editor had gone messing about with it before you even got your hands on it? Your book offends me, good sir, to the point where I feel the need to fling expletives in your face until they become unimpassioned words because, really, those words are only given power by those who chose to do so. By taking the words away, you are merely lending them more credence as something to be offended by.

Fuck this shit.

>Since I’m still a little brain melty from finals, for this entry I took a cue from my favorite fantasy writer (oh please, don’t give me that look, if it’s not apparent at this juncture that I’m a geek, you’ve really got to get your geekdar looked at).  On his twitter feed this past weekend was posted the following prompt:

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>One of the many things about myself which sometimes skirts the line of pertinence to my work as a scholar is my sense of humor. I think it is of utter importance to have a good sense of humor, and moreover for an academic to be able to laugh at herself and her work. If she cannot do this, how can she have any degree of fun with it?

That being said, I have a horribly, wonderfully wicked and hideously dirty sense of humor. It is difficult to have studied Shakespeare for so long and not. I repeatedly say to my students “you haven’t studied Shakespeare until you’ve studied it with a dirty old man”. I’ve been fortunate enough to have had several dirty old men in my life who also happened to be brilliant scholars, actors and mentors. As a result, my mind is a twisted place more often in the gutter than anywhere else. I try to take an Oscar Wilde approach to this (“We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars” (Lady Windermere’s Fan, Lord Darlington, Act III) ) and also attempt (sometimes in vain) to keep this aspect of myself out of the classroom. It is hardly appropriate in polite company, and certainly can get a girl in trouble.

That being said, what can I do with myself when presented with readings from John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester? Really, there is nothing subversive or discrete about the blatant sexuality and bawdy humor of this man’s writing and thereby I chose to wallow in it rather than turn a blind eye. You have been warned, this post will contain suitably lewd language and humor (sorry, mom).

For those not in the historical know, the Earl of Rochester (portrayed by Johnny Depp in the 2004 movie the Libertine was perhaps the most fleshly and venereal gentleman in English history. Born April 1 1647, he died at the age of thirty-three due to any number of venereal diseases (gonorrhea and syphilis being the most popular theorized causes of his demise). While alive, he wrote and was actually fairly handy with verse. One of his largest mistakes is a poem lacking a title but often referred to as “Satyr” or “A Satyr on Charles II” which proclaimed that King Charles II was as impotent a King as he was a sexual partner. The poem was accidentally delivered to the King himself, causing the Earl to flee court and be unable to return.

But what really caught my eye in Rochester’s readings was a little ditty entitled “Signor Dildo”. Written in late 1673, the poem enumerates all the wonderful qualities of “A Noble Italian call’d Signior Dildo” (4).

You, like me, may be aghast that the word “dildo” was in use in 1673. A little internet digging reveals that the first dildo actually dates from much earlier. Uncovered in a German Cave in 2005, archeologists seem to have found a stone-age dildo which is about 28,000 years old. According to this article, the scholars seem hesitant to actually label the smoothly polished stone as an Ice Age sex toy, though those of a more liberal persuasion take my attitude of “clearly, it’s a large penis”. …interestingly enough, it was also used to knap flints. Talk about a multi-tool.

But that does not explain where the word came from. A jaunt into the OED actually defines “dildo” as “A word of obscure origin, used in the refrains of ballads” and in much smaller type underneath says “…Also, a name of the penis or phallus, or a figure thereof; spec. an artificial penis used for female gratification” (first used by Thomas Nashe circa 1593 in his poem “The Choise of Vanentines or the Merie Ballad of Nash his Dildo” see lines 261 and 237) It seems to me like ye olde sweater-vest-wearing, glasses-polishing, library-card-toting scholars may have a little shame about this word. The fact that “obscure origin” comes in the definition of the word before “penis” seems strange to me. Like the wordies are trying to hide the facts. Like they are saying to us “oh, well, if you must know…” I mean clearly if I am looking the word “dildo” up in the OED I have some inkling of scholarly persuasion and interest in the topic, what is there to hide?

In case you haven’t clicked on the above link and actually read Rochester’s poem, I would highly recommend it just for kicks and grins. I have never seriously considered how many words rhyme with “dildo” and I’m certain our beloved Earl didn’t even cover all of them. The poem, written in rhyming couplets (and actually in slightly strained heroic couplets at that unless my scansion is off), is actually and honestly a delightful little piece of debauchery. At some point I will have to analyze it further, but right now I am content to bask in the glow of its divine dirtiness. My favorite bit, lines 74-78, is just so wonderfully packed with imagery that it simply must be shared, “This Signior is sound, safe, ready, and Dumb,/As ever was Candle, Carret, or Thumb:/Then away with these nasty devices, and Show/How you rate the just merits of Signior Dildo.” Candle? Carrot? Really? I don’t know whether to be shocked, appalled or amused. I think I’m a little of all of the above.

…incidentally same jaunt into the OED revealed two items which my inner middle schooler is still giggling about. Apparently there exists a “dildo-glass” which is a “cylindrical glass test tube”. There also exists a “dildo-tree, dildo-bush, dildo pear tree” which is “a tree or shrub of the genus Ceresus family Cactaceae”. Apologies, but google searches to find a picture of the illusive dildo tree only yield smut. I do not recommend entering those search terms into any search engine. Searching by scientific name proved equally fruitless as the species of cactus was not given (only genus and family, that amounts to a lot of cacti). Though personally, the thought of any cactus being called a “dildo tree” just gives me the shudders.

If you are still reading and I have not offended your finer sensibilities, I wish you a good day filled with raunchy poetry and protection from dildo trees and syphilis.

>February 15, 2010

While my focus has shifted to the scholarly of late, I also (on occasion) do things unrelated to books or dead poets. This past weekend, I was treated to dinner at Medieval Times and my sensibilities as an actor, performer and scholar of things related to Knights and Kings were suitably offended.

Don’t get me wrong, I thoroughly enjoyed watching the pretty horses, the pretty knights on the pretty horses, the pretty weapons that the knights wielded while riding the pretty horses…. What I did not enjoy was the caliber of performer able to secure a job at this establishment.

Some of the knights were amazing. Some of these fights were truly slamming, the pace was good and I actually bought that the combatants had the intention of hurting each other. However some fights were just painful to watch. They were all well choreographed, but said less-than-stellar fights had cues you could drive a truck through. As a trained stage combatant and member of the SAFD, I understand the need for safe fighting. Hell, I wouldn’t want someone swinging a Morningstar at my head unless I was absolutely certain he knew what he was doing. It was obvious, to me at least, that these performers (I hesitate to say ‘actors’) simply did not have the fight training to be fighting the way they were.

In addition to less-than-stellar fights, the performance itself was spotty at best. I definitely did not go expecting highly trained proficient actors en par with Ian McKellon, but I did expect to at least understand what the people were saying. Due to some serious annunciation problems, I only really got about two words which came out of the Princess’ mouth. Granted, she was wearing a headset mic and speaking on one of those is a skill in itself, but when I think about all the talented actors in the New York area who could be paid to play her part, I wonder at the casting decisions this organization makes. The guy who played the Prince was pretty to look at and could certainly ride a horse, but that was about it. I think the gamer term for this guy is “meat shield”. It’s no small wonder he was captured and held hostage for so long, his idea of emotion pretty much amounted to “No. Stop. Please. Don’t.” The show went more smoothly and was more entertaining when he was where he belonged: offstage.

That being said, I did have fun. Yes, you have to eat with your hands. Yes, the evil knight kicks hardcore booty. Yes, our serving wench was seriously awesome. And yes, they serve daiquiris the size of your head. I am not joking. Perhaps the best part of the experience was being encouraged to cheer for the knight whose section you were randomly assigned to sit in. At first, the audience was shy about this but as the night progressed the cheering became louder and louder. I believe that I have already expressed my heartfelt love for interactive theatre, and this certainly fell into that category. It was utterly exhilarating to be sitting amongst a group of people who fed off each others’ energies and poured it out to the performers. I can only imagine what it must have been like to be one of those performers. Our knight certainly seemed to enjoy the support. A true showman, he worked the crowd every chance he got and we loved him for it. I mean really, how can you not love a guy in tights who encourages you to do the wave as he rides by on his horse?

Overall I would recommend the experience if you can get a good deal on the tickets. Do not pay sixty bucks to go see this, but do get a group of friends together and pay thirty bucks to go. It is well worth the (discounted) cost.

>William Faulkner writes THE LONGEST sentences the world has ever seen.

Check out this gem:

“There was a wistaria vine blooming for the second time that summer on a wooden trellis before one window, into which sparrows came now and then in random gusts, making a dry vivid dusty sound before going away: and opposite Quentin, Miss Coldfield in the eternal black which she had worn for forty-three years now, whether for sister, father, or nothusband none knew, sitting so bolt upright in the straight hard chair that was so tall for her that her legs hung straight and rigid as if she had iron shinbones and ankles, clear of the floor with that air of impotent and static rage like chidren’s feet, and talking in that grim haggard amazed voice until at last listening would renege and hearing-sense self-confound and the long-dead object of her impotent yet indomitable frustration would appear, as though by outraged recapitulation evoked, quiet inattentive and harmless, out of the binding and dreamy and victorious dust.”

That would be a 157 word sentence, folks. On the first page of the novel. This next sentence was cited (for a time) to be the longest sentence in English literature (though further researching indicates that mister James Joyce surpassed it with a 4,391 word sentence in Ulysses… as though you needed another reason not to read that book):

“They both bore it as though in deliberate flagellant exaltation of physical misery transmogrified into the spirits’ travail of the two young mend during that time fifty years ago, or forty-eight rather, then forty-seven and then forty-six, since it was ’64 and then ’65 and the starved and ragged remnant of an army having retreated across Alabama and Georgia and into Carolina swept onward not by a victorious army behind it but rather by a mounting tide of the names of lost battles from either side — Chickamauga and Franklin, Vicksburg and Corinth and Atlanta — battles lost not alone because of superior numbers and failing ammunition and stores, but because of generals who should not have been generals, who were generals no through training in contemporary methods or aptitude for learning them, but by the divine right to say ‘Go there’ conferred upon them by an absolute caste system; or because the generals of it never lived long enough to learn how to fight masse cautious accretionary battles, since they were already as obsolete as Richard or Roland or du Guesclin, who wore plumes and cloaks lined with scarlet at twenty-eight and thirty and thirty-two and captured warships with cavalry charges but no grain nor meat nor bullets, who would whip three seperate armies in as many days and then tear down their own fences to cook meat robbed from their own smokehouses, who on one night and with a handful of men would gallantly set fire to and destroy a million dollar garrison of enemy supplies and on the next night be discovered by a neighbor in bed with his wife and be shot to death; –two, four, now two again, according to Quentin and Shreve, the two the four the two still talking — the one who did not yet know what he was going to do, the other who knew what he would have to do yet could not reconcile himself – Henry citing himself authority for incest, talking about his Duek John of Lorraine as if he hoped possibly to evoke that condemned and excommunicated shade to tell him in person that it was all right, as people both before and since have tried to evoke God or devil to justify them in what their glands insisted upon; –the two the four thw two facing one another in the tomblike room: Shreve, the Canadian, the child of blizzards and of cold in a bathrobe with an overcoat above it, the collar turned up about his ears; Quentin, the Southerner, the morose and delicate offspring of rain and steamy heat in the thin suitable clothing which he had brought from Mississippi, his overcoat (as thing and vain for what it was as the suit) lying on the floor where he had not even bothered to raise it:
(– the winter of ’64 now, the army retreated across Alabama, into Georgia; now Carolina was just at their backs and Bon, the officer, thinking ‘We will either be caught and annihilated or Old Joe will extricate us and we will make contact with Lee in front of Richmond and then we will at least have the privilege of surrender’: and then one day all of a sudden he thought of it, remembered, how that Jefferson regiment of which his father was not colonel was in Longstreet’s corps, and maybe from that moment the whole purpose of the retreat seemed to him to be that of bringing him within reach of his father, to give his father one more chance…”

593 words before you hit an end stop (though the Guiness Book of World Records has this sentence listed as being 1,287 words, there must have been some revision in an edition before the one I’m consulting- MLA Corrected text hardcover edition). This sentence is on pg. 361 of that book, for any who are inclined to take a gander.

As you can imagine, reading this is… tedious. The length of the sentences make the prose breathless, rambling, not unlike the dialect which Faulkner so laudably imitates. Yes, I can see myself in the old South listening to a lady on a porch as we are surrounded by wisteria. My attention wanders, darts about, and when I return to her she is still speaking exactly as she had been in a measured pace. I scarcely think she has found a spot to breathe.

So for flavor, right on good sir William, bravo. For readability, good god someone come rescue me from this book.

More to come… I’m only about halfway through it….