| I was listening to a podcast a few days ago that was a lead-up to February and 'Black History Month'. One of the people interviewed (I didn't catch her name) was defending the decisions taken by libraries and school boards in various parts of the US to remove from shelves and curricula several works generally considered to be American 'classics'. Such as books by Mark Twain and Harper Lee. The books are, she said, clearly racist. In Twain's case, one of the books being removed is The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. If she has actually read the book, she failed to understand it. The story is clearly meant to be a satirical overview of life in America, particularly as related to racial matters. Twain writes in a 'common man' style, using the kind of language his characters would have used in real life. Current sensibilities might bristle at such language today, but Huck's friend 'Jim the Nigger' is exactly what he would have been called in those days and places. In antebellum times, the very notion that Jim, a slave, should be portrayed not only as a gentle and kindly man, but as a black man whose white friend treats him like a human instead of someone's property, was downright shocking when the book was published (1884 in the UK, 1885 in the US). Indeed, when Jim flees from slavery, he and Huck bond and they become fellow travellers on the Mississippi River. They have left their home town because Jim overheard his 'owner', Miss Watson, talking to someone about 'selling him down South for $800.' Ironically, while Jim and Huck are on the run, Miss Watson dies and they later learn she had granted Jim his freedom in her will. How anyone can see this book as anything other than anti-racist is beyond my mental capacity to understand.
Harper Lee's 1960 novel, To Kill A Mockingbird, also bothers the woman in the podcast. [A second book, Go Set a Watchman, was published in 2015, the year before Lee died. It is said by some reviewers to be the 'sequel' to Mockingbird even though it is also said to have been written first. In fact, Mockingbird grew out of many editing exercises with her literary agent - Lee had originally submitted Watchman to be the first of a trilogy (never completed) but the revised version was published as Mockingbird. She insisted in 2015 that Watchman must be published exactly as she wrote it during the 1950s.] In Mockingbird, the story teller is Jean Louise Finch, known by her nickname 'Scout'. She was six-years old when the story begins and plays out in a fictional Alabama town between 1933-1935. Scout's father is a widowed lawyer named Atticus Finch and the story involves the trial of a black man, Tom Robinson, who is accused of raping a young white woman. Atticus is appointed by the court to represent Robinson - not something that he found comfortable. But he understood his duty to his client and to the truth, and fought to prove the accusation against Tom was false. Atticus succeeds in proving Tom's innocence, but, this being 1930s Alabama, Tom is convicted anyway. Atticus remains confident he can overturn the verdict on appeal, but Tom escapes the jail and is shot and killed when he tries to flee. This is a story that clearly represents the horrrendous history of black people in America. It sees the issue from both sides, but it is clear that the author thought racism was an evil thing. So, when the woman I heard on the podcast said it was proper to remove this book from schools and libraries because the story 'makes people uncomfortable', I wanted to scream - THE WHOLE POINT OF THE STORY WAS TO MAKE PEOPLE UNCOMFORTABLE!. ***** I'm weary of listening to revisionist historians, 'woke' idiots who think nothing from the past should be seen for what it really was or from the present being seen for what it is, people who want to 'self-identify' as something other than what their birth made them - but I'll get off my high horse. For now. I'm actually giving consideration to self-identifying as an ashtray - at least some people would find me useful. © Copyright 2022 by AxisofLogic.com This material is available for republication as long as reprints include verbatim copy of the article in its entirety, respecting its integrity. Reprints must cite the author and Axis of Logic as the original source including a "live link" to the article. Thank you! |
