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I've been thinking about the latest nonsense about changing the wording in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
In our sanitized, lest- we- offend world the idea is to take the word nigger which was in common use in Mark Twain's time and change it to slave.
The words do not mean the same thing.
They may have been virtually interchangeable at one time, but they are not now nor have they ever been literally interchangeable. If Twain had meant slave I am confident that's the word he'd have chosen.
He didn't and it is not anyone's place to make it seem he did. It is not okay to change a word we don't like in a written work.
It dulls the point.
Rather than rail about it I decided to say it with pictures.
One the left we have a perfectly fine photo. To the right is the picture changed to sepia tone. It loses its flavour. It tells the same story, but in a bland and boring way. The photo has no point.
Below it is another view. It's closer up, head on, the colours stand out more. It is more interesting.
I took it through a window. It has a reflection.
Good literature is a reflection of its time. It should be head on and in full colour, not bland and monotone.
