Learned a new word today

[Juan Marrero]

(06-26-2015 01:50 PM)L Verge Wrote:  Your comment about GWTW even being considered a holy book is something I have never heard of or thought of before! I must be naive, but frankly such a thought is ludicrous to me. I know you are saying it with tongue in cheek, but could others really think of it along those lines? I know many people who have the Moonlight and Magnolias nostalgia regarding the Lost Cause, but not to the point where they would consider GWTW sacred.

Now I'm starting to worry about other classics done by Southern-inspired writers...

My explicit point was that it is not a sacred test, obviously, and that moreover even sacred writings have within them statements that make one wish that the original writers, however divinely inspired, had used other terminology.

GWTW is a very well-plotted, clearly written romance that owes much to Thackery's "Vanity Fair." The book is at most casually about race and slavery. It is intrinsically about survival and loving at cross-purposes.

My point is that if there are incidental offensive adjectives (such as the gorilla-like reference) that could be deleted from GWTW without hurting the book and making it much less a potential target. A prudential decision to lightly edit, while we have a First Amendment, could only and should only be made by those who own the copyright.

Reminds me of Lincoln's dictum on litigation, something about giving in on the small things in order to hold on to the essential. That may or may not apply to literature, but just an inchoate, off-the-cuff thought on the subject of whether GWTW is safe from political correctness. To try to avoid a flag-like controversy, what may be done to insulate GWTW from PC if anything?

I enjoyed the book and movie very much despite Scarlett O'Hara expressing reluctance to dance with Abe Lincoln himself.