Re: Speaking as a Bowdleriser (was Re: SA Theatre Production)...


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Posted by D on January 17, 2011 at 07:02:54 user dthewlis.

In Reply to: Re: Speaking as a Bowdleriser (was Re: SA Theatre Production)... posted by Mike Dennis on January 16, 2011 at 22:24:49:

I disagree. Even if the bowdlerized version of a work doesn't "become the standard" it is the one that perhaps many people are exposed to, and thre will be some effect. In the U.S. it at least used to be the case that the versions of Shakespeare's plays offered in school (before University level) were bowdlerized to remove "unwholesome" references. To this day some passages in Shakespeare "seem wrong" because they aren't what I remember from my junior high days (of course, it's the junior high version that was wrong).

But how much difference is there between bowdlerizing to save the ears of youth, or to try to make something more accessible or less offensive to current mores, and full-blown censorship? I think it is a matter of degree and not kind. I'd be honest with prospective readers and in the case of youth let their parents choose.


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