- The 66-year-old Forrest Gump star insisted, “We’re all grown ups here.”
Tom Hanks has vowed to boycott any book that is rewritten so as not to offend “modern sensibilities” and insists he will decide for himself what he is offended about.
The 66-year-old Forrest Gump star got caught up in the book censorship row during a taped interview on BBC Radio 4 on Tuesday.
Art correspondent Rebecca Jones asked the Toy Story actor for his thoughts on retroactive editing of dead authors like Roald Dahl and Agatha Christie.
Publishers have caused a stir among literary fans in recent months by hiring sensitive readers to make iconic works “less offensive” — including removing words like “fat,” “crazy,” and “old hag.”
Hanks gave his opinion and said, “Well, I think we’re all grown up here.” And we understand the time and place and when these things were written.
Tom Hanks has vowed to boycott any book that is rewritten so as not to offend “modern sensibilities” and insists he will decide for himself what to insult of him. Art correspondent Rebecca Jones had asked the Forrest Gump star his thoughts on the retrospective editing of dead authors like Roald Dahl (pictured) and Agatha Christie
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“And it’s not at all difficult to say: That’s not quite working at the moment, is it?”
“Let’s trust our own feelings here instead of someone deciding what offends us and what doesn’t.”
He added, “Let me decide what offends me and what doesn’t.” I would object to reading a book from any era that says “abridged for modern sensibilities”.
Hanks appeared on the show to introduce his upcoming novel, The Making of Another Major Motion Picture Masterpiece.
His first book, a collection of short stories entitled Uncommon Type, was published in 2017 and sold more than 234,000 copies in the UK, inspiring him to start writing his new 448-page novel a year later.
This comes after Sir Michael Morpurgo, 79, last month warned publishers against rewriting classic books to suit modern sensibilities.
The award-winning children’s author, whose works include War Horse, Private Peaceful and Friend or Foe, argued that publishers would “never stop” if they “started picking out language” now deemed controversial .
Sir Michael argued that it is “really important” for children to read books and understand the times in which they were written.
Noting that society has developed “different attitudes” over time to certain words or phrases that are now “to be avoided,” the author believes children should be aware that “life was different, people were different”.
He told Radio Times, “We learned a lot that was very good, we learned a lot that is nonsense.” Once you start nitpicking, you never stop.
“I think it’s really important for kids to read books and get a sense of when the books were written.” “You just can’t keep rewriting Dickens and Shakespeare to suit people.”
In February, it was revealed that Puffin had commissioned sensitive readers to rewrite portions of Dahl’s writing to ensure the books “still bring joy to all today.”
Hanks appeared on the BBC radio show to introduce his forthcoming book, The Making of Another Major Motion Picture Masterpiece. In March, it emerged that several passages in Agatha’s Poirot and Miss Marple had been revised or removed entirely from new editions of the books (Image: English). crime novelist Agatha Christie in 1949)
Significant changes were made to the descriptions of the characters’ physical appearance – for example, the reprints eliminated the word “fat,” which had been dropped from every book, and the Oompa Loompas from “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” were made to be gender-neutral .
Elsewhere in The Witches, “old witch” was changed to “old crow,” while “You must be crazy, woman” became “You must be crazy, woman.” And in Matilda, Miss Trunchbull no longer had a “great horse face.”
Whoopi Goldberg criticized the decision to remove “objectionable” content from Dahl’s books, as well as Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels.
Speaking on US talk show The View in February, the 67-year-old EGOT winner seemed particularly outraged by reports that the classic spy novels were being edited to remove racist content.
James Bond novels publisher Ian Fleming Publications made the announcement shortly after Penguin Random House announced it would be releasing edited versions of Roald Dahl’s novels.
“You guys have to stop this, okay?” Goldberg said. “Just add a disclaimer that says, ‘Listen, this book was written at that time’ or [publish] the original.’
Most of her co-hosts on the morning talk show agreed with her – with the notable exception of Sunny Hostin, 54, who spoke out about the changes in waking life.
But in the meantime both publishers have announced, after public outcry, that they will continue to publish the unedited original versions.
Then, in March, it emerged that several passages in Agatha’s Poirot and Miss Marple had been revised or removed entirely from new editions of the books.
Editor HarperCollins has removed text containing “insults or references to ethnicity” as well as descriptions of certain characters’ physiques, The Telegraph reported.
Ms. Christie’s works were the last to undergo a politically correct rewrite. Books by Ian Fleming and Enid Blyton were also issued for sensitivity reasons.
Reprints of Ms. Christie’s novels, which were reviewed by the newspaper, revealed that the editors had made “numerous changes” to their books.
The novels written between 1920 and 1976 lacked sections of “unsympathetic” dialogue, overt insults, and character descriptions.
For example, the word “Oriental” was removed from her 1937 crime novel Death on the Nile, about detective Hercule Poirot investigating a murder on a luxury cruise.
The editor changed the character dialogue from Mrs. Allerton, who complained about child molestation.
Sir Michael Morpurgo last month warned publishers against rewriting classic books to suit modern sensibilities
The original text said: “They come back and stare and stare and their eyes are just gross, their noses too and I don’t think I really like children.”
The rewritten version supposedly says, ‘They come back and stare and stare.’ And I don’t think I really like children.’
Similar changes were made in the 1964 novel A Caribbean Mystery, which tells the story of detective Miss Marple’s vacation at a resort hotel in the West Indies.
Removed phrases such as “so beautiful white teeth” and “beautiful teeth” used to describe a smiling hotel employee.
The book also no longer contains text describing a female figure with “a torso of black marble such as would have pleased a sculptor”.
In later works by Miss Marple, the text was changed from “his Indian temper” to “his temper” when describing an Indian judge character throwing a tantrum.