Sure, some fan edits can be creative, but altering Tolkien's meticulously crafted prose to replace a period-appropriate "ere" with a more ordinary "before"? That's not creativity, that's just bowdlerization.
Threw my head back and vomited
- Thread starter Ben Sisko
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Why? It's not misspelled, and not "wrong" in any way, so why change it?
Interestingly, the second German translation of The Lord of the Rings that debuted around the time of the Jackson movies coming to theaters deliberately modernized and simplified the prose considerably over the older German translation by Margaret Carroux that Tolkien himself gave his input to. It's both reviled and praised for doing so - the Carroux translation was apparently too stereotypically and sugary fairytale-like to capture the refinement of Tolkien's original writing such as regional/dialect differences, yet the newer one overshot the mark into the other direction, feeling strangely cold and anachronistic (e.g. Sam calling Frodo "boss" (Chef) instead of "master" (Herr) - it was essentially using 1990s German instead of 1940s English as a reference frame). I think later a third translation was released that tried to combine the virtues of the two earlier attempts.
(I only witnessed this from the sidelines, and am going by the best of my memory ... I stopped reading German translations of English works long ago, and before I read LotR. I do prefer German over English translations of for example Swedish works, though, since I can't read Swedish and German is generally held to be closer in character to that language.)
(I only witnessed this from the sidelines, and am going by the best of my memory ... I stopped reading German translations of English works long ago, and before I read LotR. I do prefer German over English translations of for example Swedish works, though, since I can't read Swedish and German is generally held to be closer in character to that language.)
I do agree, as it shows a different attitude to the text - an attitude I think very comparable to the modernizing of other older literature - which I would criticise as limiting the getting of one form of full and proper experience out of a text. However modernisation or contemporisation of a text does helps comprehension sometimes despite de-mystifying and de-literarising the text. I think the changing of 'ere' and possibly other words will reflect that latter choice possibly for Ben Sisko of comprehensibility and offsetting some kind of wall forming when reading. I would never do it with Tolkien, but I can condone it, because I have to do this myself for other texts.
In this case, I find uniform changing of the word wrong. I couldn't condone it, since 'before' lacks the nuances of 'ere' that Tolkien might have been using in each individual circumstance? * And yes, it robs Tolkien of his poetry, his period and my own personal attraction to first Middle English and thence to Old English. But I know for many that loving world-building is not only annoying, but incomprehensible.
Anyway, compare the following:
and
I prefer the former, it is authentic c.1400 language, it even contains its thorns [þ=th]; the latter is what I would give to a person who doesn't care for middle english prose or its wonderful period-ness.
----
* From the OED:
A. adv.1
1.
a. in Old English (late WS.): Early, at an early hour.
b. since 15th c. only Sc. (forms air, ear): Early, soon: opposed to late.
†2. Sooner, at an earlier time. Obs.
†3. Sooner, rather, in preference. Obs.
†4.
a. Before, formerly, at a former time, on a former occasion; often preceded by ever, never. Also in of ere (see of prep. Phrases 1b). Also: A little while ago, just now.
b. First; before something else, or before anything else is done.
B. prep.
1.
a. Before (in time). Also in comb.† ere-yesterday n. Obs. the day before yesterday.
[and etc, for those who can access, see here]
If someone buys an ebook and wants to modify it for their own entertainment, what's the big deal? So long as they're not distributing it, I really don't see the problem.
Is the Thought Police really going to tell people what they can and can't do with a book they buy?
Is the Thought Police really going to tell people what they can and can't do with a book they buy?
Not to mention his lack of capital letters.
Exactly! The only losses are common experience and the idea of the 'object integrity'. The author is dead.
The difference is that I'm not reediting, say, "The Enemy Within" and then acting like it's still Richard Matheson's original work. And I'm old-school enough not to regard finished books and movies as "open-source"
Sure, if the vandalized version stays on one person's Kindle, there's no lasting harm. My concern is that these bowlderized versions will get shared and passed around and suddenly there's all these "Greg Cox" novels floating around that aren't actually what I wrote.
And you just know that there are going to be people offering cleaned-up, "family-friendly" versions of popular books and movies that are still going to bear the original creators' names. And, worse yet, some people are not even going to realize that they're not reading the "real" version.
Heck, remember that brouhaha earlier this year when some racist HUNGER GAMES fans somehow overlooked the fact that one of their favorite characters was black (until the movie forced them to confront this fact). You really think they wouldn't go back and whitewash the book if they could?
I can't wait for the day some angry fan wonders why I turned Sisko white!
(Don't laugh. I can see it happening. I've actually met people who were upset that a black guy was in charge of DS9 and complained it was "political correctness" run amok.)
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^ I get your concern, but to me that's just one of the risks you take when you allow people freedom of expression. I'd rather err on the side of doing so because the alternative is a slippery slope and prone to abuse just as much.
But again, for the sharing part we already have an answer - it's plain old piracy. Granted we're not being very effective at preventing it (and for the record, you can have a very adult debate on the pro and contra of copyright as a whole, it's not set in stone - but note that open source itself relies on the legal framework of copyright to be present for its licenses to work, so I'm certainly not a contra-copyright guy here), but that's a separate issue: The point is that it's already well-established as not-acceptable.
One more note on the open source thing, though: I mostly included that to illustrate the context of my own thoughts on the matter, not because it applies to literary works directly. And do note that open source licensing is a conscious choice of behalf of the authors, i.e. it's their intent to release their work under these terms because they believe it will be best for the work and themselves. Similar licenses for artistic works rather than software source code do exist and are quite popular, however.
Now, as someone who does chose to release his work under open source-style licenses regularly (go fork the TrekBBS ranking table!), I may also be a little more used to the potential for loss of control this involves.
But again, for the sharing part we already have an answer - it's plain old piracy. Granted we're not being very effective at preventing it (and for the record, you can have a very adult debate on the pro and contra of copyright as a whole, it's not set in stone - but note that open source itself relies on the legal framework of copyright to be present for its licenses to work, so I'm certainly not a contra-copyright guy here), but that's a separate issue: The point is that it's already well-established as not-acceptable.
One more note on the open source thing, though: I mostly included that to illustrate the context of my own thoughts on the matter, not because it applies to literary works directly. And do note that open source licensing is a conscious choice of behalf of the authors, i.e. it's their intent to release their work under these terms because they believe it will be best for the work and themselves. Similar licenses for artistic works rather than software source code do exist and are quite popular, however.
Now, as someone who does chose to release his work under open source-style licenses regularly (go fork the TrekBBS ranking table!), I may also be a little more used to the potential for loss of control this involves.
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These are all good points too, especially from an authorial point-of-view. I don't know what happens to the proliferation of fan edits, if there were ever to be such a thing. In the UK the reproduction of more than 5% of a copywritten book (or a chapter or article in a periodical) is illegal, and can't be reproduced/passed around. Here you, or your publisher's legal arm, would have protection against any non-official use of your work in the manner you said above.
Greg, bringing up the Hunger Games case is really interesting - since it raises the issue of how people interpret a text as "written" and how they imagine it in their head. Everyone has a personal imagination, and can have images or other sensory constructions radically different from the text as written, yet it is authentic to them. Ben Sisko's edits are an actual physical (lol, digital) manifestation of that everyday psychological event.
Oh, come on, not the "Thought Police" meme. Part of freedom of expression is the freedom to express distaste or disagreement toward other people's choices of expression. Nobody wants to force him not to do what he does, but we're hoping that we can persuade him to reconsider it -- or at least let him know how strongly we disagree with his choices. Disagreement is not a threat or a violation of one's rights.
Agreed. I think we can (and did) have debate on these things without jumping to conclusions about each side wanting anything at the expense of the other side (if there even are "sides" so far).
Balancing the rights of authors vs. the rights of the public is an extremely complex issue, one in almost constant flux for centuries if not longer, and one that's really easy to feel passionate about one way or the other, for both financial and very human reasons. It's best debated with a good measure of empathy and a strong preference against hyperbole.
Balancing the rights of authors vs. the rights of the public is an extremely complex issue, one in almost constant flux for centuries if not longer, and one that's really easy to feel passionate about one way or the other, for both financial and very human reasons. It's best debated with a good measure of empathy and a strong preference against hyperbole.
The freedom to express distaste or disagreement toward other people's choices? That's pretty much what I was doing with that comment. It's absurd to tell people what they should and shouldn't do if it's not hurting anyone.
Really, if I buy a book it's mine. I can read it, I can use it as a paperweight, I can use it as firewood kindling, I can use it as toliet paper. Sure the creator is going to find a number of these distasteful, certainly not for it's intended purpose, but so what? They get their cut of the royalties, regardless.
It doesn't become wrong until I start distrubuting "Heavy Book Paperweights" or "Scratchy Page TP" to others with said work. The same concept applies to people changing their books wording or context if they want to for whatever reason. Personally I think that's more effort than it's worth, but if others enjoy it, why not?
A copy of the book - ink, paper and glue - the author wrote is yours. A digital file of a book the author wrote, though...is it really yours? Do you own the book, or just the hardware it is displayed on? Is it acceptable to edit a file of a book that the author had intended to be a finished piece?
I admit to being unapologetically old-school about this. I've spent too much time staring at a blinking cursor, trying to come up with the right word or phrase, not to cringe at the idea of readers second-guessing me when it comes to my own books. The way I see it, Dave Mack or Tolkien or whomever chose the words they used for a reason, possibly after careful thought and consideration, and it's not my job as a reader to rewrite their books for them.
Don't get me wrong. I'm all for remakes and revisionist retellings and fun literary mash-ups, as long the original texts remain the original texts. If Isabel Allende wants to write her own version of Zorro, drawing on the earlier versions, more power to her, but when I reprinted Johnston McCulley's original novel a few years back, I didn't go back and revise the prose to make it read more like a modern novel. I published the same book that was published way back when. And I would be pissed if I picked up a copy of "The Mark of Zorro" by McCully and discovered that I was actually reading some abridged, sanitised, or modernized version--unless it was clearly labeled as such.
Don't get me wrong. I'm all for remakes and revisionist retellings and fun literary mash-ups, as long the original texts remain the original texts. If Isabel Allende wants to write her own version of Zorro, drawing on the earlier versions, more power to her, but when I reprinted Johnston McCulley's original novel a few years back, I didn't go back and revise the prose to make it read more like a modern novel. I published the same book that was published way back when. And I would be pissed if I picked up a copy of "The Mark of Zorro" by McCully and discovered that I was actually reading some abridged, sanitised, or modernized version--unless it was clearly labeled as such.
But Greg didn't actually suggest anywhere that action should be taken against you or me. He just shared his worries about the possible side-effects. You're putting words in his mouth and so pretty much running afoul of your own accusation, IMHO.
So would I, and really nobody's been indicating that they would be OK with tales of White Sisko being released under the name Greg Cox.
What I'm saying is: You're asking me to be realistic/pragmatic and acknowledge that this could conceivably happen. OK, I do. Now I'm asking you, what realistic/pragmatic action could be taken against it that doesn't come with its own, equally scary abuse potential of stifling freedom of expression and creative freedom? When I try I come up empty.
Indeed, all I originally wrote was that the idea of people tinkering with the original text kind of creeped me out--and I was curious to see if anybody else felt that way.
That seems a long way from calling in the "Thought Police."
And to answer Sho's question, I'm not even thinking of legal sanctions or big institutional changes right now. I'm just thinking that "Casablanca" is "Casablanca" and, personally, I'm not comfortable with customizing it to suit my own tastes.
And my own instinct is to let an author pick his own words, if only as a matter of courtesy!
In theory, "Of course." (But not really, until DRM really goes away - right now you're actually often dealing with buying a license, not a book.) If you're trying to ground your argument in physics (and really, you'll quickly find that way lies madness in dealing with this topic*), the file on my computer is not the same file authored by the writer. Ignoring the editing/mastering process for simplicity's sake, my storage device is not his storage device, a copy did take place. They're not the same atoms. Digital doesn't mean magic, it's still matter. Even the internet is very physical, as we learn again and again when a tyrannical government decides and manages to deprive its citizens of it by virtue of controlling key infrastructure.
* = However, many laws actually try to. Turns out that just running a program usually involves multiplying it by creating a copy in system memory, from the original copy on your permanent storage. The same goes for installing from CD to hard drive. All these actions invoke copyright as understood in the realm of analog media, and depending on the country you live in you're going to find various solutions to the conundrum, from defining special classes of ephemeral copies to ... it's a deep well. As you can see I tend to fall back to my experiences in the software world in these things.
No, you're not just disagreeing with my position, you're misrepresenting it. Falsely characterizing someone else's point of view is not a legitimate way to express disagreement of it. Calling someone "Thought Police" is accusing them of trying to forcibly prohibit someone else from thinking something. That is not what anyone here is doing. We're simply saying that we don't like the fact that he does it. We're hoping to convince him to change his mind, yes, but not to coerce him, so it's invalid to call it "policing" of any kind. It's just debate.
Having been edited by Greg, I can attest to this.
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My last question was really intended to be the crux of issue, to me. If an author creates a work, whatever the medium, and intends it to be finished, is it acceptable for an end-user to edit it? Scribbling in a hardcopy is one thing, but a digital file can escape more easily. Editing the Kindle text is like going into the author's word processor and changing the text.
Look at it this way - whoever Klagh is, the author intended for the character to always throw his head back and laugh. There's no call for editing it. It's not wrong, it's a deliberate choice. It might be irritating to the reader, but perhaps that was intended by the author? Maybe Klagh is an irritating character on purpose!
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