Using the N-word

Recently on Facebook a group of my friends were debating the new edition of "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," which had been edited to change the n-word into "slave."

Overwhelmingly, we hated the idea. There were a lot of great points about it. The best point was that Twain's work gives us a window into a shameful period of American history, and we need to be able to confront that honestly.

I wrote: "You can definitely oversanitize history. The problem is that by sanitizing history, later generations don't even realize how offensive the words can be. They don't realize the history, meaning and pain behind words, symbols and actions. Twa...in's use of the n-word is an opportunity for a teaching moment with the kids, and it can be handled in a way that is not offensive or hurtful.
Editors: Put down that red pen and move away from the literature!"

But I have one additional point to make. When I read the full story about the new edition, the editor explained that he wanted to make the change because he had to deal with negative reactions from audiences when he read the book aloud.

I get it. I understand. I have to say I would have a great deal of trouble saying that word out loud to a group of people, even if it was in the context of one of the greatest works of American literature. It is a word that carries so much pain that I do not think anyone can give me sanction to say it out loud, even if Mark Twain were to rise from his grave and tell me so himself. (And he wouldn't have far to walk. He's buried in the next town over from me.)

Anyway, the debate is pointless. The sanitized edition is being published. It will be out next month. But it does not mean that this edition will replace, supercede or be superior to earlier editions. It is an option that is now available for audiences that had not been able to read this work before. It can go on library bookshelves and read in middle schools, where it had often been banned.

But it should be read with the understanding that the full, original version is out there and if someone wanted to have a complete experience and have a unsanitized version of this work, they should go out and find it. Perhaps it is not a book for middle schoolers (ironic because Tom Sawyer, Becky Thatcher and Huckleberry Finn were roughly middle school aged) but readers who are at least high school age should read the unchanged work.