Cancel Culture: Should Pippi Longstocking’s Old Braids Be Cut? Biden wants to cancel the debts of millions of students – judges are skeptical

There are, said Astrid Lindgren in 1970, “a lot of idiotic things” that could be cut from her classic “Pippi Longstocking”. When the book appeared in 1945, it contained words like “negro” or “gypsy” that were still in use in Europe.

Lindgren emphasized that she never believed whites were superior to blacks. “Racist tendencies” were alien to her. “And Pippi didn’t have one either. But times have changed.”

However, it was not until 2009, after Astrid Lindgren’s death, that individual transcripts were approved by her descendants. Pippi’s father turns from the “Negro King” to the “South Sea King”. Gypsies are also absent. But soon after, new doubters came forward who were also troubled by the “South Sea King”.

Pippi’s father has colonial ambitions

In colonial fashion, Pippi’s father is about to travel to Oceania and become king of Taka-Tuka-Land. When Lindgren wrote that, the independence movements in Asia and Africa were already underway. So the Swedish author should have known that she was confirming a colonial way of thinking that had long been resisted.

When the debate about the sense and nonsense of sanitized children’s book classics first erupted around 2010, it affected Astrid Lindgren as well as Otfried Preussler (“The Little Witch”, “Räuber Hotzenplotz”) and Michael Ende (“Jim Button”). .

Preussler decided to make corrections himself. Even then, there was a lot of shaking of heads about the furor in which a politically correct ‘sensitivity police’ escalated and demanded text improvements everywhere.

Even the word “fat” should no longer be expected of the reader

But the rewrites were still harmless compared to the hundreds of surgeries Roald Dahl’s works, especially the classic children’s book “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” had to endure. Rabid Sensitivity Readers not only swapped words like “fat” or “idiot,” but added whole new ideas because Dahl’s own ideas might offend someone.

After even British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and writers like Salman Rushdie complained about the “absurd censorship”, publisher Puffin Books decided a few days ago to sell the original version and the cleaned up wake version side by side from now on. However, there are already fears that digital e-books could soon be “updated” automatically and without user consent.

In the case of Roald Dahl, economic interests prevail. Netflix acquired the rights to his works in 2021. And the streaming company fears cancellation culture could get stuck in Dahl’s books, especially in the US. It is better to erase everything that is false and scandalous as a precaution.

Children’s literature is not primarily an educational tool

But are we really educating our children to be potty-trained awake beings if we let them make works as awake as possible? No, we only bore them if we only use children’s books as an educational tool.

The pedagogical harms all good literature, including children’s literature, which always remains art if it is good. In it the children should not find a protected and ideal world.

When the evil aunt is run over by the giant peach

Reading books is a game that introduces children to all facets of reality, good and bad, funny and sad, even fantastic and anarchic. Kids can turn into animals, there are witches who blow cigars, evil aunts get run over by a giant peach in Dahl’s, and a boy gets “juiced”. Sensitive adults may find this macabre, but kids usually enjoy it.

This is what distinguishes great authors from great children’s literature. Although her books are mostly bought by adults, they are not written for them.

Roald Dahl has always said that he “doesn’t give a damn” what adults think of his stories. He only remembers to keep the kids entertained. The success proves him right to this day. (aargauerzeitung.ch)