Quote:
Originally Posted by Thasaidon
I find such comments a little gratuitous and unnecessary. Thie book written in 1872 and so will obviously not conform to today's sensibilities and shiboleths.
Like it said in another posting talking about this area "The past is a different country". They do things differently there. Do you wish to be like the ugly American who went to a foreign country, only to complain about the lack of McDonalds?
Just as an afterthought if someone from the past was brought to the present they would probably be scandalised by and find very wrong accepted attitudes and opinions of OUR time and culture.
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Just "a little"? I'm shocked.
Seriously though, the nomination process had come up with a reference that suggested Verne was anti-Semitic, which - if you've been monitoring this forum you will have seen - evolved into a discussion about whether it was appropriate to nominate older texts that do not reflect our current cultural values. As such it seemed particularly relevant to at least mention that this book did not appear (to me) to contain anything more than one would expect for the period.
Further more, this being a book club, we often discuss books in more depth that merely whether we liked it or not. As such it should never be out of place to discuss the values represented in the book as seen from our current perspective. Such gems as
Anne of Green Gables and
Tarzan of the Apes have been treated to such analysis, and there seems no reason to treat this book any differently.