Quote:
Originally Posted by DuckieTigger
You are the one that vehemently tried to argue against my belief that altering a classic text is the same evil as banning an unaltered text. Both effectively take the original out of circulation. And you justified it, because the rightsholder has the right to do so? And yet, you personally object?
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Actually, yeah. I will do it again right now. Because you are conflating two very different things.
If a book is in copyright (as Roald Dahl's books are) then the copyright holder is within their rights to edit it to their heart's content. Do I think it sucks to monkey with already published works, especially classics such as the Dahl children's books? Yes I do. But are they within their rights to do so? Yes they are.
Should Tolkien have been prevented from altering The Hobbit in 1951 to bring it more in line with The Lord of the Rings?
Should And Then There Were None only be allowed to be published under its original title: Ten Little N--s?
Should Stephen King have not been allowed to update The Stand on its first paperback publication and then release a revised and expanded version twelve years later?
Should the Oompa-Loompas have remained African pygmies, shipped over when Wonka needed them?
While the book is in copyright, the rightsholders have the right to make whatever changes they see fit. The rightsholder would be the author, their heirs or whoever the author assigned the rights to. I don't have to like or agree with changes made to sell more copies. That doesn't enter in to it.
And once copyright expires, the original unedited version will fall in to the public domain and be available again.
Now book banning, that is a third party with absolutely no business stepping in between what the library thinks it should carry and what I should be allowed to borrow.
Book banning is a wholly different thing than some copyright holder making stupid decisions with work they likely didn't produce but were lucky enough to gain the rights to.