Apparently, the Dahl estate was actually quite savvy. After having all the panicked Dahl lovers making a run on his books over the last week and sending the price of them up much to the delight of Amazon sellers, they just announced the Classic series of Dahl books will also be released, so they can make even more money. And so, yes, at the end of the day, this was actually capitalism at work. No publicity is bad publicity as they say. The idea that they didn't have this preplanned is also laughable.
On Friday 2/24/23 the Atlanta Journal reported: "Judge in case indicates forewoman followed rules."
QUOTE:
McBurney weighs in
Findling’s and Little’s takes on the special grand jury process were quite different than that of Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney, who oversaw the grand jury.
In a Wednesday interview, McBurney said he met with the special grand jurors at the end of their service to explain what they may legally discuss with anyone, not just the news media.
”They cannot discuss their deliberations,” he said. “So the question becomes what deliberations are, and I explained that would be the discussions they had amongst themselves when it was just the grand jurors in the room … when they were discussing what do we do with what we’ve learned,” said McBurney.
But if an assistant DA or a witness is in the grand jury room, they can talk about what happened then, the judge said.
”That’s not deliberations,” he said. “That’s presentation. And they’re not prohibited from talking about that, nor are they prohibited from talking about the fruit of their deliberations, which would be the final report.”
In speaking to The AJC on Wednesday, McBurney noted it is OK for judges to discuss legal procedure.
In a Feb. 13 order, McBurney concluded that “by all appearances, the special purpose grand jury did its work by the book.”
"There’s no evidence that the changes were necessary to preserve Dahl’s commercial viability."
And yet, if they HADN'T made the changes, would you be talking about Dahl's work? By simply changing a few sentences, the publisher got a ton of free publicity.
Are we seriously going to remove the word “fat” to avoid triggering trauma in children? Maybe they will put down Call of Duty or searching up porn long enough to read either the original or new version?
A war, mass shootings almost daily, rapidly increasing natural disasters, hunger and homelessness just to start a list. But let’s not traumatize anyone by using trigger words.
How about everyone put down their phones and go for a run??
Trump is wrong as usual. Most of this should not be political at all. It’s a free country. People have a right to present themselves as anything they like, including members of the opposite sex. Other people have a right to believe, disbelieve, approve of, disapprove of, praise, ignore, or think they are nuts for any of the things people present themselves as. Adults have a right to do as they will with their own bodies, including surgeries and medications to make them more nearly resemble a person of the opposite sex. It is none of the public’s business. Questions such as who participates in what women’s sporting events and who uses what public bathrooms are better decided case by case by the people putting on the events and owning the bathrooms than by winner take all political dictates. The exception is for minors. The surgeries and medications should be legally restricted by age, just as other activities, including things so simple as buying a case of beer, smoking cigarettes, or driving a car, are restricted to people old enough to make adult level judgments about them. The question of how old is old enough would be difficult and a decision somewhat arbitrary just as in other things.
In the movie "The Magic Christian" the richest man in the world buys the Mona Lisa and cuts out the nose to keep. (A jolly mad romp that also features Ringo Starr, Christopher Lee as the Count, a soundtrack by Badfinger, and the late Raquel Welch as "The Mistress of the Whip." You have had a hard week and really deserve to order out, chill some beer, and watch this one.
And now the Trumplicants will believe that if no evidence is found to "corroborate" (whatever that means) Hunter Biden's laptop that Joe Biden was successful at getting rid of it. It's a win-win. If they find evidence, great. If they don't find evidence, that's OK too. The lack of evidence proves that there was evidence. Is this a great country, or what?
The thing is this, that for over a century the core of the Republican party (the party, not their voter base) has been the upper end of the economic spectrum, from the upper middle class to the obscenely rich. And their only immutable policies are those which benefit them, namely tax cuts and deregulation for them and their business interests. Everything else is negotiable. But it is hard to win elections when that is your only platform. So their strategy is, as Scott Walker told one of his megadonors, to “divide and conquer.” To split off enough of the voters from the middle and working classes to put them over the top by waging culture wars.
For a long time that was “God, Guns, and Gays!” But times change, and that is losing its zest. The country is becoming less religious, people are appalled by the constant shootings, parents fear for the safety of their children in schools, and homophobia has subsided as gays have become visible and they have found out that their children and relatives they love are among them. Abortion was another culture war weapon until the dog caught the car and it all blew up in their faces. The party core (again, the establishment, not the voter base) was never interested in banning abortion. They just wanted to run on it as a wedge issue.
They still have the issue of the day… Mr. Potato Head, Dr. Seuss, M&M’s, Roald Dahl, and such. But they need a real gut issue. So they turn to the old practice of picking on a minority. The smaller the better. One that people can’t identify with and which can be easily demonized. “First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out — because I was not a socialist” as Pastor Niemoeller wrote. Enter the transgender controversies.
A long time ago I did a lot of work alongside an engineer at one of my customers. He was a great guy, a mensch. Always sunny and pleasant. Bailed me out of a hard spot on one occasion. Good family man with a nice wife and kids. He used to like to go to strip joints when we did startups at plants where we were installing the equipment sold by the company he worked for. That division folded when everything went to hell in the 2008 housing collapse , he moved on to another job, and I lost contact. So I was much surprised to hear some few years ago that he had transitioned and now identifies as a woman, that his wife divorced him, and I hear she won custody of the kids. I don’t pretend to understand. And I can only imagine the difficulty that was for everyone involved, both husband and wife as well as the kids.
I can only say that it fills me with unending anger that their lives are being used by mean spirited (and let us be honest, some truly evil) people as a political football in a bad faith effort to gain a political advantage.
I have spent the afternoon reading and responding to comments, simultaneously making bread (doubled the water), meatloaf (way too much Dijon), and brownies (chef’s kiss). Two fails, but I feel clearer on the issues under consideration.
When I was in college (way back in the late 80’s, so consider the context) I liked to wear a Levi’s jacket and jeans. They were very popular in my s—tkicker hometown. I also alternated, all my life, between short and long hair. I love my hair long, but hate taking care of it. So one day, at the tender age of 21, in Albany NY, I was walking to the dentist because I didn’t own a car. This car pulls up, in broad daylight, with 4 (had to be guys that attend my school, maybe football players) in it. They started yelling at me, calling me a Lezzy, and offering to rape me so I would learn that I really prefer men. I can only assume it was because of my clothing and short hair, because we were all white. Thank God it was a busy street, or I don’t know what would have happened. I doubt shouting, “I am not gay!” would have made a difference to these animals. What sickens me is that those 4 a-holes probably got married and raised children. I don’t know if this shaped my thinking, because I had already decided my parents were bigots by then, but it certainly pushed me farther to the left than I already was, I can tell you that.
Mr Sykes, I do not agree with your wording here about "children's" literature. Literature is literature no matter the intended reader. Would you call "Tom Sawyer" or "Huckleberry Finn" just children's lit? What about "Swiss Family Robinson?" How about the classics from Dr Seuss? Maurice Sendak, Shel Silverstein or EB White? The list of great authors who wrote/write books for children and young adults goes on and on.
I learned to love reading when I was a child, and it was due to the classic literature written for the young (as well as a few non-classics like The Hardy Boys mysteries). Yes, these tomes had words that are unacceptable in today's polite society, but that was it - they were just words. I was taught that words are nothing more than words, and hurtful words only have the power that you give them. Rewriting books for the sole sake of sanitizing the verbiage to account for today's sensibilities, IMO, serves no real purpose.
The old expression of "sticks and stones..." is as true now as it was. Words carry connotations and concepts (that can change over time) but no physical ability to inflict harm. We cannot protect our young from everything hurtful, but we can teach them to consider the source of the invective.
We should not alter the words used by an author, she/he put a great deal of thought into what they wrote. Instead, we should inculcate our youth with the concept that not everything they read is going to be free of hurtful words, and that in most cases the author does/did not intend to be insulting to the reader.
The “true believers” in the King James Version of the Bible - which edition I don’t know - hate all the new translations in plain English, etc. I assume the “true believers” have been annoyed since the books of the Bible were translated from ancient Hebrew, Aramaic, and whatever other languages all the bits and pieces were in when the Constantine Church translated them into Latin. I would assume they all were “cleansed” of whatever the editors of the day found objectionable. Thank the Whatever for original editions of Dahl’s work! Oh - you are aware of what the translators and Disney have done to the Brothers Grimm for many decades! Talk about changing the stories to make them mushier and more “white bread” - no offense to brown bread, Irish bread, black bread, Italian bread, French bread, etc., etc. The heights and depths of ludicrous PC thinking are nothing new.
Apparently, the Dahl estate was actually quite savvy. After having all the panicked Dahl lovers making a run on his books over the last week and sending the price of them up much to the delight of Amazon sellers, they just announced the Classic series of Dahl books will also be released, so they can make even more money. And so, yes, at the end of the day, this was actually capitalism at work. No publicity is bad publicity as they say. The idea that they didn't have this preplanned is also laughable.
Yep, and they voted for Obama twice. So, not just black and white?
On Friday 2/24/23 the Atlanta Journal reported: "Judge in case indicates forewoman followed rules."
QUOTE:
McBurney weighs in
Findling’s and Little’s takes on the special grand jury process were quite different than that of Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney, who oversaw the grand jury.
In a Wednesday interview, McBurney said he met with the special grand jurors at the end of their service to explain what they may legally discuss with anyone, not just the news media.
”They cannot discuss their deliberations,” he said. “So the question becomes what deliberations are, and I explained that would be the discussions they had amongst themselves when it was just the grand jurors in the room … when they were discussing what do we do with what we’ve learned,” said McBurney.
But if an assistant DA or a witness is in the grand jury room, they can talk about what happened then, the judge said.
”That’s not deliberations,” he said. “That’s presentation. And they’re not prohibited from talking about that, nor are they prohibited from talking about the fruit of their deliberations, which would be the final report.”
In speaking to The AJC on Wednesday, McBurney noted it is OK for judges to discuss legal procedure.
In a Feb. 13 order, McBurney concluded that “by all appearances, the special purpose grand jury did its work by the book.”
https://www.ajc.com/politics/trump-attorneys-special-grand-jury-probe-a-clown-show/ZTR6VUWXGFC2BMOCX6FH6DAPCI/
"There’s no evidence that the changes were necessary to preserve Dahl’s commercial viability."
And yet, if they HADN'T made the changes, would you be talking about Dahl's work? By simply changing a few sentences, the publisher got a ton of free publicity.
That collective rewriting group really should change their name to Milquetoast Minds.
Re the Roald Dahl debate, right in the nick of time along comes this:
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/23/arts/music/jessye-norman-unreleased-recordings.html
Amazing and thoughtful comments on this thread!
Censorship and rewrites…
STOP IT STOP IT STOP IT
Are we seriously going to remove the word “fat” to avoid triggering trauma in children? Maybe they will put down Call of Duty or searching up porn long enough to read either the original or new version?
A war, mass shootings almost daily, rapidly increasing natural disasters, hunger and homelessness just to start a list. But let’s not traumatize anyone by using trigger words.
How about everyone put down their phones and go for a run??
Trump is wrong as usual. Most of this should not be political at all. It’s a free country. People have a right to present themselves as anything they like, including members of the opposite sex. Other people have a right to believe, disbelieve, approve of, disapprove of, praise, ignore, or think they are nuts for any of the things people present themselves as. Adults have a right to do as they will with their own bodies, including surgeries and medications to make them more nearly resemble a person of the opposite sex. It is none of the public’s business. Questions such as who participates in what women’s sporting events and who uses what public bathrooms are better decided case by case by the people putting on the events and owning the bathrooms than by winner take all political dictates. The exception is for minors. The surgeries and medications should be legally restricted by age, just as other activities, including things so simple as buying a case of beer, smoking cigarettes, or driving a car, are restricted to people old enough to make adult level judgments about them. The question of how old is old enough would be difficult and a decision somewhat arbitrary just as in other things.
In the movie "The Magic Christian" the richest man in the world buys the Mona Lisa and cuts out the nose to keep. (A jolly mad romp that also features Ringo Starr, Christopher Lee as the Count, a soundtrack by Badfinger, and the late Raquel Welch as "The Mistress of the Whip." You have had a hard week and really deserve to order out, chill some beer, and watch this one.
And now the Trumplicants will believe that if no evidence is found to "corroborate" (whatever that means) Hunter Biden's laptop that Joe Biden was successful at getting rid of it. It's a win-win. If they find evidence, great. If they don't find evidence, that's OK too. The lack of evidence proves that there was evidence. Is this a great country, or what?
Re: Roald Dahl and transgender issues
The thing is this, that for over a century the core of the Republican party (the party, not their voter base) has been the upper end of the economic spectrum, from the upper middle class to the obscenely rich. And their only immutable policies are those which benefit them, namely tax cuts and deregulation for them and their business interests. Everything else is negotiable. But it is hard to win elections when that is your only platform. So their strategy is, as Scott Walker told one of his megadonors, to “divide and conquer.” To split off enough of the voters from the middle and working classes to put them over the top by waging culture wars.
For a long time that was “God, Guns, and Gays!” But times change, and that is losing its zest. The country is becoming less religious, people are appalled by the constant shootings, parents fear for the safety of their children in schools, and homophobia has subsided as gays have become visible and they have found out that their children and relatives they love are among them. Abortion was another culture war weapon until the dog caught the car and it all blew up in their faces. The party core (again, the establishment, not the voter base) was never interested in banning abortion. They just wanted to run on it as a wedge issue.
They still have the issue of the day… Mr. Potato Head, Dr. Seuss, M&M’s, Roald Dahl, and such. But they need a real gut issue. So they turn to the old practice of picking on a minority. The smaller the better. One that people can’t identify with and which can be easily demonized. “First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out — because I was not a socialist” as Pastor Niemoeller wrote. Enter the transgender controversies.
A long time ago I did a lot of work alongside an engineer at one of my customers. He was a great guy, a mensch. Always sunny and pleasant. Bailed me out of a hard spot on one occasion. Good family man with a nice wife and kids. He used to like to go to strip joints when we did startups at plants where we were installing the equipment sold by the company he worked for. That division folded when everything went to hell in the 2008 housing collapse , he moved on to another job, and I lost contact. So I was much surprised to hear some few years ago that he had transitioned and now identifies as a woman, that his wife divorced him, and I hear she won custody of the kids. I don’t pretend to understand. And I can only imagine the difficulty that was for everyone involved, both husband and wife as well as the kids.
I can only say that it fills me with unending anger that their lives are being used by mean spirited (and let us be honest, some truly evil) people as a political football in a bad faith effort to gain a political advantage.
I have spent the afternoon reading and responding to comments, simultaneously making bread (doubled the water), meatloaf (way too much Dijon), and brownies (chef’s kiss). Two fails, but I feel clearer on the issues under consideration.
When I was in college (way back in the late 80’s, so consider the context) I liked to wear a Levi’s jacket and jeans. They were very popular in my s—tkicker hometown. I also alternated, all my life, between short and long hair. I love my hair long, but hate taking care of it. So one day, at the tender age of 21, in Albany NY, I was walking to the dentist because I didn’t own a car. This car pulls up, in broad daylight, with 4 (had to be guys that attend my school, maybe football players) in it. They started yelling at me, calling me a Lezzy, and offering to rape me so I would learn that I really prefer men. I can only assume it was because of my clothing and short hair, because we were all white. Thank God it was a busy street, or I don’t know what would have happened. I doubt shouting, “I am not gay!” would have made a difference to these animals. What sickens me is that those 4 a-holes probably got married and raised children. I don’t know if this shaped my thinking, because I had already decided my parents were bigots by then, but it certainly pushed me farther to the left than I already was, I can tell you that.
"even it is merely children’s literature"
Mr Sykes, I do not agree with your wording here about "children's" literature. Literature is literature no matter the intended reader. Would you call "Tom Sawyer" or "Huckleberry Finn" just children's lit? What about "Swiss Family Robinson?" How about the classics from Dr Seuss? Maurice Sendak, Shel Silverstein or EB White? The list of great authors who wrote/write books for children and young adults goes on and on.
I learned to love reading when I was a child, and it was due to the classic literature written for the young (as well as a few non-classics like The Hardy Boys mysteries). Yes, these tomes had words that are unacceptable in today's polite society, but that was it - they were just words. I was taught that words are nothing more than words, and hurtful words only have the power that you give them. Rewriting books for the sole sake of sanitizing the verbiage to account for today's sensibilities, IMO, serves no real purpose.
The old expression of "sticks and stones..." is as true now as it was. Words carry connotations and concepts (that can change over time) but no physical ability to inflict harm. We cannot protect our young from everything hurtful, but we can teach them to consider the source of the invective.
We should not alter the words used by an author, she/he put a great deal of thought into what they wrote. Instead, we should inculcate our youth with the concept that not everything they read is going to be free of hurtful words, and that in most cases the author does/did not intend to be insulting to the reader.
fnord
The “true believers” in the King James Version of the Bible - which edition I don’t know - hate all the new translations in plain English, etc. I assume the “true believers” have been annoyed since the books of the Bible were translated from ancient Hebrew, Aramaic, and whatever other languages all the bits and pieces were in when the Constantine Church translated them into Latin. I would assume they all were “cleansed” of whatever the editors of the day found objectionable. Thank the Whatever for original editions of Dahl’s work! Oh - you are aware of what the translators and Disney have done to the Brothers Grimm for many decades! Talk about changing the stories to make them mushier and more “white bread” - no offense to brown bread, Irish bread, black bread, Italian bread, French bread, etc., etc. The heights and depths of ludicrous PC thinking are nothing new.