While we are rewriting history... (AKA Changing Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer)

(Hold on a second - I will be right with you)

:::sounds of Michael pulling out his desk drawer and retrieving his custom-made stamp and ink pad that reads, "TOO DAMNED DUMB TO LIVE!!!" ::::


I keep promising to Mark that I am going to have such a stamp made, but I would need to buy every ink pad that Staples, Office Max and Office Depot has ever carried!  I want a forehead-shaped stamp that takes up their entire forehead. Could you imagine all the ink that would be running around this world?

 OK.  I'm back with you now.

Those people who believe that they have enough power, enough talent, or the right to rewrite history to suit their needs have a lot of work on their hands.  It is a very daunting task, indeed.  After they rewrite a famous work of art (Mark Twains Adventures of Tom Sawyer, for example!), they need to take a trip to the Louvre in Paris.  Their next take is to 'fix' that smile on Mona Lisa's face.  

After all, don't you know that even though it was once acceptable and considered proper for people to NOT smile in their portraits, it is now accepted, and in fact, encouraged.  My prayers are with you, because you are up against the little known artist, Leonardo da Vinci.  I mean  - C'mon!  Who the hell was **HE**. anyway - and what did he know about it?  Today is just that - today!  It is not yesterday, and it is not tomorrow!  WE are here today, aren't we?  We are, indeed, and we can do whatever we want to, to suit ourselves!  

Side note: The "Me Generation" doesn't just affect those born during that era.  It is an addictive, contagious disease, and I have noted that it spreads across several generations, afflicting folks from 7 yrs. old to 70 yrs. old.

 Unfortunately for you, your hard work doesn't stop there!  Your task has only just begun.  You now must travel to Florence, Italy.  There is a statue there, David, by another unknown and worthless individual - Michelangelo.  

Doesn't Michelangelo know that it is politically incorrect **IN THIS COUNTRY, AND IN THIS COUNTRY, ALONE!** to be nude in public?  Most Americans don't realize that on any summer day, you can visit any public park in Europe, and the visitors to that park are happily sunbathing - in the nude.  They would like you to be clothed when you board a city bus, for example, but when you are in any public park, you can sunbathe au natural.  

Oh - don't forget the exposed penis on the Statue of David!  For this cover-up job, the tools you will require are much more than oil paint and a brush.  You must make a complete outfit of clothes for him. A pair of shorts won't do!  There are some folk in this country that are also offended by a bare, muscly chest, I don't care how natural it is! 

There are some Reubens in Europe that are showing, **GASP** of all things - FAT, naked ladies!  After all, boobies are inappropriate.  Break out your paint brushes again!

I think this undertaking is going to require a large team that is working together as efficiently as a finely tuned machine, but there is good news ahead.  A large portion of the work has already been done for you.  

Both in the past and in the present, people are working hard to erase anything linked to Adolph Hitler and / or the Nazis.  They have systematically destroyed Third Reich buildings, documents, and anything linked to this horrific period in history.  It is an undisputed fact that this reign of terror was singly the worse thing that ever happened to an innocent group of period.  Who would want to remember it?

OOOPS!  Let's not eliminate music.  Acoustic pianos and guitars are outdated.  I mean - if it isn't available on a smart phone, what good can it possibly do?  How archaic are they ?!?    Now harpsichords and pipe organs come to mind.  What a tragic waste of time and wood.  Nobody uses those things any more.  Just think of how many homes can be heated this winter if we demolished every pipe organ in, let's say, St. Louis, alone.  

The folks on your team might want to branch out.  Send some to destroy timeless art, some to destroy musical relics, and some to tackle huge sculptures.  If you want to make the task slaughtering Mark Twain's world famous literature feel like a simple walk in the park, you might want to first sharpen your talons. Considering all things, this next fella was alive 500 years before Mark Twain. First come, first serve!  My first thought was that we should completely transcribe the writings of William Shakespeare into common American English.  I mean, who the hell speaks in Old English, anymore?  I am hard pressed to find anyone who is NOT texting, and bastardizing the hell out of the English Language - much less speaking proper English.  I absolutely love it when this opportunity presents itself:

Some idiot: (After hearing someone on the radio, on TV or in person speaking British English):

"Oh, I hate it when they talk like that.  Why can't they talk like everybody else?"

Me: "You do realize, of course, that they are speaking proper English.  After all, they invented it!

Some idiot: (Gives me a dirty, confused look, and walks away!)

Do you know how many people have never seen this text? 

You can approach me at any time of the day or night, and ask me to recite the General Prologue of the Canterbury Tales.  I can recite the following literature word-for-word, in Middle English, and with the correct rhythm and prose.


The writings of Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales, General Prologue:

Whan that Aprille with his shoores soote

The drought of March hath perced to the roote

And bathed every vein in swich liquor
Of which vertu engendred is the flour
When Zephyrus eek with his sweete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt and heeth
The tendre croppes and the yonge sun
Hath in the ram his halve cours yronne
And smale fowles maken melodye
That slepen all the night with open eye
So priketh hem nature in hir courages
Thanne longen folke to goon pilgrimages
And palmeres for to seeken stronge straundes
To ferne halwes couth in sondry londes
And specially from every shires ende
Of Engelond to Canterbury they wende
The hooly blissful martyr for to seeke
That hem hath holpen whan that they were sike

I can't stomach the remodeling shows on TV these days. On a mere whim, these people will go into a home and rip out timeless decor and architecture, and replace it with crap that will be out of style within a year.  They have no concern or regard for any history the home or its contents might have.  This country, after all, is not well known for preserving a lot of its history. 

The United States of America is known world-wide as being the country that quickly destroys it's own history "to build a parking lot", as they will often tell you.

And now, a quote from Rick Steves (world famous travel guide who has, in fact, been around the world several times):

"I would like travelers, especially American travelers, to travel in a way that broadens their perspective, because I think Americans tend to be some of the most ethnocentric people on the planet. It's not just Americans, it's the big countries. It's the biggest countries that tend to be ethnocentric or ugly. There are ugly Russians, ugly Germans, ugly Japanese and ugly Americans. You don't find ugly Belgians or ugly Bulgarians, they're just too small to think the world is their norm. "

Translated:  Americans incorrectly think the rest of the world revolves around their own small part of the planet, or worse yet, they think the remainder of the world must abide by their (the American's) beliefs, standards and morals - or what is left of them. Or...worse yet...the Americans don't even know they are are harboring or even fostering those thoughts and beliefs.

Incidentally, Rick Steves also says on a regular basis that he has to mind the photography and video that his team captures when he is traveling abroad.  He says that it is an unfortunate fact, indeed, that they have to edit the film that they capture because of the taste of "21st Century Americans".  He has to eliminate art that is  many hundreds or thousands of years older than the United States is, itself, because a few Americans like to think they know what is best for the rest of the country.  I think it is yet more amazing that every other country in the world can admire and enjoy these works of art.  They have done so for millennium.  The only effects they have suffered are a much higher level of education, timeless art, and they have produced ALL of the world's best artists, most of the world's finest musicians, and many more historic figures. (The United States ranks 25th out of the top 34 countries in Math Skills alone. )

A small segway:  When I worked on the flower market, I worked with a woman who is a devout Catholic.   I had some customers that are first-generation Indian (India) immigrants to this country.  This particular group of people are devout Hindus.  As a part of many of their customs when they are practicing their religion., they make floral garlands and give them as offerings at the beautiful Hindu temples. 

When the devout Catholic asked me "What do they do with these garlands?" and I explained to her the process, she said, "Well, that has nothing do with religion!"  In her tightly closed mind, she was thinking, "If it isn't a Catholic belief or tradition, it is not religion!"  Can she possibly be serious?  The Hindus, for example,  were worshiping in their own manner 5,000 (yes, five thousand!) years before Christianity surfaced on the planet!  One person's religion is no more - or less - valid than any other persons!

The following picture is from one of the recent pujas (or poojas).
I know an Indian woman that makes these garlands.  She is a good friend of mine.  Her work is exquisite and breathtaking.

More photographs of practicing Hundus, the Hindus Temple of St. Louis, and their services and ceremonies 
:
(click on any link on this page)
http://www.hindutemplestlouis.org/Gallery/Pictures.aspx

Question: Why should we keep reminders of Nazi / Adolph Hitler around?

Answer: As a memento to **NEVER LET IT HAPPEN AGAIN!", and as a much needed history lesson for future generations who never experienced it the first-time-around. Genocide is to be avoided!

Question:  What harm can possibly come about from altering Mark Twain's "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer"?

Answer:  My first off-the-hip response is, "Why don't you just rewrite The Bible???", but that rhetorical question is invalid, because that book has been written and rewritten by so many men since the Rosetta Stones were discovered that firm believers in The Bible wouldn't recognize the original text if it was laying directly in front of them.  **ANY** time translation (and humans are the translators!) is involved, such an opportunity to "write the story as the writer sees it" is so readily available, that is is absolutely impossible to have untainted text before you.

Another answer:  The language Mark Twain used in his books was ABSOLUTELY appropriate for the time the books were written.  

People, we can't go back and change literature,  we should not change art, and we can't rewrite history.  Incidentally, Mark Twains writings are all the above: history, art and literature.

To think one has the right (or the power!) to change a literary piece is doing a gross injustice to both the artist / writer and our future generations.  It is definitely a horribly pompous and careless attitude to have by saying to your future generations, "Without your knowledge or consent, I am going to make a permanent change by  rewriting and otherwise changing works of art. Because I have a God-complex, you will never know the difference.  I am so accustomed to seeing the world from my own small point of view that I thought you should live in the same small, constricted world - so I reduced or eliminated your choices for you."

C'mon, people!  Are you really that messed up?

Let me quote the man, himself:

"It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt."

The person who is changing this man's work opened his mouth yesterday - and he opened WIDE!

- Michael