Cultural Changes

Recap

Previously on Keira Wong, for those who just tuned in, here’s a brief history of the Halycrus books:

1. Keira is recommended to submit a brief to a publisher commissioning writers for a new children’s book.
2. Brief is peer reviewed: “Ms Wong has a natural writing style for children. She implements the KISS rule well.” [KISS = Keep It Simple, Stupid – presumably I am the stupid. Thanks.]
3. Publisher wants to make the one book into a four part series.
4. Books are onsold to international arms of related companies [US, Canada, Singapore, UK].
5. Keira is asked to write a four part “prequel” to the original series, requested by the US publishers.
6. Request for the main character, blond, blue-eyed James, to be changed to African-American to be more identifiable to the US audience.

James, far left.

A good mix of aliens, humans, boys, girls, and hair colours.

So what do you want?

The concept of changing my characters for the US market always slightly amused me, mainly because the real blonde, blue-eyed James now has no credibility/proof in claiming a book character is named after him. But I am all for positive and relevant changes in books, lest it becomes simple “busy work” for the editors.

But I don’t want to think!

I scoffed at the Harry Potter series changing for American audiences from “HP and the Philosopher’s Stone” to “HP and the Sorceror’s Stone”. The change was due to the US market potentially not knowing the concept of a philosopher’s stone, as “philosopher” is associated with a “thinker” in the US. I found this particularly amusing. A suggestion: let them read the book, think about it and learn what a philosopher’s stone is within the context! Seems the name change is quite subversive to and quite indicative of the US market.

Generalised stupidity

Yes, yes, I know people may be thinking, “What’s with the generalised attitude” and I may be thinking, “What’s with the stupid?” and hope these people go off in a huff of ignorance before I scream at them: “Is this not the exact concept of learning and thinking?!” It’s ridiculous; the book is set in England. Why would English people say they eat Cap’n Crunch if they eat crumpets? Why give a false pretence of the life and culture in which they live? One of the changes I found particularly funny was changing “cooker” to “stove”. Um, what does a stove do to food? It cooks it!! Seriously, how confusing can that be?

[I have also heard that the US publishers thought the word “philosopher” is not appealing and would give children an inaccurate impression of the book's content. But I would think not many children in general all over the world, not just American children, would know that a philosopher’s stone is an alchemist tool. And I only know that because I read it in some kids’ book about wizards and a guy called Plato.]

Just enough education to perform…

But to be fair, I am now in two minds [“only two?” you may ask] over the situation. When writing for children there is always a backdrop of educating them in some form. I was reading a book to my friend’s 2 year old daughter, and it really irritated me to see the words “mommy”, “alligator” and “cookies”. There is no cultural context to this book, so I see no point in reading it the point in changing the terms used. The kid is not learning anything except how to spell incorrectly, develop a weird hybrid accent, and inaccurately name one of our most dangerous and coolest animals well into its unedumacated future.

Affirmative action

Sure, with the US HP market, they are learning about another culture, but it could be seen as regressive to read “mummy” instead of “mommy” as with my above gripe. My books were changed from “mum” in Oz/UK to “mom” for USA/CA/Sing. But this spelling was the only way one could discern the characters’ backdrop, which wasn’t integral to the story. Harry Potter, as a whole series and as a character, is very English – who knows whether that is because it is important for character identification or JK Rowling simply does not know anything else other than English culture – I don’t think the changes made are warranted. It served only to muddle the story backdrop. Why would an English lad say “mommy” when clearly his accent is not ‘alf English guv’ner, its full English. I think it would be confusing to have an English character say “mommy” as much as it would be for them to say “madre”. Only change a foreign book if it positively advantages the reader. Or, at least, doesn’t disadvantage them. Helping to identify with the characters [a similar change was made in HP as in my books] is advantageous, as is having a clearer phrase [pop my clogs v kick the bucket: pop my clogs?? What the?] but would it really kill kids to know another word for “mail” is “post”? It may help them in their future travels if they ever decide to leave the proverbial square.

But hey…change is good, right?

To be fair, looking at the changes made to Rowling’s manuscript for the US market, a lot of the changes are positively justified as they simply correct many, many, many grammatical mistakes. Despite it being written in the Queen’s language. Which may also be indicative of the English population. In this case, changing a character’s manner of speech so it is grammatically and culturally understood can never hurt [unlike my disparaging and insensitive generalisations of every nationality except my own].

Hey, in my defence, I’ve already generalised my own nationality by noting Australians never finish their sentences: CF “Arj at Large”.