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Thursday, December 11, 2008

Books Book, Interrupted

Posted by Paul Constant on Thu, Dec 11, 2008 at 11:29 AM

Students at New Rochelle School High School are going to find it difficult to complete their next assignment: comparing the film adaptation of "Girl, Interrupted" to the best-selling book. In the book, Kaysen recounts her confinement at a Massachussets mental hospital in the 1960's.

Pages from the middle of the book have been torn out by the school district after having been deemed "inappropriate" by school officials due to sexual content and strong language. Removed is a scene where the rebellious Lisa (played by Angela Jolie in the movie) encourages Susanna (played by Winona Ryder) to circumvent hospital rules against sexual intercourse by engaging in oral sex instead."The material was of a sexual nature that we deemed inappropriate for teachers to present to their students," said English Department Chariperson Leslie Altschul, "since the book has other redeeming features, we took the liberty of bowdlerizing."

I read Girl, Interrupted many years ago, when I was 17 or so. I don't remember any sex scene. And believe you me, most of the sex scenes I read at that age are burned into my brain. (Also, I read Kaysen's second book, Asa as I Knew Him, and it was one of the worst books I've ever read: It was basically her having a very long-winded and pouty fit about a man who left her. I can't think about Girl, Interrupted without thinking of the staggering badness of Asa. Some people are destined to write only one book.) I wish I could be there in a roomful of people deciding to censor or rip the centers out of books. It seems like one well-placed "Really?" would be enough to knock things off the rails.

Comments (21) RSS

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I just remember Angelina Jolie kicking a lot of orderly butt around a hospital.

Posted by Siskel and Ebert on December 11, 2008 at 11:33 AM

Is there a box full of ripped-up sex scenes in a Dumpster behind the school? Cause that'd be worth checking into.

Posted by Skip on December 11, 2008 at 11:34 AM

People who rip the center out of books will be ripping the center out of people as a result. Life is multi-dimensional and books need to reflect that.

Posted by Vince on December 11, 2008 at 11:41 AM

I can't remember ever seeing the word "bowdlerizing" used in a positive context before. Usually it's an accusation, not a boast.

Posted by Fnarf on December 11, 2008 at 11:43 AM

I can't believe they actually ripped the pages out of the book. I wish someone could sue the school or school district for destroying public property. Assuming there are 40 students in a class and they paid $15 per copy of the book. That was $600 worth of tax money that they won't get back. It's not like the books could be resold or returned to the publisher.

Destruction of books, even bad ones or ones I disagree with, piss me off. Whether it was the Bible or Mein Kampf, I don't think books or the ideas within them should be destroyed.

Posted by elswinger on December 11, 2008 at 11:43 AM

everyone knows, teenagers who can, and do, have sex shouldn't be subjected to literary depictions of said act under any circumstances. i wonder what sex ed is like in this school district....

is there a point in adulthood when you completely forget what it was like being a teenager and can only think of them as asexual bundles of innocence?

Posted by boxofbirds on December 11, 2008 at 11:43 AM

On a positive note, they don't have as much reading homework now.

Posted by Urgutha Forka on December 11, 2008 at 11:45 AM

New Rochelle is in fricking Westchester County. The school has its own planetarium. And its own Museum of Arts & Culture. For their holiday show, the Nutcracker, they hired a professional ballet troupe to perform and teach some gifted students to play a few parts.

I'm sure the kids have already spent a fraction of their allowances buying their own unshredded copies of the books from Amazon using their classroom laptops.

Posted by tomasyalba on December 11, 2008 at 11:48 AM

Far Afield is Kaysen's second book and is a well written story that really conveys the mix of familiarity and foreigness when living in a different culture. I love that book and recommend it as a travel read all the time.

Asa is Kaysen's first book. Girl, Interrupted is her third.

Posted by chris on December 11, 2008 at 12:09 PM

My daughter goes to that school. If this is the same one from the Girl, Interrupted play article, that would be really weird.
http://nrhs.nred.org/home.aspx

Posted by MaleProctologyDoucheExam on December 11, 2008 at 12:21 PM

@4:

Heck, you don't much hear the term used in ANY context these days...

Posted by COMTE on December 11, 2008 at 12:27 PM

I want the version without the gannet. Or the nuthatch.

Posted by Chris B on December 11, 2008 at 12:30 PM

@4: I just figured anyone who knew the word Bowlderize would understand the context of the word. And does anybody think Bowlder and his sister were doing any favors by censoring Shakespeare? Sweet Christ, this is stupid.

Posted by Dr. Pants on December 11, 2008 at 12:53 PM

People who tear pages out of books would just as easily burn them, given the chance.

Posted by Greg on December 11, 2008 at 1:39 PM

"Hey, check it out! We use big words like "bowdlerizing" in context, while ironically ensuring that our students receive a watered down education by censoring their materials! Awesome!"

Posted by j.lee on December 11, 2008 at 1:40 PM

I can't imagine an English teacher worth his or her salt agreeing to teach a novel with pages missing...

Posted by katy on December 11, 2008 at 2:06 PM

hoorah i grew up in the town next to new rochelle. a friend of a friend who attended told me that they were not allowed to show their senior thesis ceramic work in the group show because it somehow (i forget the actual details of the piece) involved oversized genetalia. so yes, its a rather liberal city and the school puts a lot of money into their arts programs... but there are definitely some nuts in high places.

Posted by zan on December 11, 2008 at 2:23 PM

The home economics class should bake penis cookies in protest.

Posted by Greg on December 11, 2008 at 3:13 PM

Lisa was trying to get another character to have sex. Susannah just gets caught giving her boyfriend a bj and is punished by the hospital. Susannah doesn't write a description of the blow job, just includes the documents from the hospital describing it.

Posted by It's pretty subtle. on December 11, 2008 at 5:55 PM

These students probably know more about sex than their parents do. Cutting a few pages out of a book is not going to keep them innocent. Reminds me of the show the other day where the parents didn't want to tell their son he had HIV because he was only 15. So they didn't tell him until he had already had sex with his girlfriend. Dumb.

Posted by Silverstar98121 on December 12, 2008 at 7:20 AM

Just a note ... I was preparing a blog rant of my own about school censorship and why Americans are so sexually confused when I noticed an update to the story: The school, facing much criticism, has apparently decided to replace the damaged books.

Posted by bd on December 15, 2008 at 4:21 AM