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Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Homo / Books From Here to Eternity: Now with Gay Sex!

Posted by Paul Constant on Wed, Apr 6, 2011 at 12:28 PM

According to The Guardian, James Jones's war epic is finally getting un-bowdlerized in a new e-book edition:

But the original text of the novel included two scenes which never made it to the published edition, let alone the film. In one, private Angelo Maggio — the soldier played by Frank Sinatra in the 1953 film — confesses to having oral sex with a wealthy man for $5 or $10 that "comes in handy the middle of the month". In the second scene a military investigation into gay activity is mooted.

Jones's editor at Scribner refused to allow the scenes to be included, and also excised various swear words originally intended to be included in the dialogue...Jones's daughter, novelist Kaylie Jones, said her father fought "bitterly" to keep the novel's language the way he'd originally intended it, but eventually acceded to his editor's insistence. Now, 60 years after it was first published, and more than 30 since Jones's death in 1977, the original version will be produced as an ebook through digital publisher Open Road.

Though there were experimental authors and publishers printing adult material at the same time that Jones was losing his battle with Scribner, quite a few popular novelists had to allow their books to be censored. I hope this new edition of From Here to Eternity is the beginning of a trend; I'd like to read what Hemingway, for example, originally wrote for publication.

Comments (5) RSS

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Pretty much the same thing, but with more swearing, based on the drafts of Hemingway I saw.

Posted by Will in Seattle

on April 6, 2011 at 12:34 PM

This makes me feel strangely vindicated. That there was much more to literary life that was being hidden from me by a cabal of censors that are now being ignored, makes me want to read the original intent of the author. And feel a certain joy that we could be growing up as a nation, in spite of the adolescent ignorance of an obsessive and oppressive right wing.

Posted by Vince on April 6, 2011 at 12:56 PM

It is so refreshing - Gore Vidal never recovered from the treatment he got for refusing to censor himself in the day.

I love the new (regrettably, also the last) Marable bio's additional details on Malcolm X's gay experiences, and Lelyveld's new bio talks more about Gandhi's superbromance with Kallenbach. Good stuff.

Posted by gloomy gus on April 6, 2011 at 1:23 PM

It's important to note that the editor at Scribner was Maxwell Perkins, not some prissy censor. He also edited and prepared for publication the novels of Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Thomas Wolfe among others.

Read "Max Perkins, Editor of Genius," a superb 1970s biography by A. Scott Berg.

Posted by Demetria on April 6, 2011 at 2:13 PM

Perhaps Perkin's censorship probably had as much to do with the obsenity laws, as anything else.

"Tropic of Cancer is a novel by Henry Miller, first published in 1934 by the Obelisk Press in Paris, France. Its publication in 1961 in the United States by Grove Press led to an obscenity trial that was one of several that tested American laws on pornography in the 1960s.

In 1964, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Grove Press, Inc. v. Gerstein, cited Jacobellis v. Ohio (which was decided the same day) and overruled state court findings of obscenity.

A copyright-infringing "Medusa" edition of the novel was published in New York City in 1940 by Jacob Brussel; its title page claimed its place of publication to be Mexico. Brussel was eventually sent to jail for three years for the edition."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropic_of_C…)

As a meticulous editor, Perkins was probably aware just how much Hemingway and Eternity could cross the lines (and each did, in their own way), break new ground sexually, before the government would step in and ban.

Posted by judybrowni on April 6, 2011 at 8:14 PM