In a new development that raises the biggest controversy in the world of English literature, the British newspaper “Daily Telegraph” revealed yesterday that HarperCollins Publishing House had “paraphrased” and “deleted” paragraphs from the novels “Poirot” and “Miss Marple” by the most famous author. In detective novels by Agatha Christie. HarperCollins reasoned that the reformulation and deletion were dictated by the need to "take into account modern sensitivities"! The deleted paragraphs included characters created by the inimitable English novel expressing their distress with some of the children. Several references to people smiling and one of the novel's characters commenting on their teeth and posture have also been omitted. The behavior of HarperCollins fueled a controversy that erupted recently after the house itself paraphrased passages from the novels of the famous children's book author Roald Dahl and writer Ian Fleming. The Telegraph stated that it had seen an electronic version of HarperCollins publications, which includes a large number of changes to texts written during the period from 1920 to 1976, especially the deletion of dozens of lines in which there are insults, descriptions, and references to ethnicities. In particular, a number of phrases for Miss Jane Marple and Hercule Poirot were changed. Mrs. Allerton, one of the main characters in Murder on the Nile, says she has had enough of the local children, who “stare and stare; And their eyes are simply disgusting, as are their noses. And I think I really don't like children.” HarperCollins removed this phrase from its new edition. And I contented myself with putting an alternative phrase that states the following: “They return to stare and stare. And I don't think I really like children.” The change also included vocabulary; The word "oriental" has been omitted. She also omitted a phrase in Miss Marple's novel, originally published in 1964, which indicates that a maid in a hotel in one of the West Indies "smiled, revealing beautiful, snow-white teeth." In many cases, in the novel “Crime on the Nile,” all phrases describing the Nubians, the inhabitants of the region in which the events of the detective novel take place, are omitted. For example, Christie said "the captain of the Nubian boat", and the phrase was transformed in the new edition into "the captain of the boat"! The Telegraph indicated that Christie's grandson James Pritchard runs Agatha Christie Ltd., to take care of his grandmother's books. He believes he authorized HarperCollins to make those changes. Many critics and readers oppose changing the original texts of novels and poems. It is similar to what happened in the Arab world when the dean of Arabic literature, Dr. Taha Hussein, published his famous book “On National Literature”, in which it is likely that a number of pre-Islamic poetry are plagiarized, and not real. It is a controversy that almost ended with the expiation of Dr. Taha Hussein.
Yassin Ahmed (London) @OKAZ_online
