Agatha Christie’s Poirot, Miss Marple Classic Mysteries Rewritten For Modern "Sensitivities"

Good FUCKING God.

It's not "woke", it's a full blown Cultural Revolution.

Sure, why not? As long it doesn’t affect the plot. Christie’s books are so dated. This refreshing may keep them relevant today

[Quote] Good FUCKING God. It's not "woke", it's a full blown Cultural Revolution.

When was the last time you read any of these books? Why? Because they’re old and dusty. If the publishers want anyone to keep reading this stuff, they need to make them accessible to the modern reader and get publicity for doing so

Obviously with permission of her estate, whoever or whatever entity is in charge. So, I can't be arsed. And if I ever want Dame Agatha's unwoke originals they will be available on the second-hand market.

Desperation makes the desperate do desperate things. Like rewriting for "modern sensibilities" (not sensitivies) classic literature. No matter how often it's illustrated that pandering to current empty-headed fads is a losing proposition, they keep right on doing it to everyone's detriment. I await The Merchant of Venice to be "updated" to a Muslim. Or is that way too much for "modern sensitivities".

I think is ok as long as they put in the covers it's a censured edition.

Hmmmm.... If they want to make it modern, they would also have to change the classist and sexist view of the world and the offended comments on women who dare to wear shorts. Where does it stop ? It is a product of its time. But it is so well plotted. This is why we still read Christie.

By the way, will they remove the vicious anti-Italian comments ?

Didn't think so.

Will Poirot come out?

This shit needs to stop.

RepublicanLounge

Poirot will come out as a transwoman of color, R8.

Nothing new. They've been doing it to Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, etc. for decades.

Hell, they've already done it to Christie. "And Then There Were None" had two different titles that wouldn't have flown today.

R10 would be supporting the Mao Revolution.

R12, it’s more than that. People are rewriting and censoring history. It’s never going to stop. We are living in dangerous Orwellian times.

R12 there was no issue with the change of title as it didn't change the story at all

Will she be called "Ms. Marple" now?

R2, She didn't write them....for YOU!

Adaptations are one thing; people are always mucking about with Shakespeare in productions, e.g. The Bible has its sundry translations.

But any permanent alterations of fiction should be in addition to the publication of the author's original. Put the New and Improved in a "Neo-Bowdlerized Section."

Oh, r3. When you are much older you will know the folly of your words.

R11, Call me!

[quote] This shit needs to stop.

God forbids that people who own a copyright try to make it more profitable. We must tell businesses what they can do with their intellectual property!

-Repugs

R20, Expressing an opinion is not "telling businesses......."

Maybe you'll "get it" when "Brokeback Mountain" is re-made with the "improved" clandestine romance between Jack and Alma.

[quote] Maybe you'll "get it" when "Brokeback Mountain" is re-made with the "improved" clandestine romance between Jack and Alma.

Nice try with your frausplaining, but if I don’t want to see a movie, or read a book, I just don’t see or read it. I don’t whine about how this means we are descending into “dangerous Orwellian times“.

Poor Aggie

I think it’s largely *profit-driven*, as I suspect these sanitised editions are aimed mainly at Millennials and Zoomers who grew up/have been growing up to ‘Trigger Warnings’ as part of their legitimate reading experiences in schools/colleges

They don’t see it as censorship either. Rather, it’s removing Hate Speech, and that’s completely kosher with them

There’s just something sinister to me about changing an author’s words after they are dead. Plus, it infantilises the reader. I started reading them in the 1990s as a kid and I could see the old fashioned attitudes for what they were. Readers are more discerning than given credit for. Plus it’s interesting to get this glimpse into attitudes from the past and pretending they never happened seems to me like it will end up ensuring humans don’t learn from the mistakes of history.

Where I think these changes should stay is in the realm of the adaptations. Play around with those, but leave the books alone.

After all, this will never end - people think they have all the right attitudes now, but I assure you, things will be different in 10, 20, 30 years and what they have been changed to now will similarly be considered offensive.

Interestingly, what readers found with the recent Fleming changes was that the references to black people were changed but not those to Koreans or homosexuals. They’re never going to be able to satisfy everyone.

Why not essays written to introduce the novels, from people who can talk about the issues in the story? My collection of Shakespeare does this. Germaine Greer has an interesting essay on The Taming of the Shrew, for example.

Well, la-di-da to you, Master r22 and your reference to me yet with a quotation about "Orwellian times" I never said.

You miss the context, which is of Right-Wing Republicans emptying school libraries, firing teachers, expurgating this and Bowdlerizing that, banning and criminalizing drag, forbidding schoolgirls from discussing menstruation---the attacks on the spoken, the written, and the artistic rendering of WORDS.

It doesn't matter if a deceased author's "estate" agrees to re-writing for dollars.

Back in the day, Goya's "The Naked Maja" caused quite the controversy. People demanded she be painted over. The artist instead painted a second, clothed version.

Today, she would be either painted over or simply not allowed exhibition.

And you would say, "Whatever. I don't care." Bravo.

R26: agreed

But surely this rewriting of Christie is coming from the *Left* - specifically the Woke Left - no?

Dear God, these anti-woke idiots.

Producers: Hey! We're going to film and release new adaptions of Miss Marple and Poirot and they will be exactly the same as the previous adaptations! Who's exited?

Viewers: *awkward silence*

Ups, Oh, Dear myself.

Who's excited?

[quote] Well, la-di-da to you, Master [R22] and your reference to me yet with a quotation about "Orwellian times" I never said.

Someone upthread did. That’s a direct cut and paste.

You’re not the only person in this conversation, you know.

I'm afraid to say Christie's grandson doesn't seem too bothered about permitting many changes to his Grandmother's work. I don't know how much control the company managing her estate has over adaptations but some of the Marple and a couple of Poirot episodes were execrable. Some of the new Marple stories had such glaring mistakes it's incredible he/they missed them, such as misnaming Marple's village.

Looking at that picture at OP I just want Armie Hammer to sit on my face 😈

The greatest sin of these 'modern sensitivities' adaptations on screen is that they sap the humour and life out of the works.