Bowdlerization is Good Actually

The term Bowdlerization comes from the name of Thomas Bowdler who’s 1818 Edition of William Shakespeare changes the text in a lot of ways many deem to be “Censorship”.  Now in the sense that the term strictly speaking originally refers to the act of changing the text of an older work and presenting it as if that simply is what it is that I don’t want to defend.

However due to the drift of the word it is often used primarily of one particular change a lot of Bowdler’s versions made, changing the Tragedies to have a happy ending.  And as such is often applied to adaptations and reimaginings of prior stories, not merely edited editions.  

So it’s in the context that it's treating that act as fundamentally wrong that it bothers me.  Because retelling a story that originally had a Happy Ending to subvert that ending is often praised as a bold and brave artistic choice.

There is an attitude among a certain time of Leftist that feels like Bad Endings are inherently more subversive, or at least endings that are not completely happy, where something is still lost, there is still some “consequence”.  That the first and foremost goal of Left Wing Art needs to be to show how bad things currently are.  However Karl Marx was a fundamentally optimistic person who believed a Communist future was inevitable, so there is plenty of room for Left Wing Art that plays into that optimism.  

But I also don’t need to agree with the politics of something to enjoy it.  I can artistically respect stories with bad endings, but as far as what I like personally I’d generally prefer a conservative story that makes me feel good to a fellow Leftist trying to depress me with all their cynical observations I already agree with.

So let’s go back to the Shakespearean context of the word’s origin.  It’s fairly well known that almost all of Shakespeare's plays were based on some older story, some even already had prior Elizabethan Stage Plays.  What’s relevant here however is that some of his Tragedies were a lot less Tragic in their original versions.

Even Hamlet, one of the top two most well known of them all.  The original Danish Legend of Prince Amleth does end with him taking the Throne rather than dying.

However no Legend is in my view more cursed by having its popular perception now entirely filtered through Shakespeare than that of King Lear and his daughter Cordelia.  Shakespeare probably got Lear from Holinshed's Chronicles but the oldest surviving account is from Geoffrey of Monmouth’s History of the Kings of Britain where Leir of Britain reigned in the 8th Century BC.  Now because it’s a chronicle of the entire history obviously they died eventually, but the sequence of events Shakespeare is dramatizing ends with Cordelia restoring Leir to the Throne and then succeeding him as Britain's first Ruling Queen.  That happy ending is maybe undermined by knowing that Cordelia’s sexist nephews are going to overthrow her in a few years but still it was something, could have even made great thematic propaganda for the recently passed Queen Elizabeth.

King Lear is among the plays that would get a changed up happier ending in the Bowlder era, but still not restoring the original ending since it has Cordelia marry Edgar (a character not in the original source at all, the whole Gloucester family stuff Shakespeare took from a different source) seemingly forgetting that she was married to the King of France/Gaul.  Now of course I’d be all for having Cordelia reign as a Polyandrous Queen but I don’t think that’s what these editors intended to go for.

I’d change the outcome of the Leir saga to make it even happier, have Cordelia reign longer and have her Nephew’s coup fail and have her usher in a Gender Egalitarian Communist Utopia.  Because one thing I disagree with Marx on is that we had to do Capitalism first, I think going right from Feudalism to Communism was theoretically possible and I’d love to see some Speculative Fiction explore that theoretical.

Thing is if I ever wrote my own version I’d still include some stuff from Shakespeare, Shakespearean Fools are always fun, and the complexity the Gloucester plotline adds is thematically useful, but I’d try to subvert the Bastard son being the bad one.

But let’s move the conversation to stories that were already Tragedies in Shakespeare’s source material.  The notion that it's sacrilege for any story calling itself “based on Romeo and Juliet” to let them live happily ever after I mostly just find boring and unimaginative. But I more so think any adaptation that also makes them the same gender is morally obligated to give them a happy ending, being doomed to only tragic endings is an old trope the Gay community doesn’t like being reminded of.

However Othello is the one that I really think needs to be allowed to end differently.  It is the one Shakespeare Play everyone wants to see as about Race, and Shakespeare's story was indeed more Anti-Racist then his source material.  But the nature of how Racism works has changed, so much so that some feel it’s anachronistic to even call anything that far back Racism.

I think a lot of modern people want to read the play more allegorically, they want Iago to represent systemic forces that push Black People into Crime.  But that doesn’t work. Bad Individuals make Bad allegories for Systemic Racism.  And Othello is in a more privileged position than a poor Black person living in a modern American inner city.

The fact is Conspiratorial White Supremacists never actually make Black People the Evil masterminds of their Conspiracy Theories, they refuse to see Black People as capable of that level of intelligence.  Their world view is built on seeing them as aggressive, easily manipulated pawns of Evil White People, or at least people who can pass as White like Ahskenazi Jews.  Iago is etymologically a form of the name Jacob so maybe it’s not a coincidence this play is set in the same city as the explicitly Antisemitic one.

And then there’s how Race issues aside, modern people no longer think adultery justifies murder,  There was this movie in 2001 called O that was about remaking Othello as a High School Drama.  And its decision to end the same way is really jarring, Odin not realizing murdering his girlfriend was wrong till he learns she didn’t cheat on him yet still telling everyone they’re racist if they blame him for his own actions really doesn’t work.

So it would actually fight Racism more if the villain who thinks the Black Protagonist can be pushed into violence over such base emotions is proven wrong.