Eve Garnett's Family from One End Street series question

[stripe]

This is a longshot but here goes.

 

Have any of you read Eve Garnett's Further Adventures of the Family from One End Street?

 

I bought the first in the One End Street series and my kids loved it.

 

I then bought the second one over the internet and the packaging came apart and the book was lost. While the bookstore refunded me, that left me without the book! So I got it from ILL, intending to surprise my kids,

 

But

 

I opened it up and one chapter name is "Ten Little N--- Boys." Yes, that n-word. It turns out it's about their sow having ten black babies. Er. The phrase is used a few times when referring to the piglets.

 

I was aghast.

 

I just cannot read that.

 

And I am afraid if I read it, my son will see it because he always looks over my shoulder when I'm reading aloud. I can't change the title of a chapter -- that is too obvious a switch.

 

The ILL copy is a hardback.

 

Does anyone know if there is another edition without this word?

 

It really made me sad that there's this ugly problem with an otherwise darling series. I found a copy of book #3 in the series at least.

 

I am not asking for people's opinions about the n-word, obviously whoever wants to post on here about that may, but I am just curious if it were ever altered in a way like Mary Poppins was, in later printings.

[Julie Smith]

This is a longshot but here goes.

 

Have any of you read Eve Garnett's Further Adventures of the Family from One End Street?

 

I bought the first in the One End Street series and my kids loved it.

 

I then bought the second one over the internet and the packaging came apart and the book was lost. While the bookstore refunded me, that left me without the book! So I got it from ILL, intending to surprise my kids,

 

But

 

I opened it up and one chapter name is "Ten Little N--- Boys." Yes, that n-word. It turns out it's about their sow having ten black babies. Er. The phrase is used a few times when referring to the piglets.

 

I was aghast.

 

I just cannot read that.

 

And I am afraid if I read it, my son will see it because he always looks over my shoulder when I'm reading aloud. I can't change the title of a chapter -- that is too obvious a switch.

 

The ILL copy is a hardback.

 

Does anyone know if there is another edition without this word?

 

It really made me sad that there's this ugly problem with an otherwise darling series. I found a copy of book #3 in the series at least.

 

I am not asking for people's opinions about the n-word, obviously whoever wants to post on here about that may, but I am just curious if it were ever altered in a way like Mary Poppins was, in later printings.

 

Sorry but my library doesn't have a copy of the book so I can't look for you. But it does have a copy of the first in the series and I have now added it to my list of books to maybe one day read out loud.

 

Thank you for the suggestion.

[stripe]

If I ever figure it out, I will reply to this thread.

 

I own the first and third in the series and they're cute. Though I did come across a disgruntled comment about how the first beat out The Hobbit for the Carnegie Medal and is since forgotten.

[stripe]

An update.

 

I found a copy of it (a Penguin paperback, not the hardcover the ILL was) and it was exactly the same, with the "Ten N---- boys" chapter. I am rather torn about how to read this one out loud to my kids. It is entirely bizarre (to me) that it's in there at all, but in a way, it shows just how these things were so commonplace. The series is utterly charming in every other way.

 

I had the same issue with Lark Rise to Candleford, which also reminisced about eating n- boy candies in her childhood or something. (Nothing like the tv show at any rate.)

[Julie Smith]

An update.

 

I found a copy of it (a Penguin paperback, not the hardcover the ILL was) and it was exactly the same, with the "Ten N---- boys" chapter. I am rather torn about how to read this one out loud to my kids. It is entirely bizarre (to me) that it's in there at all, but in a way, it shows just how these things were so commonplace. The series is utterly charming in every other way.

 

I had the same issue with Lark Rise to Candleford, which also reminisced about eating n- boy candies in her childhood or something. (Nothing like the tv show at any rate.)

 

When I was a kid my Mom would sometimes get black licorice in the shape of little babies. She said when she was a kid there were called, "n--- babies" (but in danish)

[stripe]

In Garnett's book, it refers to their (black colored) sow who gives birth to 10 piglets. No idea why this was necessary.

 

I understand the licorice candy reference. It's not my first encounter with it. Just .... sad.

[nmoira]

When I was a kid my Mom would sometimes get black licorice in the shape of little babies. She said when she was a kid there were called, "n--- babies" (but in danish)

This is about 30 years ago now, but a friend of mine was the other side of mortified when yarn shopping with her recently arrived Irish grandmother who insisted on *loudly* demanding of the clerk where the "n**** brown" wool was. "No, that's not n*** brown! Where is the n**** brown?"