Word: menikoff
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...tale of how this censorship occurred is the first and by far the longer part of this volume. Editor Barry Menikoff, a professor of English at the University of Hawaii, promises to reveal plenty of melodrama and skulduggery: "A story of stylistic abuse by printers and proofreaders, of literary abuse by publishers, editors, and friends, and finally of the abuse of art by Stevenson himself in sanctioning the publication of a corrupt text...
Unfortunately, the evidence does not live up to these lurid claims. Menikoff devotes 23 closely printed pages to the nefarious fiddling that went on with Stevenson's punctuation and spelling; the imposition of "house styles" by various publishers was, of course, common during Stevenson's lifetime, and is not entirely unheard of today. On a more substantive level, some sexual undertones in the story were muffled, and some mildly profane or irreligious sentiments were excised or rendered inoffensive. These changes now seem fatuous, but they did not accomplish what Menikoff asserts: "A finished and artistically sophisticated novel was reduced...
Fortunately, Menikoff includes the original version of The Beach of Falesa, which is roughly half as long as his scholarly preface and many times as interesting. The story Stevenson intended is a bit grittier and more pungent than the one that appeared. A vagabond British trader named Wiltshire tells of being assigned to reopen a defunct post on a remote island. He is befriended at first by a man called Case, who enjoys a trading monopoly. Case persuades the newcomer to take up with Uma, a beautiful, half-naked native girl, and arranges a sham wedding ceremony. Before long, Wiltshire...
...Hills, Calif.; David C. Kibbe of Eliot House and Hudson, Ohio; Hillel J. Kieval of Peabody Terrace and Auburndale; David A. Koplow of Winthrop House and Sioux Falls, S.D.; William H. Lohman of Quincy House and Providence, R.I.; Wayne H. McGuire of Dudley House and Somerville; and, Jerry A. Menikoff of Dunster House and Massapeque Park...
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