my favourite book - or political correctness gone too far

when i was younger i had quite a collection of books, and i read them over and over and over again. enid blyton was one of my favourites. mostly because, and im not sure why, i had this orphan fascination, and enid blyton had a few orphans, or only children, or kids left to their own devices, in her stories.

the folk of the faraway tree was my most favourite of all. i dont know how many times ive read about jo, bessie, fanny and connie. ive recently finished reading it to x and he loved it as well. it had him thinking about trees and faeries and using his imagination rather than playing nintendo.

so how pissed off do you think i get when i find out that the original 4 kids, jo, bessie, fanny and dick, (the spoilt cousin) have had their names changed so they fit better in todays society?

jo is now joe, bessie - beth, fanny - franny, and dick - rick. also, because corporal punishment is not so ok now, dame slap is now called dame snap. i'm surprised they didnt take those chapters out completely.

dame wash-a-lot washes all the time. isnt that a bit sexist to have a female character that stays home and does the washing al the time?

what about moonface? that name is a bit mean, dont you think? just because he has a rather large head, doesnt mean you should call him that.

and silky, the lovely little faerie silky. its well known that she has a soft spot ofr moonface. could it be because she *has* to say that on account of moonface being her pimp, and loaning out pretty silky to all his friends. that squirrel with the red jumper is his little messenger boy, it all makes sense.

saucepan man is just like a bum with his trolley full of plastic bags, and really, they arent all that nice to look at so we should take him out of the story all together.

whatsizname forgets his name all the time, so is quite obviously suffering from alzhiemrs. thats quite nasty to tease an alzhemers sufferer. we should give him a name and more say in the story.

the angry pixie is just outright rude. he throws ink al over connies lovely party dress so he should be out. connie, she's just a prissy little whiner so she can get out as well.

and while we're at it, why dont we cut down the tree and build a superhighway and a shopping centre. inside the shops we can sell plastic replicas of the tree and make billions.

yeah

OR WE COULD JUST LEAVE THE BOOK THE WAY IT WAS WRITTEN