A content warning has been added to the new edition of Nancy Mitford’s 1945 novel The Pursuit of Love.
Publishing house Penguin has reissued Mitford’s book, about an upper English family in the interwar period, now with a cautionary note inserted into its opening pages.
The warning informs readers that the novel features “expressions and depictions of prejudices that were commonplace in British society” when it was written 80 years ago, condemning them as “wrong then” and “wrong today”.
Narrated by character Fanny Logan, the story follows the love life of her cousin, Linda Radlett, and is presented as a comedy with tragic elements.
Penguin has not specified what “prejudices” in Mitford’s novel prompted the cautionary note. The character of Uncle Matthew, however, is likely to have played a part in their decision.
Portrayed by Dominic West in the 2022 BBC adaptation of the novel, Uncle Matthew commonly breaks out into xenophobic rants targeting Germans, Italians, Spanish people and French people, using slurs to describe them.
He demonstrates a dislike of “bloody foreigners” as well as educated women.
As noted by The Telegraph, the slurs used by Uncle Matthew have not been edited out by Penguin for the latest edition, which was issued in 2021. Other ethnic terms similarly remain.
The cautionary note, however, adds that publishers do not want to rewrite history, stipulating that “we are printing the novel as it was originally published, because to make changes would be the same as pretending these prejudices never existed”.
A spokesperson for Penguin told The Independent : “We publish a very wide range of thousands of classic titles, spanning centuries of publishing. In a small number of cases we include a note that a text was written in a very different social and historical context.
“These decisions are made by individual editors drawing on their publishing expertise and judgment, and based on factors including the content of the book and the wishes of an author’s estate.”
The news follows months after it emerged that Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels and Roald Dahl’s children’s books are being edited for modern readers.
In February, it was revealed that Fleming’s 007 books had been rewritten to omit racist langauge and a number of racial references following a review by sensitivity readers.
You can find the most glaring edits as well as the most conspicuous elements to remain in the James Bond novels here.
The controversial news followed only days after it was announced that Dahl’s children’s books were similarly being edited to remove language considered offensive, such as the word “fat”.
In February, the Queen forced publisher Puffin UK to back down on its censorship of the Dahl books after she delivered an impassioned speech defending free speech and the right of writers to express themselves,
