Category: Section 2: Censorship

Figure 1: A section of the index where René Descartes and his works could be found

The Index was first published as a response to the many existing controversial works that the Catholic Church deemed to potentially disrupt or distract the faithful masses. The works listed in the Index covered topics ranging from the likes of philosophy and politics to theology and science. In all cases, these were considered for banning because they fulfilled the general criteria of blasphemy, heresy, and religiously taboo topics. To prevent dissent and formation of controversial opinion by the masses, the Index was implemented to prevent contamination of the Catholic faith and corruption of morals through theologically erroneous or immoral books, with the first edition being published in 1559. The Index was then subsequently distributed to Catholic congregations around the world to spread word of this banned literature. It also acted as a guide for censors to determine what natures of books to permit for publishing, as printers then required official authorisation before books could be published. As more authors published their works over the years, the Index was constantly updated into newer editions. It was eventually discontinued by Pope Paul VI in 1966.

While the Index listed authors whose works were to be banned from being published, the censors allowed authors to update and correct their works for a chance to be reviewed, potentially having their works removed from the Index. There was also encouragement for would-be authors to self-censor, correct, and edit their works in order to prevent the possibility of being inducted into the Index.

Some examples of well-known works that were mentioned in the Index from its conceiving till its abolishment include John Milton’s Paradise Lost, Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, and Simone De Beauvoir’s The Second Sex, amongst others.

The section of the text in this picture details several specific works of René Descartes, the first being Meditationes de Prima Philosophia, or Meditations on First Philosophy. This text details his metaphysical philosophy and discusses the nature of the relationship between God and Man. Possibly to prevent doubt on the Catholic faith by the faithful, Descartes’ work was indexed, preventing circulation of such theological discourses. Listed to be banned for religious reasons, the justifications for indexing Descartes’ many works were but just a few of the many reasons for the variety of works listed in the Index.

Even though the governing body banned these works, the nature of literature and the discourse of the many possible topics that sprang up from the burgeoning educated and knowledgeable generation resulted in an ever-expanding repertoire of books to sieve through and censor, eventually deeming the censorship and review of works too cumbersome of a task to undertake by the governing body. This would lead to the decline and eventual abolishment of the Index, and placement of the onus of reading responsibly on the faithful masses instead.

Prepared by Ye Heng

Maugham’s The Painted Veil tells the story of the focal female character, Kitty Fane, and her adulterous affair which results in her husband’s revenge; forcing her to accompany him to the centre of a cholera epidemic. It is considered a literary classic and has been adapted to films thrice in America: two under the exact same name in both 1934 and 2006, and one repackaged as ‘The Seventh Sin’ in 1957.

Before its publication as a book in 1925, The Painted Veil had originally been serialised the previous year, both in Nash’s magazine in London and in the American publication Hearst’s International Magazine in New York. Unlike the unaltered American First Trade Edition released by Doran on March 20^th; the bibliographic history of this First English edition, originally released by Heinemann on April 23^rd, is quite complex due to two threatened libel actions which caused drastic alterations in the text and necessitated its reissue due to these censorship complications.

In Great Britain, where this First English Edition was printed, the main character’s surname was already a point of contention during Nash’s publication in 1924. Several readers had threatened to sue for libel since they shared the last name ‘Lane’ with the protagonists. After settling the lawsuit, Maugham had decided to change the characters’ names to ‘Forr’ during the run of the English serialisation, before finally settling on the name ‘Fane’ in the later First English publication in book form, which was printed in two runs of 4,000 copies each.

In the course of its publication, the first issue was recalled and ordered to be scrapped when faced with similar libel charges by the Assistant Secretary of the Hong Kong Government who protested the setting of the novel, what with the direct reference to the state itself and the possible political implications behind the story.

Unfortunately, out of the initial 8000 copies, 4000 had already been disseminated and needed to be recollected. Yet 74 copies —most of which were review copies— still remain in existence, making up this practically unobtainable first issue of the First English Edition. Thus, the preface (Fig 1) of this second Heinemann issue, where Maugham revealed the intricacies of having used certain names, was kept in all subsequent versions of the book.

Fig 1: Preface/Author’s Note

In the first issue of the English Edition, the text was in its unaltered form where Maugham directly quoted many real-life locations such as ‘Hong Kong’, ‘Happy Valley’, ‘The Peak’ (Victoria Peak) and ‘Kowloon’ which led to the eventual lawsuit due to its false depiction of these places and the misunderstandings that could arise from it.

Fig 2: Library Edition, without dust cover

Fig 3: Original Edition, with dust cover

However, in this second issue (Fig 2), Maugham cleverly adapted these location names and henceforth referred to them as ‘Tching-Yen’, ‘Pleasant Valley’, ‘The Mount’ and ‘Lushan’ respectively. All references to ‘Canton’ (Guangzhou) have also been removed due to its proximity to Hong Kong. Even though Maugham had changed the names to avoid allegations, he later admitted in 1934 that he was indeed inspired by the events witnessed during his voyage to China, which directly led to the creation of this book and raises the question of whether this kind of censorship was necessary at all.

Prepared by Aedrie

The birth of Prince James Francis Edward in 1688 was plagued by rumors that he was an imposter baby and that the actual child of James II of England and his wife, Mary of Modena, had been still-born. Written by an unnamed author, which could be due to not wanting to be persecuted, the book is an accusation against the royal family of sneaking a commoner’s child into the royal palace and claiming the child as their own in order to have an heir. This book therefore argues that Prince James Francis Edward was not the true heir to the throne. The book not only contains supposed written evidence of how the child was smuggled into St. James’s Palace and the Queen’s chamber, it also contains a map (Fig 1) of the palace and outlines the alleged pathway by which the child was brought into the chamber.

Fig 1: Map of the Palace with the alleged pathway of how Prince James Francis Edward was snuck in

The text of the Depositions was printed from two different settings of type. Setting 1 has line 10 of ‘The Authors Apology’ beginning with ‘quick’, while for setting 2, line 10 begins with ‘buick’ (with ‘q’ inverted). The setting of the book that is being presented is that of setting 1 (Fig 2). Furthermore, upon comparing the book at hand with those housed at the British Library and Bodleian Libraries using their online catalogue, it is noted that across all the books on page 8, paragraph 7 has been overprinted with the same type ornaments and the letter m. This indicates that the same stamp has been used across all books, at least those observed, to censor the paragraph. Further inspection reveals that the type ornaments and the letter m are not stamped at the same angle throughout all books. Hence overprinting could possibly have occurred after the book had been published and that it had most likely been done by a person and not a machine.

Fig 2: Page of “The Authors Apology” where line 10 begins with ‘quick’

However, what is hard to ascertain is the person who had the paragraph censored. One assumption is that it could have been the author himself or had at least instructed someone to censor the paragraph due to errors with regards to the information. What makes this assumption less credible is that if the author had been one to have censored the paragraph, it would have been most likely reflected in the ‘The Authors Apology.’ where the author himself has noted the errors and changes that have been made throughout the book. Another theory is that it could have been censored by the bookseller Simon Burgis himself as the same stamp has been used in the books that were printed for him. It is important to note that all these remain theories as it is impossible to figure out who authorized the censorship due to the lack of information regarding the book.

Prepared by Lee Ann