Completely Bewildered

[owlectomy]

The strangest story to come across my desk today, via my aunt who lives in Saskatchewan, is that people are getting all het up about a "new edition" of Anne of Green Gables whose cover features a buxom blonde teenager. (Anne, of course, is a redhead.)

It's not a good-looking cover, and it's not exactly a good representation of the book, but... Anne of Green Gables is public domain. Any random person has the right to publish a copy of the book with Gilbert Blythe wrestling a polar bear or Diana Barry flying an invisible airplane. And, that's pretty much what happened: a random person slapped some stock art on the cover and published the book with CreateSpace. I get how important Anne is to Our Shared Cultural Heritage or whatever, but this isn't a reputable publisher sexing up a beloved book, it's not going to be on the shelves in bookstores, and... as far as I'm concerned this is a complete nonstory. So I have no idea why the Toronto Sun and the Globe and Mail are acting like this is news. Well, at least the Globe and Mail article makes clear that it's self-published.

(I fear that I may be coming across as "self-publishing, meh, who cares." This is not my intention. Trying to make a buck by selling something you didn't make, but nevertheless have the right to sell, and putting a terrible, slightly offensive cover on it... meh, it's kinda sleazy, but who cares?)

Comments

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

I saw this a while back somewhere else, that didn't say it was self-published. I assumed it was some publisher issuing a new version that *would* be in bookstores. Possibly the papers don't understand the distinction?

[takumashii.livejournal.com]

I really HOPE that anyone doing reporting for a major newspaper like that would understand the distinction, but that may be too much to hope for!