ain't i grand?

on monday mornings, i am the parent reader for jackson's kindergarten class. all of the other parent readers are bi-weekly in their duties; but, being the over-zealous first-time parent, i signed up for a weekly assignment. as i'm already at the school, anyway (to volunteer in my wife's library) , i figured i might as well ingratiate myself with all the kindergarteners.

one great thing about being married to a librarian is that she knows every book out there. think meg ryan in "you've got mail." that's my wife. when time comes for the reading hour, she will be sure to give me some good suggestions for apt material; or often enough, just pick something out for me and tell me "the kids will love it." she's always right.

for some reason, i have had "little black sambo" on my mind lately. for a book i first discovered over 30 years ago, this little masterpiece has real staying power. innocently written by an anglo mother for her two children; "little black sambo" has become a lightening rod for the cry of "racism" over the past few decades. to be sure, "sambo" was a pejorative remark dating to the 17th century, the illustrations were caricatures of black and african stereotypes, and african americans grew to hate the conventional images portrayed in this piece of work. what a shame. it is a charming story about a clever little boy from a mythical land who outwits some tigers in an effort to keep his clothes, and save his life. written in the day that it was, any resemblance to perceived stereotypes or prejudices was not only ignored, it was certainly not even recognized by the caucasian family for whom it was written.

the book i read today is a re-telling of this famous tale published under the title "sam and the tigers." it is basically the same story, but written with some creative differences. no one is named sambo, or mumbo, or jumbo. nobody is drawn to look like aunt jemima or any one else in the jemima clan. the story is a little more in-depth, has a "unity in nature" theme, and the whole community is involved in the celebration of sam's triumph. fortunately, the new author stays close enough to the original to leave most of the charm i've always loved in this story.

the new book is written in the dialect of the uncle remus stories. these stories are hard to find, because they are percieved to be racist in concept,as they ridicule the speech patterns of the working poor blacks of the south. replacing one perceived cultural inequity with another is an interesting course to pursue. i can't figure it out.

of course, the greater question to arise is : what elements of our heritage will completely survive the cultural guillotine that is political correctness? re-writing of history has begun to creep into school texts and controversial works of literature are constantly challenged, re-written, or censored. there are moments in the history of man (and the u.s.a.) that are regrettable at best...deplorable in other circumstances. to delete these failures in right-thinking from our history is to close our minds to the lessons learned through the struggle to raise our species above the places previously inhabited. to lump too many works into the category of "failure" is to diminish our ability to explore the differences that make us who we are.