Tripe, Secret Garden

I don't know what version of secret garden I read as a kid but reading it now and the sheer racism of the author is so jarring. Fuck. I think the books they sold here must have been cleaned of the original texts but how tf can this shit still be in print? It's a children's novel and this is what they taught kids pathetic. 

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Mary listened to her with a grave, puzzled expression. The native servants she had been used to in India were not in the least like this. They were obsequious and servile and did not presume to talk to their masters as if they were their equals. They made salaams and called them "protector of the poor" and names of that sort. Indian servants were commanded to do things, not asked. It was not the custom to say "please" and "thank you" and Mary had always slapped her Ayah in the face when she was angry. She wondered a little what this girl would do if one slapped her in the face. She was a round, rosy, good-natured looking creature, but she had a sturdy way which made Mistress Mary wonder if she might not even slap back—if the person who slapped her was only a little girl.

" You thought I was a native! You dared! You don't know anything about natives! They are not people—they're servants who must salaam to you. You know nothing about India. You know nothing about anything! " 

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This dialogue was allowed to exist in a children's novel, and still does. Coming from the mouth of a child no less. Fuck. 

The world disappoints me. I feel awful reading this tripe. How poetic that it's a day before independence day no less. 

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Sometimes I understand why people can feel insecure. But you have to never bend to this garbage or think less of yourself just coz someone else did. 

I hate racists from the bottom of my heart. All of you can collectively fuck off. 

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I had actually loved this book, it was like a wonderful treasure to me as a child and now I hate it. Just hate it. Whatever sanitized version I must have read back then just feels traitorous asf now. Even The Little Princess was written by this author, I loved that too and I do not want to ever read it again. Funny. Two books that genuinely had a place in my heart and I was so little when I read them I didn't know they were the same author. And now I'm just filled with disgust at them revealing to me the disdain the author held for people like me.

Bitch. 

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What a deeply problematic fucking book lol. Even the uncle in the book is shown as some ugly dude who had no business landing a beautiful wife, the girl is shown as ugly and people tell her that to her face. It's like the only hero here is the clean air of england like some oasis that heals you. Yeah fuck this for good tbh.