Argh.

[conuly]

Apparently, in addition to not blushing, tanning, going pale from shock/fear, reading (!), or being dentists, black people don't get black eyes. And if somebody is described as having "brown eyes" that can't mean "dark brown eyes", it has to mean "normal" brown eyes, which are light brown.

Oh, yeah, there's no racism here at all.

(Pro tip: If you're trying to claim you're just "shocked", leave it at one comment. One comment "Gosh, I thought she'd look more like Emma Watson, I wasn't expecting this" can mean anything. 500+ comments "Oh, I HATE how everybody has to FORCE diversity into EVERYTHING where it doesn't BELONG, they're RUINING the character and making a MOCKERY of everything I love, sjws, ugh!" starts to look, well, kinda like racism. I'm just saying.)

Comments

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

You're quite right; the Solanaceae are a huge family, and there are lots of Old World species, but eggplant is the only one I can think of that was cultivated for food in Europe, and I don't think it does very well in a northerly climate. At any rate, I'm sure it would never have occurred to Tolkien that some readers would call his novels too implausibly fantastical because potatoes.

"everybody ought to know where potatoes and tomatoes come from, and I will actually refuse to read books that put those in the wrong time periods."

The things everybody ought to know but everybody doesn't know are as many as the stars in the sky. But it seems a bit inconsistent to refuse to read books that have too much botanical diversity, then to complain about people who object to too much human diversity. The question of what color skin Hermione Granger has is a pretty trivial issue, but it's of far greater importance to the story than the question of how Sam Gamgee can possibly be growing those taters.

[conuly]

But it seems a bit inconsistent to refuse to read books that have too much botanical diversity, then to complain about people who object to too much human diversity.

I am large, I contain multitudes.

The question of what color skin Hermione Granger has is a pretty trivial issue, but it's of far greater importance to the story than the question of how Sam Gamgee can possibly be growing those taters.

You and I clearly have different priorities :P

but eggplant is the only one I can think of that was cultivated for food in Europe, and I don't think it does very well in a northerly climate.

No, and in fairness I don't think it was *eaten* in most of Europe until well after it was cultivated there as an ornamental because, well, nightshade.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

"I am large, I contain multitudes."

LOL, good answer.

"You and I clearly have different priorities :P"

Well, yeah: you're a Potter geek, I'm a Tolkien geek.

See, here's a secret only Tolkien geeks really grok about The Lord of the Rings: according to canon, LotR is a translation of the Red Book of Westmarch (http://lotr.wikia.com/wiki/Red_Book_of_Westmarch):

"In the first edition of The Fellowship of the Ring, Tolkien's foreword claimed he had translated the Red Book (http://lotr.wikia.com/wiki/Red_Book_of_Westmarch) from the original Westron (http://lotr.wikia.com/wiki/Westron) into English, and it therefore must be supposed that copies of the book survived through several Ages."

"In The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, Westron was presented as having been completely translated by English. This had certain important implications: first of all, proper names with derivations somewhat evident to speakers of Westron had been translated, to preserve the effect. Thus, names like Baggins, Bagshot Row, Peregrin, Rivendell etc., are presented as not the actual names. "

There is more explanation (http://lotr.wikia.com/wiki/Westron) of all this if you want it. Anyway, what this means is that the Westron word Tolkien 'translated' as potato might have been better translated as turnip. So those who complain that the potato is a New World plant are perfectly correct, but their complaint is not relevant, because the author cleverly left himself an unassailable 'out' in the very first edition.

Really, I'm amazed that such a conlang geek as yourself is not a Tolkien geek. There is some justification to the claim that Tolkien wrote his stories to give his constructed languages someone to speak them. Anyway, if you mentally substitute the word turnip every time potato occurs in the text, it will not affect the story. Same for the coffee and cinnamon rolls: the 'translations' of Westron are meant to convey an image, not to be literally accurate. Probably only Tolkien could have gotten away with this, but he did, and it works.

I suppose it doesn't affect the story much if Hermione Granger is black. My daughter thought that her description is so minimal so that more girls can identify with her, which is sensible enough. However, Rowling did not leave herself an 'out' there, because if Hermione is black, why is that fact never mentioned?

It doesn't wash to say "because it doesn't matter". Ron's red hair is certainly mentioned often enough, and Harry Potter's complexion is described (so I'm told) as 'olive', so if Hermione was black, she'd have been described as such. England may not be as race-obsessed as America, but it's not totally color-blind either.

"... because, well, nightshade."

Good reason; the nightshade family is all more-or-less poisonous (http://www.diagnosisdiet.com/nightshades/), even the species we eat anyway.

[conuly]

However, Rowling did not leave herself an 'out' there, because if Hermione is black, why is that fact never mentioned?

Because she was too busy calling Hermione "waspish" every time she opens her mouth.

Good reason; the nightshade family is all more-or-less poisonous, even the species we eat anyway.

And I will say I'm frankly astonished there are so many edible members of that family, and also tobacco. (Which will kill you, of course, but not right away, so....)

Centuries ago, the common eggplant was referred to as “mad apple” due to belief that eating it regularly would cause mental illness.

Not exactly true. Mad apple is a poor translation of "melanzana" as "mala insana", when in fact the word doesn't have that origin at all. Of course, once the translation appeared, an explanation appeared to justify it, and the one probably just kept on reinforcing the other.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

I get the impression that Hermione in the books is not much like Hermione in the movies.

Heh, humans can and will eat anything that doesn't kill us immediately. "Mithridates, he died old."

"once the translation appeared, an explanation appeared to justify it, and the one probably just kept on reinforcing the other."

That makes sense, because eggplant doesn't actually drive people mad, or at least not so's you'd notice.

[conuly]

Well, I'm just wild about eggplant, and eggplant's wild about... no, wait, that doesn't work. :)

I've never seen the movies. Hermione's skin color may not matter much to me, but Harry's eye color manifestly does. (We all have our things.) Plus, I usually don't like movie adaptations.

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

I liked the movies well enough, having never read the books. My daughter doesn't care for the movies because she says they get too much wrong. She loves the first three books, but says they go downhill after that.

Apparently the actor who plays Harry was supposed to wear emerald-green contact lenses, but couldn't tolerate them. I suppose they could have CGI'd his eyes, but it might have looked hokey