Apple relaxes restrictions on 'Ulysses' comic strip

Images of a nude woman and two men embracing will, at last, grace the iPad, with Apple having reversed its decision to censor two comic strip renditions of literary classics designed for the new tablet computer. Erotic drawings in a version of James Joyce’s Ulysses, sketched by artist Robert Berry, and a version of The Importance of Being Earnest by Belgian Tom Bouden were given the go-ahead when public outcry ensued after Apple’s attempt to censor the works. 

Apple’s announcement comes just at the right time, with “Bloomsday” - an annual celebration named after Ulysses' protagonist Leopold Bloom that pays homage to Joyce’s lovers - was celebrated on June 16. Fans of the Irish writer were incensed when The New Yorker reported that Apple had asked Berry to redraw two panels of Ulysses Seen, in which a goddess appeared naked.

James Joyce "Ulysses Seen", page 36, which Apple sought to censor. Drawings by Robert Berry (Throwaway Horse). "Ulysses Seen", page 37, rattled Apple with its nude images. Drawings by Robert Berry (Throwaway Horse).

Berry offered to obscure the offending body parts with a fig leaf, but Apple refused. "We didn't anticipate a strict "no nudity" rule for images when the product carries a mature rating. We figured we would have to pixelate some images at most and not completely remake them. We received a call from Apple informing us that they couldn't approve our app unless the nudity was completely removed. They were very polite about it, but very firm about their guidelines", explains Robert Berry to France24.com.

Following widespread objection, Apple changed its tune. "We made a mistake. When the art panel edits of the Ulysses Seen app and the graphic novel adaptation of Oscar Wilde's Importance of Being Earnest app were brought to our attention, we offered the developers the opportunity to resubmit their original drawings and update their apps", said spokesperson Trudy Miller in an email on Monday.

Apple has also relaxed its censorshop of another comic strip, Tom Bouden's version of The Importance of Being Earnest, in which two female characters are replaced with men. The result is a homosexual parody that, from the beginning, was not really to Apple’s taste. 

Oscar Wilde Censored sketches of "The Importance of Being Earnest" by Tom Bouden (iPad application designed by Peter Bonte). Original sketches of "The Importance of Being Earnest" by Tom Bouden (iPad application designed by Peter Bonte).

This has not been Ulysees'  first victory over attempts to censor it. In 1921, the Society for the Suppression of Vice judged the work obscene, and prevented the novel – which had been published in instalments by The Little Review – from being sold. But on December 6 1933, a New York court overruled the prohibition in a judgment that has become part of literary history.

"To my mind it's just another in a long list of victories that Ulysees has won for making people challenge their own conventions. 88 years later Joyce is still showing us that artistic freedom is still the most fundamental aspect of innovation and needs to be a part of our modern world", Berry says excitedly.

The business manager of the start-up firm Throwaway Horse, which publishes the comic strip Ulysses Seen, takes a more pragmatic view. "We are uncomfortable with the term 'censoring': it’s Apple's house, their ball-game. Apple is not the government. And we are free to publish whatever we want on our own website", Chad Rutkowski told France24.com.

The controversy has allowed Ulysses Seen to reap the benefits of a vast publicity campaign for very little money. And perhaps it will help convert new fans to the works of the notoriously libertarian James Joyce.