Bury My Heart's "poetic license"

HBO Buries its Honesty at Wounded KneeAccording to the New York Times, the network carefully considered its decision. Daniel Giat, who adapted Brown’s book for the screenplay, recently said to a group of television writers “Everyone felt very strongly that we needed a white character or a part-white, part-Indian character to carry a contemporary white audience through this project.”

At least that’s the truth.

Of course, apologists tell us that it’s the “bigger issue” that’s paramount. That “poetic license” is standard practice in adaptations; therefore adding and cutting and fabricating is just dandy and a-okay as long as it remains intellectually honest.

Intellectually honest? Not when you have a real-life person engaging in a major battle he never fought in. Intellectual honesty is when you add dialogue and scenes to flesh out the story but remain faithful to the known facts. That ain’t the case here. HBO IS FABRICATING HISTORY TO APPEAL TO WHITE FOLKS.