I recall as a youth how shocking it was to encounter the F-word in “Life, The Universe, and Everything” by Adams. At the time I figured it was because the book was so old as to predate PC enthusiasm. Turns out I wasn’t reading the US edition. Wiki:
Possibly the most famous example of censorship is in Chapter 22, in which the UK edition mentions that the “Rory” is an award for “The Most Gratuitous Use of the Word ‘Fuck’ in a Serious Screenplay.” In the US edition, this was changed to “Belgium” and the text from the original radio series described “Belgium” as the most offensive word used in the galaxy.
This raises the question as to whether UK literature was swearier first and if that means that the UK has historically had more “value of individualism”.
