Lena Dunham’s Book To Undergo Tweak After Rape Story Controversy

Is Lena Dunham’s publisher going to edit Dunham’s memoir “Not That Kind of Girl”? According to the Wrap, publisher Random House will alter all future copies of Dunham’s brave story about her own rape which took place while the writer and actress was in college at Oberlin.

Although Dunham stated that some names were changed in the book, one Oberlin alum by the name of Barry isn’t satisfied. The former student is a dead ringer for the description of Dunham’s attacker, who she refers to as — you guessed it — Barry. Dunham describes “Barry” having a flamboyant mustache, a deep voice, and purple cowboy boots that were worn by the “token Republican.”

The real Barry, who is not a rapist but just a regular dude that shares Dunham’s pseudonym, is suffering from the release of the book. After several attempts to get the attention of Random House and Dunham, he decided to hire an attorney to get things straightened out.

In a statement, Barry’s attorney said of the situation, “We’re not on a warpath. It took the threat of litigation to make them take action. We have certainly intimated that we think our client is being libeled, but we’ve been trying to be as reasonable as possible.”

As for what will change in Lena Dunham’s “Not That Kind of Girl,” Random House has said that physical books will be changed and digital copies will be clear about Barry just being a pseudonym.

To pay for legal representation, Barry raised a legal fund on GoFundMe in his quest to put an end to the confusion. Random House is now offering to foot this bill. In a statement, Random House said, “On our own behalf and on behalf of our author, regrets the confusion that has led attorney Aaron Minc to post on GoFundMe on behalf of his client, whose first name is Barry.”

“We are offering to pay the fees Mr. Minc has billed his client to date. Our offer will allow Mr. Minc and his client to donate all of the crowd-funding raised to not-for-profit organizations assisting survivors of rape and sexual assault.”

So far, Lena Dunham has not responded to the Barry snafu, but since the release of her memoir she’s been at the forefront of controversy spawning from the book. Critics interpreted sexual abuse when the writer described how at 7-years-old her curious nature that got the best of her when she opened her sister’s privates only to discover that she found the toddler had “six or seven pebbles in there.”

In another part of the book, Dunham described wooing her sister with gifts in favor of affection. In the book Lena writes, “Basically, anything a sexual predator might do to woo a small suburban girl, I was trying.”

That said, responding to real life Oberlin Barry coming forward with a libel accusation was probably not the first thing that came to Lena’s mind.

[Image via Helga Esteb / Shutterstock.com]