Revised Versions Of Roald Dahl's Books Reach Stores, Publishers Criticised For 'Absurd Censorship'

There has been quite a stir ever since the revised version of Roald Dahl’s children’s books reached the store shelves. Many writers and readers have come forward and criticised the publisher, Puffin Books, and the Dahl estate for tampering with the classic books the majority of which were published from the '60s to '80s.

Puffin Books And Dahl Estate Bands Together To Change Text In Roald Dahl's Children's Books

Twitter

Puffin Books explained that the changes to the original copies were made to comply with the readers of today’s time. Classic hits such as ‘Charlie And The Chocolate Factory’ and ‘Matilda’ were censored in order to make them more acceptable to the modern reader. The publisher diluted the text of Dahl’s books so that they “can continue to be enjoyed by all today.”

Changes to the book were made to agree with modern times, although it seems that many are protesting the recent changes. Augustus Gloop from ‘Charlie And The Chocolate Factory’ is no longer ‘enormously fat’ but just ‘enormous’. His ‘great flabby folds of fat’ were reduced to his ‘great folds’ and the ‘crazy prince’ became just the ‘prince’. While some changes were welcome as ‘Pondicherry’ was changed to ‘Puducherry’ others were deemed unnecessary and even harmful.?

Critics React To Puffin Books Censoring Roald Dahl's Books

Wikimedia Commons

Critics from around the world took to the internet to shame the publishers and the estate for their tampering with the texts. Booker Prize winner Salman Rushdie weighed his opinion on the matter and wrote in a tweet, “Roald Dahl was no angel but this is absurd censorship. Puffin Books and the Dahl estate should be ashamed.”?

On similar notes, writer Philip Pullman told BBC, “If Dahl offends us, let him go out of print.” While PM Rishi Sunak also entered the debate and said, “we shouldn’t gobblefunk around with words. I think it’s important that works of literature and works of fiction are preserved and not airbrushed.”

BBC broadcaster Dominique Samuels wrote, “The censorship of Roald Dahl’s work is yet another example of how the woke mob is completely out of control. What’s next, secret libraries of unedited books that we’ll have to hide away from these psychopaths?”?

One Twitter user pointed out, “Just to be clear, this move from the Roald Dahl estate to effectively erase his ouevre’s rougher edges isn’t millennial woke censorship it’s cynical boomer big business. Same as with Seuss, you’ve got an increasingly-dated author & an estate hellbent on cashing in the IP forever.”

One user suggested, “been trying to talk about the roald dahl censorship without sounding like a boomer. anyway, i think that this statement from Warner Brothers before their old racist cartoons is pretty good, would rather publishers do something like this than literally change words.”