The decision to change objectionable passages for a new edition of the books had triggered heavy criticism.
After sharp criticism of a linguistic adaptation of the children’s books by author Roald Dahl, the British Puffin publishing house has announced an unchanged edition of its classics. This will be published in addition to the defused version for young readers, it said in a statement on Friday. “We recognize the importance of continuing to print the author’s original writing,” the statement said.
Readers would have the freedom to choose which version of the Dahl stories they preferred. The publisher’s decision to remove offensive content and words for a new edition of the books had previously caused an outcry. According to reports, words like “fat” and “ugly” should disappear from Dahl’s works.
The publisher confirmed that issues such as weight, mental health, violence, gender and skin color were affected. For many critics, however, this went too far. The British-Indian author Salman Rushdie accused the publisher of “absurd censorship”.
The publisher justified the changes by saying that the new edition is aimed at young readers who are coming into contact with literature for the first time. According to the publisher, the classic series of Dahl books will include seventeen titles, including “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”, “Matilda”, “The BFG” and “The Fantastic Mr. Fox”. The books are to be enriched with archive material.
Briton Roald Dahl, who died in 1990, is controversial because he repeatedly drew attention to himself with clearly anti-Semitic statements. His family apologized in 2020 for the writer’s views. But that is not the background for the adaptation of his texts.