Goosebumps author ‘censors his own works’

‘One character who had six chins is now described as being at least 6ft 6in’

WHEN children of the 1990s were not clutching wands outside bookshops in anticipation of the latest Harry Potter book, they were being terrified by RL Stine’s tales of missing campers, cursed cameras or haunted theme parks.

Now, the Goosebumps series author, one of the most successful children’s writers worldwide, is reported to have edited many of his titles to remove references to weight, mental health or race.

The 79-year-old American, who has sold more than 300 million copies of the 62-book series – making it the second highest selling series ever after Potter – is re-releasing e-book versions through publisher Scholastic.

The new versions include more than 100 edits across more than a dozen titles, according to The Times.

One character is described as “cheerful” in the new series, as opposed to “plump”. And another who had “six chins” is now described as “at least 6ft 6in”, the paper reported.

Other references to violence or to the attractiveness of female characters are also said to have been sanitised.

In a reissued version of Bride of the Living Dummy,a

ventriloquist dummy come to life no longer knocks a girl unconscious with a “love tap”, using a “magic spell” instead.

Other edits are said to include a character’s African American heritage no longer being mentioned in one of the titles and a description of a group as “very overweight” replaced with “huge”.

In The Curse of Camp Cold Lake, meanwhile, a reference to one of the boys wolf-whistling at the camp leader has been changed to “whistled loudly”.

Several mentions of the word “crazy” have reportedly been removed across the series.

And a character’s musings about whether a monster intends to keep him as a “slave” have also been altered.

The news follows a backlash after Puffin UK attempted a censored release of another children’s author with an equally grotesque and enjoyably macabre style – Roald Dahl – only to backtrack and announce that uncensored versions would continue to be published.

Puffin had removed references to weight, mental health, gender and colour.

Reissued copies of Ian Fleming’s Bond novels have also been amended to remove a number of references to race, although sexist language and offensive terms for east Asian people remain.

Stine and Scholastic did not respond to a request for comment.