Sanitizing Roald Dahl
Roald Dahl’s classic children’s books are famously dark, irreverent, and edgy, said Danica Kirka in the Associated Press. But the late Dahl’s publisher is now seeking to “make them more acceptable to modern readers” by rewriting his language to remove hundreds of possibly “damaging” words. Puffin Books U.K., which publishes perennial Dahl favorites such as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Matilda, changed parts of at least 10 books in partnership with Inclusive Minds, a consortium of “sensitivity readers” who make children’s books “more inclusive.” Gone are references to people being “fat,” “ugly,” “bald,” and “crazy.” Scary tractors are no longer “black.” Boys and girls are referred to as the more gender-neutral “children.” Matilda now reads Jane Austen instead of colonialist white male Rudyard Kipling. In Witches, a disguised witch seeking to pass as an ordinary woman no longer poses as a “supermarket cashier” but as a “top scientist.” Facing a firestorm of accusations of “censorship,” Puffin announced that alongside the sanitized versions it will also publish unaltered “classic” versions of 17 Dahl books.
“Why not do Shakespeare next?” asked Charles C.W. Cooke in National Review. The Bard’s work may be out of copyright, but it is filled with “non-inclusive” descriptions of fat and ugly people, racism and sexism and political violence, and in the character of Shylock, anti-Semitism.
If it sounds “ridiculous” to rewrite Shakespeare to reflect modern sensibilities, it is no less offensive for cultural scolds to insert clumsy political correctness into “the greatest genius in the history of children’s books.” The “arrogance” of these “totalitarian” censors is breathtaking.
“The cultural left should be extremely cautious about championing the censorship of literature,” said Helen Lewis in The Atlantic. Reworking Dahl opens a dangerous door at a time when conservatives are banning books like The Handmaid’s Tale that discuss race, gender, and sexuality in ways they find offensive. Actually, very few people on the Left agree with censoring Dahl, said Nick Catoggio in The Dispatch. His books have been beloved by generations of children because of their prickly, mean-spirited nature, not in spite of it, and are “touchstones” many of us grew up with. Those offended by Dahl have another option: to write “better, more popular books” that have no mean descriptions or subversive satire. “Good luck, fellas.”