The original stories of the author Roald Dahl will continue to be published without altering adjectives or physical descriptions of some of his characters, as announced by the Puffin publishing house, the children's literature subsidiary of the giant Penguin Random House.
The company has been forced to give in, in the face of unanimous protests from writers, book critics, readers, politicians and even British royalty.
With the authorization of the heirs of the prolific author, the publisher had carried out a complete revision of already classic works such as
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
, or
James and the Giant Peach.
, to eliminate some adjectives or physical descriptions of their characters, with the aim of making the texts more politically correct and adapting them to a supposedly greater sensitivity of new generations.
The widespread protest backlash—led by writer Salman Rushdie, also published by Penguin—spread beyond the UK's borders.
Dahl had sold more than 300 million copies of his books worldwide.
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The "rewriting" of Roald Dahl's texts sparks global outrage and suspicions about its legality
"We have been paying attention to the debate over the past week, which has only reaffirmed the extraordinary power of Roald Dahl's books, and has raised the question of how to maintain the relevance of stories from another time for each new generation." Francesca Dow, Puffin's CEO, said in a public statement.
The publisher, which planned to publish a new collection of Dahl's complete works with the revised texts —which can already be purchased individually— at the end of the year has finally announced that readers will be able to choose between the original version of the books, of which they will also print new editions, or the updated version with the corrections that have sparked so much criticism.
Publisher-imposed corrections meant that Augustus Gloop, the ambitious, food-obsessed kid in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, was no longer "enormously fat" but just "enormous";
Aunt Sponge, from
James and the Giant Peach
, stopped being the "fat aunt";
the men of the clouds (Cloud-Men), also in that book, now became "people" (Cloud-People), and even a mention of Rudyard Kipling -the Victorian author has been questioned for years for his colonialist tone- had been turned Jane Austen into another.
The queen consort Camila, known for her great fondness for books and who even maintains a reading club on the internet, also wanted to intervene in the controversies of these last days, during a ceremony held at her official residence in Clarence House: "Please , remain honest with your vocation, oblivious to the obstacles of those who try to break your freedom of expression or impose limits on your imagination”, said the wife of Carlos III to the authors who had attended the event.
The publisher Penguin, said its executive director in the United Kingdom, Tom Weldon, is used to "being part of the cultural debate" always present in society, although "sometimes it is challenging and becomes uncomfortable.
And it is clear that this has been one of those occasions·”, Weldon has lamented, after confirming that “readers will be free to choose the version of Dahl they prefer” when they are published again at the end of 2023.
After the intense debate and the rectification of the publisher, there have also been those who have expressed their suspicions before a stormy week that is going to translate into an increase in sales of Dahl's books.
At the moment, the collection of 16 stories from her has already been in the second position of sales of children's literature on Amazon.
The Glasgow bookseller D Franklin, founder of the Galli Books publishing house —with an editorial line focused on justice and “intersectionality”—, expressed his suspicions on Twitter: “Puffin and the Dahl heirs have struggled to make cash: a A first increase in sales of the old printed editions, after the controversy created, was followed by another jump in sales among those who supported the changes.
And now they announce the edition of two versions to choose from”.
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