Agatha Christie retitled, Roald Dahl rewritten, a bad wind blows on the edition.
In question: words deemed infamous, "nigger", but also "fat" or even "secretary", in clear any description held to be derogatory.
Among publishers,
"sensitivity readers"
responsible for sparing the reader perform a strange task in the name of "inclusiveness".
What does it matter to them that the very principle of the tale is to force the line to instruct the young reader.
Roald Dahl, master of the genre, practiced caricature and burlesque excess to make people laugh.
“Castigat ridendo mores”
(“he corrects morals by laughing”), such was the motto of the commedia dell'arte.
This pleasant pedagogy is unacceptable for a certain modern mentality.
A century ago, this crazy practice would have been called censorship.
Today, we make it a charitable work: it would be a question of preserving the fragile spirits.
Everything is judged by the yardstick of contemporary sensibility in its excess and…
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