Piers Morgan speaks out over Roald Dahl books being edited
Piers Morgan has spoken out about how the Roald Dahl books have been edited to bring the language in line with the modern day.
Characters like Augustus Gloop have been referred to as “enormous” rather than “fat” in new editions of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Matilda and The Twits have also been edited to remove language that could be offensive.
Of course, Piers Morgan is furious, because he always is.
“For all of the people, products, books, brands, movies, meals, songs, ideas, and dead historic figures that have been outlawed by the cancel culture vultures, I never thought they’d be feasting on this,” he said on his show, Piers Morgan Uncensored.
“Does your skin crawl as much as mine does when you hear that phrase – sensitivity readers, to ransack the great Roald Dahl’s legendary books.”
“The thought police have taken a meat cleaver to some of the best-loved stories of all time, literally hundreds and hundreds of words and phrases have been cut or completely re-written,” he said. Morgan also claimed the books were never offensive in the first place.
He went on: “In Fantastic Mr Fox, a line describing tractors – probably one of my favourites – as black has been deleted, because apparently just mentioning a colour of an object like a tractor is now racially charged.
“Matilda’s Miss Trunchbull no longer has a great horsey face, even though her face does resemble a horse, now it’s just a face, presumably to avoid upsetting any horses that might watch this or read it.”
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak also condemned the edits recently, saying via a press statement: “When it comes to our very rich literary heritage, the Prime Minister agrees with the BFG that you should not gobblefunk around with words.” Philip Pullman had also suggested the works should remain as they were written and be allowed to be replaced slowly by more modern books written my new authors.
Dahl’s publisher Puffin had said they’d hired sensitivity readers so that the books “can continue to be enjoyed by all today.”