'Absurd censorship': Roald Dahl's books have been rewritten, these are the changes and why

manchestereveningnews.co.uk:

The language used in the work of writer Roald Dahl has been changed to remove anything that my be deemed offensive. The publisher of Dahl’s work, Puffin books has removed words like “fat” to describe characters and gender neutral terms are also now being used.

The changes which were first reported by the Telegraph have been met with scrutiny. Author Salman Rushdie branded the move 'absurd censorship', with even the Prime Minister Rishi Sunak condemning the changes by saying works of fiction should be "preserved and not airbrushed". READ MORE: Pet insurer has people 'crying' after revealing list of best pet names including Dad, McRib and Car Seat French Fry Roald Dahl’s Story Company say they have worked closely to bring inclusion and accessibility to children’s literature with a collective called Inclusive Minds and say that every change was ‘carefully considered’. How have some of the changes been made? In perhaps Dahl’s most famous piece of work, James and the Giant Peach, The Centipede sings, “Aunt Sponge was terrifically fat and tremendously flabby at that,” and also sings “Aunt Spiker was thin as a wire, and dry as a bone, only drier.” These lines have been changed to: “Aunt Sponge was a nasty old brute, and deserved to be squashed by the fruit." In 'The Witches’ at the end of a passage that reveals that the witches are bald underneath their wigs has been changed to say, “There are plenty of other reasons why women might wear wigs and there is certainly nothing wrong with that.” References to 'female' characters are also removed and instead they are referred to as a woman.

One example is Ms Trunchbull from Matilda. In the older texts, she was described as a 'most formidable female' but the new texts will say