Puffin (publisher of Roald Dahl's childrens' books) is hired sensitivity readers to make edits designed to make the books more inclusive. Some controversy followed. Sample changes that were reported (making an effort to a sampling of different categories of changes, and noting that at least one of these appears to be a typo of some sort).
Charlie and the chocolate factory
"Pants" -> "trousers"
“You only had to mention the word “cacao” to an Oompa-Loompa and he would start dribbling at the mouth” removed, along with similar
"She wants a good kick in the pants,” whispered Grandpa Joe" -> "“She needs to learn some manners,” whispered Grandpa Joe"
"A few queer rumblings were heard" -> "A few strange rumblings were heard"
Fantastic Mr. Fox
"He was enormously fat." -> "He was enormous."
"Each man will have a gun and a flashlight." -> "Each person will have a person and a flashlight."
Several changes made to ensure that "smallest fox" is not observed to drink cider.
“That ought to cheer up poor Mrs Fox.” -> “That ought to cheer up Mrs Fox." (and other removals of the word 'poor' in similar context)
BFG
Removed: "Japanese beans is very small, so a giant will need to gobble up about six Japanese beans before he is feeling full up. Others like the Norway people and the Yankee-Doodles is ever so much bigger and usually two or three of those makes a good tuck-in."
"It was something black" -> "It was something dark"
“I don’t have a mother or a father” -> "I don't have parents"
"His skin was reddish-brown" removed
"The eyes were tiny black holes" -> "The eyes were tiny holes"
"except her faithful old Mary" -> "except her faithful Mary"
Resolves to roughly the percentage of changes that have been undone, as best I can judge from common reporting, at the end of this year.
For more context, see this HN thread and links therein: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34849383
I also suggest this comprehensive listing of changes made, on reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/books/comments/1154tr5/the_hundreds_of_changes_made_to_roald_dahls_books/j8znxo2/
Related questions
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I intend to resolve this 50%.
The problem is as follows. It is possible to buy the new (2022) edition, which supposedly has these changes made. However, this is in no way the default. I have failed to find this edition in any brick-and-mortar store. Some news articles complained that readers found their ebook editions automatically updated, but when I bought the ebook of BFG on amazon, none of the changes were in place.
Open to comments or further information. Otherwise this resolves 50% at the end of the week.
@ScottLawrence I did not check correctly. Still working on the resolution. Sorry folks, bear with me...
@SirCryptomind In progress. As I said below, this'll resolve later this month after I have an opportunity to walk into a couple stores. One of the other markets will resolve this weekend (I just need to write a script to determine the answer).
When shopping online, it looks like most books for sale are the old version, without the edits. I'll try going into a couple stores later this month and see which editions are available. If the majority of books that I can actually buy don't have these edits, I have a difficult time resolving this to NO.
(I'm extremely glad I didn't bet in this market!)
There's an update: https://www.foxnews.com/media/ronald-dahls-publisher-backs-down-anti-woke-backlash-classic-language-version-stay-print
This alone is not sufficient for a YES resolution. Without new announcements, I'll look at the end of the year at what's actually available on shelves and online.
@Duncan No. I'll use my judgement about what the "main" version is. As an extreme example, if in October Puffin begins charging $500 for limited-edition "heirloom" copies, that's not going to count towards a YES.
There are lots of ways this market could end up requiring a judgement call, so I'm not betting in it, of course.