Sir Alexander McCall Smith has criticised the “censoring” of children’s books by authors such as Roald Dahl and Enid Blyton, arguing that they present a “sanitised world view”.
As reported by The Telegraph, McCall Smith, who is best known for his No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency books, said children are “quintessentially unreconstructed” and love the “unbowdlerised” versions of the novels. The report continues:
While “many enlightened modern parents” would prefer to remove or change parts that offend their sensibilities, he said their offspring “remain doggedly socially conservative, not to say reactionary”.
The 76-year-old author, who is based in Edinburgh, said he had chosen to read unedited versions of Enid Blyton’s Secret Seven books to his grandchildren, who “love” them.
Blyton has been criticised for racism and xenophobia in her books and her novels have been the subject to “sensitive text revisions”.
The Roald Dahl Story Company and Puffin Books carried out a review of Dahl’s classics which led to the removal or rewriting of content deemed offensive. This included references to weight, mental health, violence, gender and race.
McCall Smith has written more than 100 books that have sold around 30 million copies worldwide and been translated into 46 languages.
Writing in Scottish Field magazine, he said: “Reading out loud to attentive children is one of life’s undoubted pleasures, even if at times it can be demanding.
“Children know if you skip anything, whether out of desire to get to the end more quickly, or because you decide that a passage is too out of step with the zeitgeist. Once they spot the censorship, they are not slow to protest.
“There is a lot to feel uncomfortable about in Enid Blyton. The children in the books are often unkind, embodying the unattractive attitudes of bourgeois Surrey, circa 1952.
“Exclusivity lies at the heart of the Secret Seven’s appeal. The real point here is somebody is excluded, which makes membership of the band seem infinitely more precious.
“The children in the Blyton books love cutting others out from the fun. They are also not slow to disparage those who do not have their advantages.
“Occasionally disadvantaged children crop up in these stories, but they are very much the other, barely tolerated by the Secret Seven or their associates.”
He added: “In spite of these evident failings, the juvenile audience to which I am currently reading these books loves them. And therein lies a bit of a lesson: children can see through a sanitised world view.
Worth reading in full.
