The author of one of the world’s most successful children’s fiction series has accused his publisher of editing references to mental health and weight in his books without his permission.
Last week The Times revealed that RL Stine’s Goosebumps books, which have sold more than 300 million copies and are the second-highest selling series behind Harry Potter, had been re-released as sanitised ebooks.
Stine has now said that the publisher, Scholastic, made the changes to his work without reviewing them with him. “I’ve never changed a word in Goosebumps. Any changes were never shown to me,” Stine tweeted.
As well as changing cultural references such as “Walkman”, the publisher removed words that it believed some readers might find offensive. A character is described as “cheerful” rather than “plump”, references to villains making victims “slaves” have been removed and “crazy” has been changed to “silly”.
In one of the novels, a character wearing a Halloween costume, dressed as “a dark and stormy night”, no longer wears black face paint.
Scholastic said that it had made the changes to “keep the language current and avoid imagery that could negatively impact a young person’s view of themselves today, with a particular focus on mental health”.
The Goosebumps titles were a phenomenon when they were first printed in the 1990s and at the height of their success were selling four million copies a month. Stine, 79, from the United States, wrote 62 of the original Goosebumps series and once said that he could write a book in six days.
In the novel Bride of the Living Dummy, released in 1998, a character dressed as a clown has the black rings painted around his eyes and mouth changed to red.
In the 1997 edition of I Live in Your Basement!, a monster issues orders to the protagonist. “Did he really expect me to be his slave — for ever?” has been changed to, “Did he really expect me to do this — for ever?”
Similarly early books in a series of Slappy novels — the ventriloquist’s dummy, who comes to life and is the villain of the series — describe him as wanting to subjugate humans as his “slaves”, but in later stories they are called “servants”.
There are many mentions of the word “crazy” removed across the series. Replacements include terms such as “silly”, “wild”, “scary”, “lost her mind” and “stressed”. The term “a real nut” is now “a real wild one” and “nutcase” is “weirdo”.
In Say Cheese and Die — Again!, released in 1996, a line about schoolgirls having “crushes” on the headmaster has been deleted.
The edits, part of a 2018 ebook re-release, are the latest example of novels being changed in an attempt to reduce offence. Last month it emerged that Roald Dahl’s stories had been subjected to hundreds of changes, including no longer describing Augustus Gloop as fat or Mrs Twit as fearfully ugly.
Reissued versions of James Bond novels will also be edited to remove racial references later this year.
Scholastic said: “For more than 30 years the Goosebumps series has brought millions of kids to reading through humour with just the right amount of scary. Scholastic takes its responsibility seriously to continue bringing this classic adolescent brand to each new generation.
“When reissuing titles several years ago, Scholastic reviewed the text to keep the language current and avoid imagery that could negatively impact a young person’s view of themselves today, with a particular focus on mental health.”
