In the latest attempt to convince children that history began when they were born, Hodder has elected to update the language in 10 of Enid Blyton’s Famous Five books to be more approachable for 21st century readers. Alison Flood writes in the Sydney Morning Herald:

Hodder is ”sensitively and carefully” revising Blyton’s text after research showed the old-fashioned language was preventing young readers from enjoying the stories.

The narrative of the novels will remain the same but ”mercy me!” has been changed to ”oh no!,” ”fellow” to ”old man” and ”it’s all very peculiar” to ”it’s all very strange.” Other changes include ”housemistress” to ”teacher,” ”awful swotter” to ”bookworm,” ”school tunic” to ”uniform” and ”tinker” to ”traveller.”

Flood goes on to quote Tony Summerfield, head of the Enid Blyton Society, who feels that updating words that have taken on “offensive” connotations (he specifies “queer” and “gay”) is acceptable, but change for the sake of change is not.

Quillblog has a different take on the matter. The word “peculiar” is still in use; changing it to “strange” seems like a blatant case of dumbing down. By contrast, the archaic term “awful swotter” is not so well known, but it is clearly more colourful than the pallid “bookworm,” and is there anything wrong with sending children on a hunt for an unknown term’s meaning? This is how learning and growth occurs.

Updating language to make it more recognizable to modern readers sounds admirable, but it ignores the reality of language as a living, evolving thing, a creature with a history. It also denudes language of its musicality and its beauty. After all, “She hath forsworn to love, and in that vow / Do I live dead that live to tell it now” is infinitely preferable to “She’s taken a vow of abstinence / And it’s killing me.”