BBC stars Greg James and Chris Smith have apologised after sparking a backlash for telling the illustrator of their follow-up book to Roald Dahl’s ‘The Twits’ to give a character a glass eye to make her ‘more disgusting’.
Radio 1 DJ James and his former newsreader Smith said they were ‘sorry to have caused offence’ with the launch video of their new book, The Twits Next Door.
In a promotional video for their follow-up to Dahl’s 1980 novel, James and Smith are seen helping illustrator Emily Jones put the finishing touches on the characters. It is not clear whether they are the original Twits or new protagonists.
As they discuss how to make the characters more revolting, the illustrator asks the pair: ‘What about a glass eye?’
James responds ‘A glass eye!’ before Smith adds: ‘She needs a glass eye. That’s it. What a disgusting pair of Twits!’ Puffin Books, which has 65,000 followers, hastily deleted the video after the outrage.
In the original 1980 story Mrs Twit had a glass eye and likes to let Mr Twit know she is always watching him as they play grotesque tricks on each other. In one prank, she places her glass eye into Mr Twit’s mug of beer at breakfast.
Breaking his silence on the backlash, James said: ‘We are so sorry to have caused offence with the launch video. It was absolutely not our intention. And we apologise unreservedly. It’s now gone.
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BBC stars Greg James and Chris Smith have been accused of ableism after asking the illustrator of their new follow-up book to Roald Dahl’s Twits to give a character a glass eye to make her ‘more disgusting’
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As they discuss how to make the characters more revolting, the illustrator asks the pair: ‘What about a glass eye?’ James responds ‘A glass eye!’ before Smith adds: ‘She needs a glass eye. That’s it. What a disgusting pair of Twits!’
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Greg James and Chris Smith have broken their silence on the video which sparked a backlash
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James said the opportunity to write The Twits Next Door, based on the 1980 novel The Twits, was ‘too good to resist’
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James (left) and Smith (right) – who have written children’s books before – said the opportunity to write The Twits Next Door, based on the 1980 novel The Twits, was ‘too good to resist’
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It comes a year after it was revealed that Puffin had hired sensitivity readers to rewrite chunks of Dahl’s text to make sure the books ‘can continue to be enjoyed by all today’, resulting in extensive changes across the author’s work
‘We understand that words matter and we pride ourselves on championing and welcoming everyone into the magical world of children’s books. We would never dream of deliberately setting out to exclude anyone.’
QUENTIN BLAKE: How did Mrs Twit get her glass eye?
The Twits illustrator Quentin Blake previously explained: ‘It’s very enjoyable to draw dirty, bad-tempered people.
‘Roald helped me by writing that Mr Twit’s beard stuck out like a brush (‘It grew in spikes that stuck out straight like the bristles of a nailbrush’) and I had to do quite a few drawings to get it right.
‘Mrs Twit has a glass eye which ‘was always looking the other way’ and it was great fun to have two eyes do two different things.
‘I felt Mr Twit was the more aggressive while Mrs Twit was more devious, so her face expresses that deviousness while his is angry.
‘With Roald there’s very little ‘he thought’, ‘she felt’. There’s no subtlety so you are never at a loss over what to draw.’
The BBC duo were condemned by a blind charity and other celebrities after they said adding a glass eye would make a character more ‘disgusting’.
In a lengthy tweet, James continued: ‘With the glass eye comment, we were attempting to pay homage to one of the Twit’s most famous pranks involving a glass of beer in order to remind people of Dahl’s infamous terrible two.
‘It’s in no way a suggestion that this forms any part of the plot of the new story nor was it our intention to suggest that it was in any way disgusting. It’s unfortunate that the word disgusting appears to be a direct comment on that.
‘That’s an error on our part. We are devastated that it’s come across like this but completely understand why there is anger. And we appreciate everyone rightly calling it out.
‘We hear that fully, we’re so upset that we made a mistake but we’re still incredibly proud of this book and we’re excited to get out there and share it with young readers all over the world x’.
It comes a year after it was revealed that Puffin had hired sensitivity readers to rewrite chunks of Dahl’s text to make sure the books ‘can continue to be enjoyed by all today’, resulting in extensive changes across the author’s work.
A host of changes included Mrs Twit’s ‘fearful ugliness’ being chopped to ‘ugliness’.
The video has sparked a major backlash with Paralympian Tanni Grey-Thompson commenting: ‘Thanks. Thanks very much. #sarcasm. I’d hoped the world had moved on.’
The Royal National Institute of Blind People told MailOnline: ‘When there’s positive representation of disabilities in children’s books, a truly wonderful thing happens – children with disabilities feel seen and heard, and their friends and classmates treat everyone the same. There is nothing at all revolting about prosthetic eyes, we think they’re brilliant.
‘We strongly urge all authors, illustrators, or publishers to think about the influence they have and the role they can play in encouraging acceptance and understanding of disabilities, both visible and invisible, especially for children with vision impairments.’
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In the original 1980 story Mrs Twit had a glass eye and follows she and her husband’s efforts to play grotesque tricks on each other
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Greg James (pictured) and Chris Smith were condemned for the video
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Charities, celebrities and authors condemned James and Smith for the video which was later deleted
Ed Finch posted: ‘This is a real mistake. I would take it down now. Having taught more than one child with a prosthetic eye – and with other eye conditions- I know that the very last thing they need is for a respected adult to be saying that their disability is ‘disgusting’.
The Twits (1980)
An extract about Mrs Twit in Roald Dahl’s book says: ‘Mrs Twit was no better than her husband.
‘She did not, of course, have a hairy face. It was a pity she didn’t because that at any rate would have hidden some of her fearful ugliness. Take a look at her.
‘Have you ever seen a woman with an uglier face than that? I doubt it.
‘But the funny thing is that Mrs Twit wasn’t born ugly. She’d had quite a nice face when she was young. The ugliness had grown upon her year by year as she got older.
‘Why would that happen? I’ll tell you why.
‘If a person has ugly thoughts, it begins to show on the face. And when that person has ugly thoughts every day, every week, every year, the face gets uglier and uglier until it gets so ugly you can hardly bear to look at it.
‘A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly. You can have a wonky nose and a crooked mouth and a double chin and stick-out teeth, but if you have good thoughts they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.’
Another user, Nic, replied: ‘Agree completely, my son (now an adult) is registered blind and his eyes look different due to his condition and many surgeries, would be furious with anyone saying they’re disgusting, this is very wrong.’
Author Richard O’Neill wrote: ‘As someone with a serious eye problem, this is just awful. Worse for children. But no doubt it’ll win an award.’
Ruth Murran posted: ‘The most appalling thing I’ve ever seen from a children’s publisher. I grew up with 1970s stories that often contained worrying messages for a disabled person like me but, fifty years on, they have far surpassed that discrimination and damage. How did nobody notice before this?’
James and Smith are among 13 authors commissioned to write new stories based on Dahl’s beloved characters.
They have previously partnered up to publish a successful children’s book series called Kid Normal.
In a statement, they told the BBC: ‘To be offered the opportunity to write a story starring the most revolting and hilarious pair of his famous characters was exciting, a little bit frightening and certainly too good to resist.
‘We’ve had such a great time playing with The Twits.’
The story, which will be published in August, will see the Twits attempt to get rid of their new neighbours called the Lovelies.
Other celebrities that have been commissioned to write stories include presenter Konnie Huq, The Last Leg comedian Adam Hills and former doctor
Puffin said they hoped the books would bring new readers to Dahl’s famous works.
Last year, the Telegraph revealed that his beloved children’s books are being rewritten by sensitivity gurus to remove language they deem offensive.
Considerable edits have been made to descriptions of the characters’ physical appearance – the new editions no longer use the word ‘fat’ which has been cut from every book.
Augustus Gloop in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory can now only be described as ‘enormous’.
Hundreds of changes were made to the original text, extinguishing Dahl’s colourful and memorable descriptions, some over fifty years old, to make his characters less grotesque.
Gender is also eliminated with books no longer referring to ‘female’ characters.
Miss Trunchbull in Matilda, once a ‘most formidable female’, is now a ‘most formidable woman’, while her ‘great horsey face’ is now called ‘her face’.
Oompa-Loompas who were once ‘small men’ are now ‘small people’ and Fantastic Mr Fox’s three sons have become daughters.
Puffin Books, Greg James and Chris Smith have been approached for comment.
