BBC Films is making a new adaptation of Arthur Ransome’s children’s classic Swallows and Amazons for cinema release this year. If successful it will be the first of a series of films based on Ransome’s twelve novels. However, a change of the name of the character Titty Walker, who was based on the real Mavis ‘Titty’ Altounyan, to Tatty, has incensed Barbara Altounyan, her niece. Altounyan told The Telegraph, ‘I would absolutely wring someone’s neck if I could only find out whose neck I could wring. It’s just the most disgustingly pompous thing to do, to feel you can change somebody’s identity without any permission or discussion.’ She also commented that the real Titty would be ‘turning in her grave’ and that the alteration ‘runs the risk of leaving audiences ignorant of the innocence and charm of Arthur Ransome’s children’s novel.’
The BBC have form in this crime against literature, previously changing Titty to Kitty for the 1963 TV serial. By contrast a shockingly controversial 1974 U certificate cinema film, in which Titty was played by Sophie Neville, now president of the Arthur Ransome Society, left the name proudly uncensored.