"Beauty and the Beast": the controversial version illustrated by Jul available in bookstores

"Finally!" proclaims the red banner on the controversial illustrated version of Beauty and the Beast , which arrives in bookstores this Wednesday, June 18, instead of the distribution to final-year primary school students initially planned.

The text is a classic, in the version by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont from 1756. The illustrations are very contemporary, signed Jul, designer of Silex in the City or 50 Nuances de Grecs .

The book was commissioned by the Ministry of National Education and cancelled in March . The ministry found that it addressed "topics that would be suitable for older students, at the end of middle school or the beginning of high school, such as alcohol, social media, or complex social realities."

For the cartoonist, it was a "political decision" of "censorship" under "false pretexts".

The publisher, GrandPalaisRmnÉditions, a subsidiary of a public institution, indicates in a press release that the book is intended for readers "from 10 years old."

The preface originally written by Minister Élisabeth Borne was removed and the print run set at 20,000 copies, compared to the approximately 800,000 required for distribution to CM2 pupils.

"Everyone agrees on this book, except for the two or three people who orchestrated this censorship. Everyone at the ministry approved it; everyone thought it was fantastic. And recent ministers, Nicole Belloubet, Gabriel Attal, Pap Ndiaye, still say so," the author told AFP.

These three former Ministers of National Education read excerpts from the story in a support video broadcast on Sunday.

"This mobilization of the Republican arc, with elected officials as far apart as François Ruffin and Édouard Philippe , shows that it is not possible for an ultra-reactionary fringe to tell us what to read or not to read. There is unanimity in proclaiming that this book deserves to be circulated," added Jul.

"The people who will buy it in a bookstore are those who already go to bookstores. It was supposed to be given to those who don't go. Promoting a common literary heritage is the ministry's mission, and it failed," according to the author.