Marvelous Middle Grade Monday: MATILDA by Roald Dahl

MATILDA by Roald Dahl (first published by Jonathan Cape in 1988)

What It's About (via Goodreads): 
Matilda is a little girl who is far too good to be true. At age five-and-a-half she's knocking off double-digit multiplication problems and blitz-reading Dickens. Even more remarkably, her classmates love her even though she's a super-nerd and the teacher's pet. But everything is not perfect in Matilda's world. For starters she has two of the most idiotic, self-centered parents who ever lived. Then there's the large, busty nightmare of a school principal, Miss ("The") Trunchbull, a former hammer-throwing champion who flings children at will and is approximately as sympathetic as a bulldozer. Fortunately for Matilda, she has the inner resources to deal with such annoyances: astonishing intelligence, saintly patience, and an innate predilection for revenge.


She warms up with some practical jokes aimed at her hapless parents, but the true test comes when she rallies in defense of her teacher, the sweet Miss Honey, against the diabolical Trunchbull. There is never any doubt that Matilda will carry the day. Even so, this wonderful story is far from predictable. Roald Dahl, while keeping the plot moving imaginatively, also has an unerring ear for emotional truth.

Opening Lines:
"It's a funny thing about mothers and fathers. Even when their own child is the most disgusting little blister you could ever imagine, they still think that he or she is wonderful."

My Thoughts:
Every so often at Middle Grade Mafioso, I present a classic. MATILDA was on the Oregon Battle of the Books reading list this year, and my son and I read it together. He couldn't believe how hard I was laughing. I was in tears!

Maybe this is because I'm originally British, and the book skewers a particular type of bullying British person. Matilda's parents are horrid, and Miss Trunchbull is an amalgam of all the hideous bullies Roald Dahl met as a small child in a British boarding school. She's vicious, self-centred, and prone to outbursts of violence. (Dahl's autobiography BOY: TALES OF CHILDHOOD gives one an unerring insight into what life was like in early 20th century British education.)

Many adults in a Dahl novel are ghastly. It seems as if he had an insight into how a child might see the world of adulthood and all its fearsomeness. Children, in his novels, can also be awful (think of the self-centred bunch who accompany Charlie into the chocolate factory.) But there's always one--Matilda, Charlie, James--who stands for something more noble, who has not fallen prey to the soullessness of modern life (Dahl can't stand the "telly," or "the dreaded box" as he sometimes calls it. I shudder to think about how he would react to the ubiquity of modern screens!) Personally, I think that's why generations of children have loved Roald Dahl's writing. In his heroes and heroines, they can see themselves fighting the good fight against bullies, braggarts, and goggle boxes.

Here's an excerpt from his poem TELEVISION. You can read the whole glorious thing HERE:

So please, oh please, we beg, we pray,
Go throw your TV set away,
And in its place you can install
A lovely bookshelf on the wall.
Then fill the shelves with lots of books,
Ignoring all the dirty looks,
The screams and yells, the bites and kicks,
And children hitting you with sticks-
Fear not, because we promise you
That, in about a week or two
Of having nothing else to do,
They'll now begin to feel the need
Of having something to read.
And once they start -- oh boy, oh boy!
You watch the slowly growing joy
That fills their hearts. They'll grow so keen
They'll wonder what they'd ever seen
In that ridiculous machine,
That nauseating, foul, unclean,
Repulsive television screen!

About Roald Dahl:
Born in 1916, Roald Dahl was a British novelist, short story writer and screenwriter of Norwegian descent, who rose to prominence in the 1940's with works for both children and adults, and became one of the world's bestselling authors.

His first children's book was The Gremlins, about mischievous little creatures that were part of RAF folklore. The book was commissioned by Walt Disney for a film that was never made, and published in 1943. Dahl went on to create some of the best-loved children's stories of the 20th century, such as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Matilda, and James and the Giant Peach.

Roald Dahl died on November 23, 1990.

Website: http://roalddahl.com/

Marvelous Middle Grade Monday: The BFG by Roald Dahl

The BFG by Roald Dahl (first published in 1982)

Sometimes it makes a nice change to feature a classic...

I'm a huge Roald Dahl fan--but had not actually read this one until a few weeks ago. The local children's theater produced a play of it, and my middle son, the thespian, loved it so much that he begged me to do a BFG (which stands for BIG FRIENDLY GIANT) table at his school's book event which takes place next Friday. I've been able to persuade him I won't be on stilts, but we are planning to make some nifty-looking BFG ears!

The Story (via Goodreads):
The BFG is no ordinary bone-crunching giant. He is far too nice and jumbly. It's lucky for Sophie that he is. Had she been carried off in the middle of the night by the Bloodbottler, or any of the other giants—rather than the BFG—she would have soon become breakfast. When Sophie hears that the giants are flush-bunking off to England to swollomp a few nice little chiddlers, she decides she must stop them once and for all. And the BFG is going to help her!

Opening Lines: 

"Sophie couldn't sleep.
A brilliant moonbeam was slanting through a gap in the curtains. It was shining right on to her pillow."

(Which goes to show that you don't necessarily have to open a novel with linguistic or situational pyrotechnics. However, it does help to start with making the reader question. In this case, "why can't she go to sleep?")

What I Liked:
The inventiveness of the language was the most immediately dazzling thing. Dahl gives the giants their own variant of English ("redunculous," "squackling whoppsy appetite,"rotsome snozzcumbers" are just three of the BFG's phrases taken at random.)
The relationship between the BFG and Sophie. Although the BFG has effectively kidnapped Sophie (and this fear is well-portrayed in the first pages) he is very tender and protective of her--and she comes to like him too. Together, they plan to stop the giants who eat "human beans."
The BFG himself. A "titchy" runt of a giant (at a mere 24 feet tall), the BFG is a dreamblower, and takes great delight in finding the right dreams to bestow on children. His giant ears are attuned to the slightest sound, and he tells Sophie that each dream has its own music. He's a delightful character.
The illustrations by the illustrious Quentin Blake.

About the Author:
Roald Dahl (1916-1990) was born in Wales of Norwegian parents. After successfully publishing adult fiction and short stories, he began writing children's stories in 1960, as entertainment for his own children, to whom many of his books are dedicated. Other novels include Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, James and the Giant Peach, and Matilda. You can visit his website and see yet more wonderful Quentin Blake illustrations there! (It does make "whizzpopping" noises too!)