Showing posts with label Childhood. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Childhood. Show all posts

Tuesday, 14 January 2014

Your Series

YOUR SERIES
 This marks the first post, in what I hope to be a snowballing idea for Dahl heritage..

It's very simple, just send in, comment or tweet your earliest Roald Dahl memory so it can be added.
Then have a good time reading others tales of childhood terror and literature love- have fun guessing who's could possibly be who's.....

+) My earliest memory of RD- falling in love with charlie and the choc factory and wishing I would somehow find a golden ticket... also made lickable wallpaper thanks to Roald Dalh's revolting recipes book!


+) Although the storyline line is a little muddled, my earliest and most vivid memory was of the absolutely terrifying (when you're 6 years old, anyway) crocodile in "the enormous crocodile" - I could never get over the size of his menacing jaws and teeth - and its stuck with me ever since.
Oh and him being flung into the sunset at the end of the story!
  
+) Lying in bed listening to the BFG tapes when I was small, my heart would race all the way through thinking that giants would appear at my window too Making "Plate of Soil and Engine oil" from the Roald Dahl recipe book for Sunday lunch pudding, perhaps THE best chocolatey treat....
+) Every night my dad used to sit down with me and read a bed time story- he's really good at putting on daft voices for all the characters. One night he brought out a book with a collection of Dahl's stories; the Witches, Esio Trot, The Giraffe the Pelly and Me, and the Twits (the latter he began to read). To this day I still feel a bit uncomfortable when I need to itch my belly, as Dahl said - only ugly, nasty people get itchy bellies! Of course, for me, Dahl wouldn't be without Quentin Blake- together, they are magic, and I will most definitely be reading those books to my children one day. 

+) I used to listen to Dahl's autobiography in the car with my family on our annual summer drive to the south of France. When he's in Africa he's served rice with fried bananas in, on a big banana leaf (I think). We have a banana tree in France so at the start of the holiday I demanded from mother some banana rice on a leaf like Roald Dahl had. It was delicious, definitely recommend it.  
+) When I was little I was inseparable from my copy of the twits. I once went to the toilet and fell asleep reading it.  

+) The first time I remember was when we listen to his tapes. I don't know who did the audio voice over, but it was very calming and I would always fall asleep.  I think I had to listen them 5 or 6 times before I had heard the whole story between naps.
+) I rememeber when I was suddenly signed up to the Roald Dahl Kids club. I had a badge and new book mark. I was also given my first Dahl audiotape "The Giraffe, the Pelly and Me". I actually thought i was really sad when I first listened.

+) I once ate a worm because that's what happened in the twits. I'm still not ashamed of myself- rather proud if I say so


 

Tuesday, 19 November 2013

Dahl's Childhood: An Overview


Dahl's Childhood played a phenomenal part in his writing, drawing influences for characters or wonderful ideas from his own life. Many ideas come from the tales his mother use to tell him from her Norweign folk stories, as well as his childhood hate for teachers, rules and punishments. 

Tales such as Matilda, the BFG, the Witches and Charlie & The Chocolate Factory are written from a child's perspective and portray adults as the Villans.

Photo Courtesy of the Reading Project
Dahl's childhood experiences formed the tales behind Boy: Tales of 
Childhood (1984).
Photo Courtesy of The Telegraph
An exert from Boy details The Great Mouse Plot of 1924.
Aged Seven, when Dahl attened Llandaff Cathedral School in Cardiff, he and his friends had a grudge against the local sweet-shop owner, Mrs. Pratchett. Mrs Pratchett was a sour, elderly widow who gave no thought to hygiene. They played a prank on her by placing a dead mouse in a gobstopper jar. They were caned by the headmaster as a punishment, while Mrs. Pratchett watched, laughing and encouraging him to cane them harder.

Aged 13, Dahl moved to Repton School in Derybshire. Having had the choice between Marlborough and Repton, Dahl choose Repton because it was easier to pronounce. 
At Repton the boys were delivered sweets and tasters from the Cadbury factory. The weekly deliveries inspired Young Dahl to dream of working as an inventor for Cadbury. An idea he has said later bore Charlie & the Chocolate Factory. 

Image Courtesy of weheartit.com


While Dahl hardly excelled as a student, his mother offered to pay for his tuition at Oxford or Cambridge University when he graduated. Dahl's response, as quoted from his autobiography, Boy: Tales of Childhood, was, 

"No thank you. I want to go straight from school to work for a company that will send me to wonderful faraway places like Africa or China." - Roald Dahl

Photo Courtesy of The Telegraph

Dahl's childhood was sprinkled with sadness as both his elder sister and father died when Dahl was three years old. His family remained in England to receive a British education- arguably the time that fueled Dahl's imagination the most. 

The wondrous childhood of Roald Dahl shaped the stories we now treasure.

After his education, Roald Dahl joined the war effort, but what exactly did this extra ordinary man do?