Roald Dahl

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Flick Wit - November 2007

Remembering Roald Dahl

November 23rd 2007 08:11

As if we could ever forget him, when his legendary legacy lives on through every generation. Nevertheless, as today marks seventeen years since this amazing man’s extraordinary life came to an end, it’s a good time to look back at his trials and triumphs, and give tribute to those ever-so-wonderful stories of his.

Roald Dahl - Image courtesy of bbc.news.co.uk

Roald Dahl was born in Norway, and grew up in Wales and England with his mother after his sister died of appendicitis and his father of pneumonia when Roald was just three. He attended a number of schools, and was punished often for mischievous pranks, including putting a dead mouse in a jar of lollies in the store of a shopkeeper he thought “mean and loathsome”.

During his later days of school, Dahl became a keen photographer, and at almost two metres tall, pursued an interest in a number of sports. He also discovered a passion for chocolate, and would often daydream about inventing a chocolate bar fit to impress the likes of the Cadbury brothers.

After school, he worked for the Shell Petroleum Company for several years in Tanzania, in a position that offered many perks including a luxury house and personal servants, before becoming an officer in the King’s African Rifles just before the beginning of World War II. A month later, Dahl joined the Royal Air Force. He began training with a group of twenty men – only three of whom would survive the War – and flew solo for the first time after less than eight hours experience. Almost a year later, after being made Pilot Officer, Dahl was sent on an assignment in the wrong direction over the desert. He ran out of fuel, and was forced to attempt a landing. The landing was of the ‘crash’ variety, resulting in Dahl fracturing his skull, breaking his nose, and being rendered blind.

A younger Roald Dahl - Image courtesy of kevincmurphy.com

In hospital, recovering from his injuries, Dahl professed himself in love with a nurse tending him, so enamoured was he by the sound of her voice. Soon after, he regained his sight and realised he wasn’t in love with her at all. He returned to duty, playing a key role in several important battles and trying his hand at espionage, before ending the War as a Wing Commander.

Seven years after World War II ended, Dahl married Academy Award winning actress, Patricia Neal, and together they had five children, one of whom died of measles at seven years old. Another of the children was hit by a taxi while in his pram. He was severely injured, and suffered intracranial pressure due to fluid on the brain, which caused Dahl to become involved in the development of the Wade-Dahl-Till (WDT), an apparatus used to assuage the condition. While Neal was pregnant with their fifth child, she suffered three burst cerebral aneurisms, and had to undertake extensive rehabilitation in order to learn to walk and talk again. Eighteen years later, Neal and Dahl divorced, and Dahl eventually married his ex-wife’s ex-best-friend, Felicity d’Abreu Crosland, whom he remained with until he died of a rare blood disease in 1990, at the age of 74.

Actress Patricia Neal - Image courtesy of nndb.com

It already sounds like he had quite a remarkable life, doesn’t it? Yet the most remarkable thing of all was Roald Dahl’s incredible contribution to children’s literature. He also wrote a collection of non-fiction and fiction for adults, a play, many television scripts for Alfred Hitchcock Presents (one of which was later adapted by Quentin Tarantino) and several screenplays, but it was his poetry and fiction for children for which he will always be remembered.

Much of Dahl’s inspiration for his children’s stories can be traced to experiences in his own life. He began with The Gremlins in 1943, a tale of impish creatures who set out to destroy English planes, but who are eventually convinced to join forces with the Allies. Next came James and the Giant Peach, which tells of a young boy’s abuse at the hands of evil aunts. Evil adults versus kind adults, with the story told from a child's point of view, is a common theme in many of Dahl’s books, which can probably be attributed to his misery at boarding school and longing for his mother at home and the father he never really knew.

Three years after James and the Giant Peach, Dahl wrote what is possibly his most famous story, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, conjured from his own childhood chocolate obsessions. In the following thirty-five years, he wrote The Magic Finger, Fantastic Mr Fox, Danny: The Champion of the World, The Enormous Crocodile, The Twits, The BFG (the idea for this was based on Norwegian folk tales told by his mother, and the central character based on his granddaughter, model Sophie Dahl), The Witches, Revolting Rhymes, Matilda and more. Seven of Dahl’s children’s stories have been made into films:

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – film of the same name by Tim Burton, starring Johnny Depp and Freddie Highmore, plus the original Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory by Mel Stuart, starring Gene Wilder.

Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka - Image courtesy of art.com

Danny: Champion of the World – film of the same name, directed by Gavin Millar and starring Jeremy Irons, Robbie Coltrane and Cyril Cusack.

The BFG – film of the same name, an animated production directed by Brian Cosgrove.

The Witches – film of the same name, directed by Nicolas Roeg and starring Anjelica Houston and Rowan Atkinson.

Anjelica Houston as The Grand High Witch - Image courtesy of britmovie.com.uk

James and the Giant Peach – film of the same name, directed by Henry Selick and starring Paul Terry, Simon Callow, Richard Dreyfus, Susan Sarandon, Jane Leeves, Miriam Margoyles, David Thewlis and Johanna Lumley.

Matilda – film of the same name, directed by Danny Devito, and starring Mara Wilson, Pam Ferris and Danny Devito.

Fantastic Mr Fox - film of the same name, coming in 2009, directed by Wes Anderson and starring Cate Blanchett, George Clooney and Anjelica Houston.

The stories that Roald Dahl created were quirky and outrageous, and always a little bit naughty. They captured the minds and hearts of children the world over, inspiring them to read and promoting literacy – something Dahl had a lifelong commitment to. I would recommend each and every one of them, as they all contributed significantly to the joy of my childhood, and will no doubt continue to delight me until I’m as old as Grandpa Joe.

Michaelie Clark

Link – Roald Dahl Official Website
Link – Roald Dahl at IMDB

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