What do a factory filled with revolutionary confectionary wonders and a magic-infused colossal peach have in common? How about a shadowy society of children-hating witches and a rogue vegetarian dream-catching giant? Believe it or not, the above are all story ideas penned by the legendary author Roald Dahl. Writing for children is notoriously difficult, but Dahl captivates the minds of even the most fickle bunch. How did he go about writing such hits? Join Wordsmith as we celebrate the brilliance that is the world of Dahl.
Dahl wrote the majority of his works inside a cosy hut. Following a simple routine for 45 years, he would write every morning from 10 to noon – and even if he was performing poorly, he believed all writers required perseverance and the grit to stay. “You have to keep going – bottom on the chair and stick it out – otherwise when you get into the habit of walking away when you’re stuck, you’ll never get it done.”
From seed to tree
In a series of interviews with Todd McCormack, Dahl explained that each of his book ideas began as “tiny little seeds” – some of which could take over a year of “mooching” and brooding to sprout. Although each of Dahl’s books are set in a seemingly fantastical world, much of his inspiration originated from the surroundings of his countryside home in Buckinghamshire, England.
The idea for James and the Giant Peach bloomed as a result of the many apple orchards around his home. “I had a fascination with an apple… and you can watch them through the summer growing and growing from tiny apples to bigger and bigger ones,” he explained. “It saved me an obvious thought, ‘What would happen if it didn’t stop growing? Why should it stop growing at a certain size?’” The magic of fiction is unbound by logic or the laws of nature – so as long as it entertains your readers, you’re free to make pigs fly or people shoot breadsticks out of their knuckles. Dahl also made careful consideration on the type of fruit he would write about. Apples were much too plain, so naturally he went with a fuzzy peach. “It’s big and squishy and you can go into it, and it’s got a big seed in the middle that you can play with,” described Dahl as conjured up images of the magnificent peach becoming James’ new home.
The most brilliant ideas can occur at the strangest of times, like when you’re on the toilet or in the shower, which is why Dahl made sure to always write down a good idea immediately. “It disappears otherwise like a dream,” he says, “but when I get it, I don’t dash up here to start and write it. I’m very careful, I walk around it, sniff it, and see if it’ll go through.” Much like any copywriting task, proper planning beforehand prevents stalling during the writing phase.
Dahl on the details
Beyond creative plotlines, Dahl excelled at creating highly memorable characters. From the dastardly Grand High Witch and the eccentric Willy Wonka to the brilliant Matilda or kind-hearted BFG, no two characters were alike. “When you’re writing a book with people in it, it’s no good having people who are ordinary, because they aren’t going to interest your readers at all,” he tells McCormack. To do so, Dahl recommends the exaggeration of character qualities. “If a person is nasty or bad or cruel, make them very bad or nasty – and you make them extremely ugly – that I think, is fun and makes an impact.” Imagine if Superman only saved people occasionally or if Darth Vader didn’t crush every rebel along the way – they’d be a lot less recognisable as the superhero and supervillain archetype!
Dahl’s characters were inspired by the people he knew. For example, the BFG’s quirky and stuttering speech (complete with “Gobblefunk” vocabulary like wondercrump orwhoopsey-splunkers) was inspired by his wife’s condition after she had suffered a stroke – causing mispronunciations, slurs and seemingly fantastical words. This sort of detailing that references the people around us not only creates strong characters, and as strange as it sounds in Dahl’s context, it makes them more believable as well.
In an interview with Mavis Nicholson, Dahl explains what it is like to write for children. At 8:13, he comments that pop-up books fail as books because it doesn’t stretch a child’s imagination – he believes every comedic child’s book must have an underlying laugh. It is the anticipation of this laugh that motivates the reader to turn the page.
Dahl then ties his plot and character together with the greatest tool available in his arsenal – his sense of humour. In order to pull off comedy in children’s fiction properly, Dahl believes you need to be able to laugh at the same jokes as children do. As a result, slapstick and Looney Tunes-esque punchlines can usually be found at the core of his works. “It’s got to be exciting and it’s got to be fast,” he says. “The fine line between roaring with laughter and crying because it’s a disaster is a very fine line – you see a chap slip on a banana skin and you roar with laughter when he falls [flat] on his backside, but if in doing so you suddenly see his broken leg, you very quickly stop laughing and it’s not a joke anymore.”
Indeed, it’s not all sunshine and rainbows in Dahl’s writing. There are plenty of gruesome scenes sprinkled throughout his books, like when the gluttonous Augustus Gloop fell into a river of molten chocolate as a result of his greed. From our perspective, Augustus’ ironic downfall was an amusingly justified punishment – but if we looked at it from Augustus or his parent’s perspective, it would undoubtedly be a terrifying ordeal. It’s usually not good business to market frightening thoughts or dark humour to children, so how does Dahl do it? “You never describe any horrors, you just say that they do happen,” he explains.
After Augustus is sucked away into a network of pipes from the chocolate lake, Willy Wonka casually tells the frantic Mr. and Mrs. Gloop that he’d gone to the “fudge room” before nonchalantly continuing the factory tour – and that was the end of Augustus Gloop. Mind you, we don’t actually read about the boy being turned into his favourite candy, but rather than graphically describing his fate, Dahl lets the reader decide instead. If you disliked Augustus, perhaps a box of Augustus-flavoured Fudge would sneak its way onto the market (which Wonka vowed wouldn’t sell well); if you pitied him, maybe he just fell into a barrel for later processing – it’s all up to your imagination! (PS. He gets saved by Oompa Loompas)
Dahl’s legacy inspired generations of children to read, and even as an adult, these books are equally fun and silly to reread. If you can get your hands on some of his books (George’s Marvellous Medicine and The Twits are this writer’s favourites), take note on Dahl’s delivery of jokes and the way he structures his narrative – his fine storytelling will help you immensely if you plan to write for children!