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Roald Dahl

The British storyteller behind Matilda, The BFG and Charlie

A black-and-white photograph of the author Roald Dahl

Photo 路 Wikimedia Commons

What is it?

Roald Dahl was a British writer whose children's books are read in over 60 languages, all over the world. He wrote The BFG, Matilda, James and the Giant Peach, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Fantastic Mr Fox and many more. His books have been turned into films, plays and a musical.

Tell me more

Roald Dahl wrote in a small wooden hut at the bottom of his garden in Buckinghamshire, England. The hut had a wing-back armchair, a wooden writing board across his knees, and yellow lined paper. He wrote every morning with the same kind of pencil, and he sharpened them six at a time.

Dahl loved inventing words. The BFG (the Big Friendly Giant) speaks in his own special language. Snozzcumbers are vegetables. Frobscottle is a fizzy drink that makes whizzpoppers. Scientists who study language call invented words like these 'Gobblefunk' - which is itself a Dahl word.

He often put a little bit of himself into his books. In Boy: Tales of Childhood, he wrote about growing up at school, the sweet shops he loved, and once being asked to taste-test chocolate bars for Cadbury - which gave him the idea for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory years later.

His writing hut is still there today, looked after by his family. You can visit it (carefully kept exactly as he left it) at the Roald Dahl Museum in Great Missenden. The pencil shavings on the floor are real.

In the classroom

Walk your class through this in 15 minutes.

Talk together

Discussion prompts

  1. 01If you could invent one new word and have everyone in the world use it, what would it be and what would it mean?
  2. 02Roald Dahl wrote in the same hut, in the same chair, with the same pencils. Why might it help to have a special routine when you make things?
  3. 03Which character from a book do you wish was real? Why that one?
Try this

Classroom activity

Invent five 'Gobblefunk' words of your own - a food, a feeling, an animal, a place and an everyday object. Write a sentence using each one. Read them aloud to a partner and see if they can guess what each one means.

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