Critical Reception[1]

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Michelle Shirley English 650 Dr. Sara Schwebel November 9, 2009 A Critical Reception of Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Mark West denounces David Ree’s criticism of Dahl’s The Twits by saying that his fouryear-old godson did not think as Rees claims that “bearded people are dirty and are trying to hide their real appearance” (115). Instead, after hearing the passage about moldy and disgusting particles of food trapped inside a beard, the boy laughed and “spent the next several minutes searching through my beard and pretending to find all sorts of revolting things” (West 115). Paul McGhee, a child psychologist and the author of Humor: Its Origin and Development explains the process of children’s humor as it associates with toilet training and bathroom humor. McGhee says, “It becomes boring simply to say taboo words [such as poop], so more complicated and interesting ways of expressing “toiletness” are created” (West 115). In this sense, Dahl’s outrageous sense of humor fits right in with children’s approach to humor and Freudian release of anxiety. On the other hand, the plot of Dahl’s George’s Marvelous Medicine causes critics like Rees to suggest that “grumpy people “deserve to be poisoned and killed”’ (West 116) because George kills his grandmother by poisoning her medicine jar. Although I have not read this book of Dahl’s the plot does seem particularly disturbing despite the fact that West cites a recent study that claims that children do not take a literal interpretation of the novel (West 116). The American Library Association has Dahl’s books on its list of books that should be “restricted from young children or removed from the shelves” (Talbot). Science Fiction author

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Ursula K LeGuin says that one of her daughters who read and re-read Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory “was like one possessed while reading it, and for a while after reading she was, for a usually amiable child, quite nasty” (Talbot). Could it be that the child was nasty because she was angry over the fact that she knew her mother did not approve of the book that she so adored? A parent against teaching Dahl in elementary schools in Virginia wrote the Washington Post saying that “children misbehave and take retribution on adults, and there’s never, ever a consequence for their actions” (Talbot). West cites an interview where Dahl explains his portrayal of adults in his writing. Dahl explains that children are “in the process of becoming civilized” (West 116) and that sometimes the overbearing parent or teacher is seen as the enemy. Dahl explains that the adults in his books are “sometimes silly or grotesque” (West 116). Dahl says he “like[s] to poke fun at grown-ups, especially the pretentious ones and grouchy ones” (West 116). Dahl’s portrayal of the ugliness of his grown-up and children characters helps his readers to grow and become civilized. Bruno Bettelheim supports this exposure in his 1976 book The Uses of Enchantment in which he defend the violence in fairy tales. Bruno argues that “Children also benefit from learning about violence and brutishness in fairy tales, Bettelheim writes, for it counters the “widespread refusal to let children know that the source of much that goes wrong in our life is due to our natures—the propensity of all men for acting aggressively, asocially, selfishly”’ (Talbot). In this sense, the Virginian and David Rees both seek to keep children in the unrealistic literary and social bubble that says that all adults and children are good and nice to one another. Dahl’s philosophy when writing serves as a defense of his unique style of humor. In his “Ideas to Help Aspiring Writers” he “confesses that his “main preoccupation” while writing is “a constant unholy terror of boring the reader”’ (Krull 568). Dahl also tells writers to “create … situations that cause “actual loud belly laughs”’ (Krull 568). Knowing what Dahl’s motivations are while writing his children’s

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novels allows the reader a window into understanding his outrageous storylines. Immensely amusing and revolting at the same time in a slapstick sort of manner, Dahl has the potential to make a kid laugh him or herself silly. Margaret Talbot from The New Yorker notes that Dahl was named as a favorite author of British readers in 2000. Talbot also notes that six of Dahl’s books were made into movies! Talbot also compliments Dahl’s style. She says that his books are “propelled by crisp verbs,” and that he “plays exuberantly with synonyms” (Talbot). Talbot says that “Dahl has a waspish tone— unsentimental, ever so slightly sadistic, and archly amusing.” Dahl wrote wartime stories after serving in the British Royal Air Force in World War II; he wrote short stories with what the British call “a twist in the tail” (Talbot). His first children’s story was “The Gremlins” which is about small creatures who live in the air and can ruin flights; the story was made into a Disney picture book but not a movie (Talbot). In 1945, Dahl published his first novel Over to You, but it was unsuccessful compared to his short stories (Galef 29). Ernest Hemingway said that he “didn’t understand them [his stories]” (Galef 29) after reading the novel. When Dahl’s short stories with a twist in the end ran out of style and magazines such as The New Yorker began rejecting his entries, Dahl turned his efforts again towards writing children’s literature (Galef 30). At this time, he had his own children, so they provided some inspiration for his writings. Dahl published Switch Bitch in Playboy but did not find a lasting audience in that genre (Galef 30). Kathleen Krull writes in retrospect to the controversy that Eleanor Cameron created in 1972 by bashing Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and speaking or writing in horror of the prophecy of Marshall McLuhan, a media ‘oracle.’ McLuhan says that “books were already dead” (Krull 564). McLuhan “mourns “his firm belief that the importance of the written word is over and done with, and remains only to be buried with a hurried phrase or two over the

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casket”’ (Krull 564). Cameron says that the “book is not only about candy, it is like candy—and as such “one of the most tasteless books ever written for children”’ (Krull 565). Cameron also claims that Dahl’s novel will harm his readers, which produced an out roar from Dahl himself in which he says that he “almost spontaneously combusts” (Krull 566). Krull says that Cameron, in her anger over McLuhan’s predictions, lashed out at Dahl. Krull also criticizes Cameron’s bashing of “popularity” and her derogatory association between Dahl’s work and his propensity to make readers laugh. Krull says that “Popular writers do keep kids reading” (Krull 568) despite the fact that Cameron associates popularity and laughter to the media, which to Cameron, implied the oncoming theft of literature by the media. Krull ends her article by explaining that “writers are still “door-openers”’ (Krull 570). She also says that divisions between the former English Literature professor McLuhan and Science Fiction author Cameron “are unfortunate” (Krull 570). Krull writes a “Memo to heaven: “Hey, you guys were all on the same side”’ (Krull 570). Works Cited Conant, Jennet. The Irregulars: Roald Dahl and the British Spy Ring in Wartime Washington. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2008. Dahl, Roald. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. New York: Knopf, 1964. Galef, David. “Crossing Over: Authors Who Write Both Children’s and Adults’ Fiction.” Children’s Literature Association Quarterly 20.1 (1995): 29-35. Web. 2 Nov. 2009. Krull, Kathleen. “Revisiting Eleanor, Marshall, and Roald; or, Having a Sense of Humor in the Millenium.” Horn Book Magazine 75.5 (1999): 565-71. Web. 2 Nov. 2009. Talbot, Margaret. “The Candy Man: Why Children Love Roald Dahl’s Stories-And Many Adults Don’t.” The New Yorker (2005). Web. 2 Nov. 2009. West, Mark I. “The Grotesque and the Taboo in Roald Dahl’s Humorous Writings for Children.” Children’s Literature Association Quarterly 15.3 (1990): 115-16. Web. 2 Nov. 2009.