The Independent takes a look at a new biography of one of the greats in children's literature - Roald Dahl. A nice guy, he was not.
From the piece...
"A terrible wrathful man, with a slow fuse burning in one end of his belly and a stick of dynamite in the other." That was how Roald Dahl described his long-term American publisher Alfred Knopf in the New York Times in 1983 – but it could easily have applied to himself.
The much-loved, best-selling children's author, one of the UK's most popular post-war writers, was a man of considerable fury and contempt for people who crossed him, or whom he considered beneath him. The creator of Willy Wonka, the Twits and Fantastic Mr Fox was often less than fantastic as a human being. He was an anti-Semite, a chronically unfaithful husband and a raging bully to business associates, teachers and friends. The creator of the Big Friendly Giant could easily, it seems, transform himself into a Big Unfriendly Bastard.
What are Dahl's Top Ten children's books? Look no further.
1 comment:
I used to read so many of his books growing up! And I thought that they were just really dark; I didn't realize taht Dahl himself was pretty nasty, too...
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