Book report

Boy: Tales of childhood

Book: Boy

Author: Roald Dahl

Published in: 1984

Genre: Autobiography/childhood novel

Illustrations by: Quentin Blake

Book starts by telling us the story of Dahl’s father, Harald Dahl. The Norwegian Harald has lost one arm in an accident, but is determine to succeed, so he travels to southern part of Wales to start his own business as a shipbroker. Roald’s father now meets his first wife, who tragically dies after giving birth to a child. Eventually, Harald find himself a second wife, this time from his very own birth country, and the story of Roald Dahl begins. During his childhood he has been witness to a tremendous amount of experiences. His father dies along with his sister when Roald is at a rather young age, and his head-master beats him with a cane several times. This doesn’t stop Dahl from completing all of his concoctions.

He spends his summer in Norway among wooden houses, boats and granite rocks, and when he is home he writes to his mother every Sunday from the boarding school he lives at by the name “Boy”. This routine may have affected him to be an author. Besides, Dahl has quite an exciting childhood, which has given him ideas for some of his books. The book follows young Roald throughout the first 36 years of his life.

 I think this was a really good book. It is written with a lot of humor, and excitement, but at the same time Roald also master to write about the grave moments of his life. What makes the book a tad worse is the way he construct his sentences. He makes them very long with a lot of information, and descriptions in them. For me, this was a bit tiring to read. It is not a very complicated book, though, and the language is easy to understand. I think the book is suitable for all young children, but perhaps the eldest kids in the age 8-13 will find the book more interesting, and meaningful

                                                      Dahl as a child