It's Sunday, so this must be From the Vault where Bryce and I choose our favourite or most timely episodes to re-share with you.
Today's episode first aired in September of 2021 and it's all about my all-time favourite kids.
Author Roald Dahl.
Maybe, if you're looking for something to do over the school holidays, you could pick up one of his snozz-thumping, splendiferous books.
The BFG is my favourite, but there are more than 20 to choose from.
And if you want to get creative, I've stuck a link in the episode notes to some activities to help you write just like him.
Now, drop your coats anywhere, watch out for Oompa Loompas, and let's go.
This is a Squeeze Kids podcast. your fresh take on what's happening in the world around you.
He was a British spy, a lover of chocolate and one of the most famous children's authors the world has ever known.
This is your Roald Dahl Squiz Kids Shortcut, a podcast where we dive into the who what when where, why and how of the big news stories.
I'm Amanda Bower.
And I'm Bryce Corbett.
Bryce, September 13 is Roald Dahl Day.
Chosen because on that day in 1916, the author of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was born.
Oh, I love that book.
You are not alone there, my friend.
Today we're going to take you through who Roald Dahl was, why kids and adults love his book so much, and what you can do to write like him.
Cool.
And don't forget, listen carefully because there's a squiz at the end.
Hoo!
So Bryce Roald Dahl's childhood is going to sound a little familiar if you've read a lot of his books, which I know you have.
I have.
When he was just a young kid, something really sad happened.
His dad died.
Like in James and the Giant Peach, where both James' parents died.
Although in the book, they die in a very crazy way.
A rhinoceros escapes from the zoo, remember, and eats them.
Yeah, that's right.
And actually, in real life, rhinos are vegetarians.
Roald's father died of a lung infection, something that's fairly easy to treat nowadays, but it wasn't back in 1920.
Well, that's good to hear that it's not as dangerous now.
How else was his childhood like his books, though?
You're going to love this one.
Where Roll grew up in Wales, the woman who owned the local lolly shop was apparently, in his words, mean and loathsome.
So he and his friends came up with what they called the Great Mouse Plot of 1924.
What?
They put a dead mouse into a jar of gobstoppers.
Oh, seriously?
Hang on a minute, aren't there everlasting gobstoppers in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory?
Exactly.
And there's another connection between Roald Dahl's real life and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Not long after the mouse incident, Roald Dahl was sent to boarding school in England.
Overall, he did not love that experience, but there was one really great part.
The Cadbury Chocolate Company occasionally sent boxes of new chocolates to the school to be tested by the pupils.
Cool.
Roald Dahl dreamt of inventing a new chocolate bar that would win the praise of Mr Cadbury himself.
And that's where the inspiration came from for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Wow.
I want to test chocolate bars.
Where do I sign up to volunteer for that?
I want that job too.
Once Roald Dahl was a grown-up, he actually had a much more serious job.
He was working for Shell, selling oil in Africa.
He did that for a few years and then World War II started and he became a fighter pilot in Africa and then the Middle East and then Greece, before being sent to America to work at the British Embassy in Washington.
And you said he was a spy?
Yeah, while he was in Washington he sent intelligence back to Britain about what the Americans were up to.
Even though they were fighting on the same side, I guess they didn't completely trust each other.
Wow.
So when did Roald Dahl start writing children's books?
Was it after the war?
Actually, no.
He started writing during the war.
His first book was called The Gremlins, and it was about these little creatures that Air Force pilots blamed for anything that went wrong with their planes.
He actually sent a copy to the First Lady while he was in Washington.
The First Lady is the wife of the President of America.
And Eleanor Roosevelt read it to her grandchildren in the White House.
Oh, wow.
That's pretty impressive for his first kid's book.
Yeah.
So why is it that people love Roald Dahl's books so much?
Why?
Michael Rosen, who's a pretty famous children's poet, has spent a lot of time thinking about this question of why Roald Dahl's books are so beloved by kids and adults.
And he's got some pretty convincing reasons.
Are you ready to hear them, Bryce?
Yep.
Hit me.
Gobblefunk.
Nope.
Whizpopping.
Scrumdiddlyumptious.
What the?
So those are all words from the official Oxford Roald Dahl Dictionary.
Roald Dahl invented more than 500 fizz-wizzing words.
Fizz-wizzing means excellent.
I love that word.
And children adore his fantastic language.
And it's not just random.
I mean, what else could scrum-diddly-umptious mean except delicious?
And icky slush?
Well, that's clearly the opposite.
What about whiz-popping?
What does that mean?
Well...
That actually takes us to another reason why people love him so much.
Whiz-popping is what happens when air escapes out of your bum.
The big friendly giant, you might recall, did it all the time.
Oh, yeah.
So lots of Roald Dahl's books have slightly naughty words and moments when characters do things that go against what's normally acceptable, like whiz-popping in front of the Queen of England.
Ha!
Kids love that kind of stuff, and adults do too.
I was going to say, not just kids.
There are lots of secret plans too, aren't there, and clever tricks in his books.
I know I love that about him.
Not only that, but it is usually kids hatching those plans against mean adults.
And when you think about it, Bryce, there are a lot of mean adults in Roald Dahl's books.
There's the terrible Trunchbull from Matilda, the horrible aunts in James and the Giant Peach the witches.
There's the nasty Grandma Cranky in George's Marvellous Medicine.
And the heroes are basically always kids and they always get the better of the adults.
Revenge is pretty sweet in a Roald Dahl book.
It sure is.
And anything seems possible.
A magic finger, a marvellous medicine.
Not to mention worlds where there are giant peaches inhabited by talking insects.
Yeah.
So what can we all do to write like Roald Dahl?
What?
So Amanda, I'm guessing the first thing to do to write like Roald Dahl is to make up your own words.
True, but you do need to be careful that you do it in a way that your readers are going to understand.
So one thing Roald Dahl used was a lot of onomatopoeia.
What?
Onomatopoeia what?
Onomatopoeia.
It's where the word sounds like what it's describing.
So crunch sounds exactly like what happens when you bite down on an apple.
Sure does.
Butterfly sounds like a gorgeous flying creature.
So every made-up word that Roald Dahl had that started with trog was bad.
Troglumper was the worst kind of nightmare you could ever have.
And he rhymed a lot too, didn't he?
Basically, Roald Dahl used all the writing tricks.
Alliteration, rhyming, similes, metaphors.
Actually, Bryce, this is definitely one of those situations where it's best to show, not tell.
Mm-hm.
Squiz Kids, your classroom resources are a little bit different this time.
At the end of this podcast, you'll be able to stay listening and hear me reading a passage from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
That's partly because I just love reading aloud and I miss it, but partly because you're going to be drawing what you hear.
That will help you realise what a master of description Roald Dahl was.
And then you'll be able to create your own character and describe them using all of Roald Dahl's tricks.
And is there a second resource?
Because you usually do two.
Don't worry, I've got you covered.
Your second challenge will be to create a recipe for a marvellous medicine, just like George did.
It'll be a beautiful brew, I'm sure.
And Bryce, I had to share a link in the episode notes to this incredible official interactive research paper in the British Journal of Medicine that was published last year.
You can go and click on various ingredients that were in Georgia's marvellous medicine and you can see what medical effect they would have on someone if they really did drink it.
Oh, wow.
It's fabulous.
So even doctors love rolled up.
Time for the quiz.
This is the part of the podcast where you get to test how well you've been listening.
Question number one.
What did Roald Dahl and his friends leave in a jar of gobstoppers?
That's right.
It was a dead mouse.
Question two.
Who read Roald Dahl's first kids book, The Gremlins, to her grandchildren?
It was Eleanor Roosevelt, the First Lady of the United States.
Question number three.
What does whiz-popping mean?
That's right.
It means farting.
That's all we have time for today.
Thanks for joining us as we explored the who, what, how, where, when and why of Roald Dahl.
Now get out there and have a most excellent day.
Music Over and out.
And if you're still listening, it's because you're ready to get started with drawing a character from a Roald Dahl book.
I recommend that you get some coloured pencils or texters, because I think that's going to be important for your creation.
Listen carefully and just draw what you hear.
Mr Wonka was standing all alone just inside the open gates of the factory.
And what an extraordinary little man he was.
He had a black top hat on his head.
He wore a tailcoat made of a beautiful plum-coloured velvet.
His trousers were bottle green.
His gloves were pearly grey.
And in one hand, he carried a fine gold-topped walking cane.
Covering his chin, there was a small, neat, pointed black beard, a goatee.
And his eyes, his eyes were most marvelously bright.
They seemed to be sparkling and twinkling at you all the time.
The whole face, in fact, was alight with fun and laughter.
And oh, how clever he looked, how quick and sharp and full of life.
He kept making quick, jerky little movements with his head, cocking it this way and that and taking everything in with those bright twinkling eyes.
He was like a squirrel in the quickness of his movements, like a quick, clever old squirrel from the park.
Now you might want to listen to that a couple of times as you get your drawing done, and then you're going to compare them with other students in your class or other people that you've been listening with and just see how similar are they.
How good was Roald Dahl at getting you to make a picture in your mind?
