Roald Dahl essay

Roald Dahl’s Life and Stories

Roald Dahl was one of the most successful children’s writers of all time.  Probably the reason of all his success was due to his own life experiences and childhood.  Though he had a troubled childhood, he had many adventures that he based many of his books on.  He was more than a writer though, he did so many things you would never imagine.

     

Roald Dahl was a pilot for the British Air Force in World War II.  That was where he met Ian Fleming, the author of the James Bond series, and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.  He also began work on his own adaption of his book “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.”  He was originally assigned to write the screenplay for the 1971 version of it but missed the deadline.  So it was taken over by David Seltzer.  After the movie was made, Dahl disowned it, saying it was too focused on Willy Wonka and not enough on Charlie.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was not the only one of his books that was made into a major motion picture though.  Almost every book he wrote was made into a movie.  Even his first story caught the eye of Walt Disney himself.  It was called “The Gremlins” and though Roald Dahl had many meetings with Walt Disney about it, the movie was never made.

He also was an inventor.  When his youngest son Theo was hit by a taxi in New York, he flew out of his baby carriage and suffered severe brain damage.  Dahl along with a doctor and an engineer created the Wade-Dahl-Till valve, which helped thousands of children with brain damage.  He also worked for the British government for a short time while he visited America.  Another thing most people don’t know about Roald Dahl is that when his children's books were first published many parents and adults didn’t approve of them.  They thought they were disrespectful and rude.  Also his books usually showed parents in a bad light, and he also usually killed them off.  Though he did do this in almost all of his books, that was his style of writing.  He was creative, imaginative and original in almost every book he wrote.  He incorporated all of his childhood experiences and adventures to make his books become classics for generations.