Roald Dahl – the storyteller as benevolent sadist (2010)
nymag.com
nymag.com
'In a letter to The Times of London, Dahl called Rushdie "a dangerous opportunist," saying he "must have been totally aware of the deep and violent feelings his book would stir up among devout Muslims. In other words, he knew exactly what he was doing and cannot plead otherwise. This kind of sensationalism does indeed get an indifferent book on to the top of the best-seller list, — but to my mind it is a cheap way of doing it." The author of dark children's books and stories for adults (who himself once had police protection after getting death threats) also advocated self-censorship. It "puts a severe strain on the very power principle that the writer has an absolute right to say what he likes," he wrote. "In a civilized world we all have a moral obligation to apply a modicum of censorship to our own work in order to reinforce this principle of free speech."'
[0] http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/04/arts/04iht-15donadio.64826...
Christopher Hitchens was a staunch defender of him during the Satanic Verses debacle and was disgusted by the lack of reaction (or, when there is a reaction, the lack of bravery to make it public) in the religious and literary communities:
"One might have thought that such arrogant state-sponsored homicide, directed at a lonely and peaceful individual who pursued a life devoted to language, would have called forth a general condemnation. But such was not the case. In considered statements, the Vatican, the archbishop of Canterbury, the chief sephardic rabbi of Israel all took a stand in sympathy with–the ayatollah. So did the cardinal archbishop of New York and many other lesser religious figures. While they usually managed a few words in which to deplore the resort to violence, all these men stated that the main problem raised by the publication of The Satanic Verses was not murder by mercenaries, but blasphemy. Some public figures not in holy orders, such as the Marxist writer John Berger, the Tory historian Hugh Trevor-Roper, and the doyen of espionage authors John Le Carré, also pronounced that Rushdie was the author of his own troubles, and had brought them on himself by “offending” a great monotheistic religion. There seemed nothing fantastic, to these people, in the British police having to defend an Indian-born ex-Muslim citizen from a concerted campaign to take his life in the name of god."
He even found himself inadvertently involved in the formation of the Red Army; during his subsequent escape from Russia, he narrowly avoided their clutches by employing his wit and intelligence - the stuff of fiction, but this was for real. He had a genuinely fascinating life.
There are obviously a few (many?) who think less of Roal Dahl's books.. I guess he's not PC enough
Your original comment is echoed in various mentions of Dahl I've heard over the years: that he's overly cruel, and therefore unsuitable for kids. But these adults often miss the fact that he's delightfully cruel (with justice coming to the people who deserve it!), and ironic in way that a younger audience enthusiastically responds to.
There is clearly a common thread of morality through his books which is rare these days. My son responds well to it, and wants to be one of the good guys! (I should be so lucky.. but still :))
My other, non-hereto-mentioned reason is that Dahl is of direct Norwegian ancestry, and so is my son (well, with an Australian mum) - so I take that as a bonus.
Voting is an anxiety ridden experience now for me. HN got interesting with karmic power.
Edit: I was not the downvoter, btw.
I have a lot of friends who are teachers and their advice is read ANYTHING you like to kids. So few parents bother that they threw the rule book out decades ago.
On a side note, son just fell asleep (Australia) as I was reading another few pages of Danny and the Champion of the World to him - well maybe half an hour's worth. Quality time; it makes for such good night time reading. (Danny is a very brave boy!).
My point: On a forum with tens of thousands (more?) of users, nearly every permutation of awful or incompetent person will have been encountered by someone here.
They didn't feel half as dark then as they do now. And compared to the nightmares children invent for themselves, Dahl stories are probably pretty tame.
It's a great book, by the way.
Coming from the magic of the rest of his books both are quite a shift but they give you clue into the events that shaped his mind for the rest of his stories.
It is a real-person slashfic about raping famous men for money. (Freud, Picasso, Shaw, all by name.) Seriously.
That man could tell a fantastic story within a chapter.