Classic Dahl! (The Twits - Roald Dahl)

Member Name: xBorgx

Product:	The Twits - Roald Dahl
Date:	30/08/09 (205 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great, fun,creative...

Disadvantages: None

Mr and Mrs Twit are not only a couple of twits, they are an really, really nasty couple in their sixties. They like no one; none likes them. They keep four monkeys in a cage outside their windowless house and Mr Twit teaches them to walk upside down - very cruel - as his secret ambition is to create the first ever upside-down monkey circus. Mr Twit also sticks sticky glue to an old dead tree in their garden so that when birds land on it they get stuck and he can pick them off and give them to Mrs Twit to make Bird Pie Supper.


An extremely coarse couple, and one that can only be created from the master of this kind of children's book - Roald Dahl.

But the Twits are not only vulgar in mind, they are vulgar physically too, as Mr Dahl so wonderfully describes as the beginning of this short (95 pages) book. Mr Twit is scruffy looking with a big, big beard. You are under the impression that the author dislikes beards as he says that it is impossible to tell what a man with a hairy beard looks like, or perhaps he would rather you did not know! Mr Twit's beard is especially dirty and full of old bits of food, such as tinned sardine, cornflake and Stilton cheese.

To quote the book: 'Because of this, Mr Twit never went really hungry. By sticking out his tongue and curling it sideways to explore the hairy jungle around his mouth, he was always able to find a tasty morsel here and there to nibble on.'

Mrs Twits is just as bad. She did not have a hairy face, which is a shame because she was so ugly! She was not born ugly, but had acquired these looks through many years of ugly thoughts. She carried a walking stick, but not because she had a bad leg, because she could 'Hit things with it, things like dogs and cats and small children...'

The book begins with the Twits playing tricks on each other. Mr Twit makes Mrs Twit think she is shrinking by putting a small circle of wood on her walking stick every night; Mrs Twit digs worms from the garden and serves them to Mr Twit as spaghetti. We find out about how cruel these people are.

The story finishes with the monkeys and the birds thinking up an ingenious plan to gain their revenge on this ghastly couple. That is all I will say of the plot as I really do not want to spoil things for the reader. Suffice to say that you will read many a good descriptive of horrible vulgarity, of sly revenge that this Welsh born author is famous for. I have also read Fantastic Mr Fox and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory as a child, so to compare with these I would say this is more of a vulgar humour for older kids, however my children are ever enraptured no matter how many times they read it!


Our version is the Puffin one with great illustrations by Quentin Blake.

ISBN 0140314067


This review also appears on Ciao UK (in a slightly different form) by me a Borg...

Summary: Those Horrible Twits...