This rhymed retelling of six popular fairy tales is delightfully revolting, indeed. Dahl employs his signature mix of the creepy, the gory and the twisty with a good helping of humour to create new plots for each tale, which in some cases changes everything whilst still keeping the fundamental points and in other cases goes along with the traditional versions and only adds an eleventh-hour tweak. The rhyming, to me, felt singable and that made them funnier still.
Of all those included, my favourites—which I think are the best-written too—were the versions of Cinderella, Snow White and Little Red Riding Hood. Given that these happen to be in my Top 5 of most loved fairy tales, I’m absurdly pleased with Mr. Dahl’s rendition. The first was the one that had me laughing out the loudest, and why not, with verses like these:
Then midnight struck. She shouted, ‘Heck! ‘I’ve got to run to save my neck!’ The Prince cried, ‘No! Alas! Alack!’ He grabbed her dress to hold her back. As Cindy shouted, ‘Let me go!’ The dress was ripped from head to toe. She ran out in her underwear, And lost one slipper on the stair.
Next in the list of best and funniest would be Snow White. You believed that she’s a meek damsel that only knows how to clean house and charm animals like Disney told you? Forget it! This Snow White is the most cunning princess out there: instead of ending up as a household maid in a tiny cabin in the forest, she finds employment with 7 former ex-jockeys with a gambling problem, and resourceful as she is, she decides to make them all rich. Off to her father the king’s castle she goes, and manages to steal the Magic Mirror:
The footmen and the servants slept So no one saw her as she crept On tip-toe through the mighty hall And grabbed THE MIRROR off the wall. As soon as she had got it home, She told the Senior Dwarf (or Gnome) To ask it what he wished to know. ‘Go on!’ she shouted. ‘Have a go!’ He said, ‘Oh Mirror, please don’t joke! ‘Each one of us is stony broke!
And Little Red Riding Hood is not far behind. Red is a complete badass here, even if creepy at one point. She appears twice, and in this version, it’s the Big Bad Wolf who'd need protection from a little girl, who is tough as nails.
The weakest of the Revolting Rhymes retellings would appear to be Goldilocks, which is hardly different from the mainstream version and only includes a twist that doesn’t either surprise nor reads well-executed. As for Jack and the Beanstalk, it can go any way in readers’ enjoyment, as it would depend on each reader’s tastes, I’d warrant, and much the same can be said for the Three Little Pigs retelling, though this one was much funnier.
I’d recommend this highly to anyone who enjoys tales and retellings of them, one doesn’t need to be young in years to like this. At the very least, it’ll bring a smile to your face.
Dahl manages to revive old, worn fairy tales into quirky, fun adventures. Each story surprised me with the ending - often darker than the stories that we are used to (Disney!).
I loved the little twists that he gives to other little fairy tales.
n Ah, Piglet, you must never trust Young ladies from the upper crust.n
Audiobook Comments Read by Tamsin Greig, Stephen Mangan and Miriam Margolyes - they really knocked this audiobook out of the park!
"Revolting Rhymes" is truly a revolting series of famous fairy tales that have horror twist to each one. My most favorite story out this book is "Jack and the Beanstalk" where Jack has to deal with his insensitive mother while getting some golden leaves from the giant's beanstalk.
Quentin Blake's illustrations are both funny and scary at the same time and Roald Dahl's rhyming for this book is fantastic. For anyone who love revolting tales from Roald Dahl, "Revolting Rhymes" is definitely the book for you!
I'm not going to review this, I'm simply going to point out to many of the previous reviewers that the word "slut" is defined as "a dirty, untidy, or slovenly woman". It is only in the past 20 years, or so, that the word has commonly become associated with sexual morality (or the lack thereof). Especially given Roald Dahl's age when he wrote this in the 1980s, I'm pretty certain that he did not mean it to have any sexual connotation, especially since cinderella is, by definition, someone who looks dirty and untidy all the time!
Besides that, anyone who doesn't want to "expose" their young child to the corrupting influence of this book because of that one word, taken out of context, is extremely unrealistic about what sort of language they hear/use when they are in the school yard!
Let your children read it, I guarantee they'll thank you for it!
Short but too, too sweet! I just love fairy tale twists (see my Warning! review from the other day). Dahl' s rhymes are ingenious. That could not have been easy. He may be my favorite children's author.
Un libro divertido, que, una vez leído, nunca más volverás a ver a los cuentos de hadas de la misma manera que antes. Sí, se nota que aquí se le salió la maldad a Roald Dahl XD
A short compendium of fifteen tales told by one of the great children's storytellers of all time. Dahl uses his wonderful rhyming ability to re-tell some of the better known fairy tales to 'set the record straight'. Children can marvel at all the things they will learn from Dahl and his mind that spills full of wonderful ideas. From there, Dahl takes the reader on to recount a few lesser known members of the animal kingdom, all of whom have special abilities. Sure to entertain and impress, Dahl has done it again with his wonderful wit and (somewhat) saucy language, which I still think straddles what would be appropriate for the age level to which this piece is geared.
Kudos, Mr. Dahl for dazzling and impressing. I am pleased to have added this to my buddy reads and hope others will find it enjoyable too.
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Roald Dahl é ácido, é por isso que gosto das histórias dele, especialmente Charlie e a Fábrica de Chocolate. A forma como faz críticas à sociedade, mete o dedo mesmo na ferida, naquelas coisas que já nem reparamos por cairem na normalidade.
Histórias em Verso para Meninos Perversos está embebido nessa característica da escrita do autor. Pegando em algumas histórias tradicionais, Roald Dahl dá-lhes uma roupagem um bocadinho mais contemporânea (sim, mesmo tendo já algumas décadas, as "perversões" descritas conseguem ser actuais), onde algumas personagens acabam por ter...bem...o que merecem, mas não como esperamos.
Vale a pena ler se gostarem da escrita do autor, ou se estiverem curiosos em ficar a conhecer ;)