Посоветовали вчера в книжном чате, я открыла и залипла ) очень милая маленькая книжка воспоминаний про детство и школу, не считая того, что в школе мальчишек всё время лупили.

Second reading - still a great one, although not my favourite Dahl yarn.

I should probably give this 5 stars as I really enjoyed this, liked this and it's so good. I mean there is a lot of pain here and it's so funny.

Dahl is telling stories from his childhood. He would holiday in the summer in Norway with his family every year. He also went to boarding school. You can see how this is the seeds for almost all his stories. All the horror of adults he tells come from his experience at school. I can't believe some stuff he had to live through. It was abusive.

There was caning and students could also use corporal punishment on each other. Teacher would single out students and yet he makes it all funny. It was too short and probably a good thing. You see where Charlie and the chocolate factory come from. I mean the Trunchbull from Matilda is right out of his experience.

In the last chapter, I got tickled the most. So the chapter is called fagging. In British boarding school an older boy would have younger classmen under him that did chores and things for him and he was called a fag. This is back in the 20s or 30s before the meaning of the English word took over. One of the boys forces Dahl to go and warm up the outhouse toilet seat for him by sitting on it for 15 minutes or more. He tells Dahl something like, "You have a warm bottom, I don't like a cold bottom fag, I like hot bottom fags." I know it's childish and I simply died laughing. I mean, so funny sounding. How strange the past interacting with the future. There term is still derogatory in a different way. I mean it's still sad they had that kind of power over underclassmen and hopefully it is better for kids now. I guess school has always been hell.

This is worth the read.

Recommended to me by my 10 year old (she wanted me to read the one about the adenoids), this is just a lovely book. It's a precious adjective but applies perfectly to this book. It's not really an autobiography: Dahl spares us the tedious details and focuses on the good bits. Great for anglophiles (and norwegiaphiles if there is such a thing) and also a revealing glimpse of an era when children were treated in ways that would make modern parents blanch.

An easy and entertaining read. Loved it.

Petit Nicolas на максималках.
Даль, конечно, невероятный, ничего удивительного, что и воспоминания о детстве классные и добрые

One of the great authors of children's stories, Roald Dahl entertains readers with this piece that encompasses his life to age twenty. While Dahl clearly states that this piece is not an autobiography (for those sorts of books are filled with stale and dusty tales), this is a fabulous compendium of memories from his early years. The eldest son of two Norwegians, Dahl's early years were a mixture of pain (he lost his sister and father within a single week) and childhood frivolity (he loved to play with his school chums whenever time permitted). In one vivid memory, Dahl recounts his love of sweets and a shopkeeper who had a hate-on for him, which led young Roald to concoct a plan to exact revenge, which backfired horribly. A child from his father's second marriage, Dahl remembers riding with his elder half-sister, who got into a serious motor vehicle accident that almost cost him part of his face, Dahl recounts this with as much humour as the event permits. Dahl works hard to recollect those annual summer vacations outside Oslo, where grandparents doted on him and he could not wait for school to let out each summer. However, those glorious thoughts are countered with memories of the strap and horrid matrons patrolling the dorms when he left for boarding school. By the end, Dahl bridges his memories of entering the workforce and the hope that he might pen another short volume to entice readers to continue on with this journey. Like many of his books, the reader is lured into a blissful experience with Dahl's easy writing and fascinating ideas.

One cannot read Roald Dahl and not feel some connection to the characters that fill the narrative. Although this is a move away from fiction and forces the author to recollect his own life, Dahl is happy to admit he does not remember large portions of life before eight, though his memories flood forward thereafter. While some would think that a man of seventy would have so much to tell, Dahl does not wish to fill pages with dreary recollections, choosing to succinctly tell his early life. I could see some interesting themes in the vignettes Dahl chose to present, which ended up being major children's stories that I read in my younger years. Dahl's use of these memories to craft timeless classics, such as The BFG and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, only adds to the greatness of this short book. Told in a highly animated fashion, the reader cannot help but picture the young Roald heading to see that horrid matron or visiting with his beloved Norwegian grandparents while dreaming of sweets on his way home from school in second form. A piece that was so interesting, I am scrambling to get my hands on the second volume, to hear of his wartime memories. A must-read for anyone who has a little while to relax and loves the style Dahl has made famous.

Kudos, Mr. Dahl for all you did in your life. You will always hold a special place in my heart, which is only strengthened after reading this piece.

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We always want to know more about our favorite authors, and now we can. Roald Dahl writes about his experiences as a young boy and his struggles. He goes to boarding school, has his noes cut off, and much more. He tell us of his obsessions, such as Cadbury eggs, and his faults. I laughed and cried during this book and recommend it to sixth graders or seventh graders.

Reading this was such a pleasure, since Roald Dahl’s books were among our favorites when my children were younger. I haven’t yet seriously ventured into his books for adults. I tried to read one of them, but it was dark and I was sitting alone in the car and got seriously scared. I still want to give them a go and haven’t quite given up yet. Anyway, I digress. This is an easy and quick read as far as autobiographies go. It’s not a complete autobiography, however, just enjoyable stories about his childhood. I’ve always enjoyed Dahl’s writing style.

This part touched me. Roald Dahl was sent to boarding school at the age of nine.
“From my very first Sunday at St. Peter’s until the day my mother died thirty-two years later, I wrote to her once a week, sometimes more often, whenever I was away from home. I wrote to her every week from St. Peter’s, and every week from my next school, Repton, and every week from Dar es Salaam in East Africa, where I went on my first job after leaving school, and then every week during the war from Kenya and Iraq and Egypt when I was flying with the RAF.
My mother, for her part, kept every one of those letters, binding them carefully in neat bundles with green tape, but this was her own secret. She never told me she was doing it. In 1957, when she knew she was dying, I was in hospital in Oxford having a serious operation on my spine and I was unable to write to her. So she had a telephone specially installed beside her bed in order that she might have one last conversation with me. She didn’t tell me she was dying nor did anyone else for that matter because I was in a fairly serious condition myself at the time. She simply asked me how I was and hoped I would get better soon and sent me her love. I had no idea that she would die the next day, but she knew all right and she wanted to reach out and speak to me for the last time.”

And his father:
“He harboured a curious theory about how to develop a sense of beauty in the minds of his children. Every time my mother became pregnant, he would wait until the last three months of her pregnancy and then he would announce to her that ‘the glorious walks’ must begin. These glorious walks consisted of him taking her to places of great beauty in the countryside and waking with her for about an hour each day so that she could absorb the splendor of the surroundings. His theory was that if the eye of a pregnant woman was constantly observing the beauty of nature, this beauty would somehow become transmitted to the mind of the unborn baby within her womb and that baby would grow up to be a lover of beautiful things. This was the treatment that all of his children received before they were born.”

This is a really good book about Roald Dahl's life asa a kid.

Остроумен и сладкодумен, провокиращ и инспириращ, Ролад Дал е истинско явление в световната детска литература. От находчиви и добросърдечни момчета и момичета, до разпръскващи сънища добри великани и екстравагантни собственици на шоколадови фабрики, героите му са любимци на мнозина, а с книгите на Дал са израснали вече няколко поколения. Но от къде идва сякаш неизчерпаемото вдъхновение на автора? Възможно ли е собственото му детство да е не по-малко вълнуващо, страшно и забавно от собствените му фантасмагории? Ще научите това от автобиографичната му творба „Момче” (изд. „Enthusiast”). Прочетете ревюто на "Книжни Криле":

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Lovely book!
I had to read this to help my little sister with her homework... I'm such a great sister.