While this is obviously not Dahl at his best, "My Uncle Oswald" it still is a stylish, shocking, exhilarating and masterfully provocative book. The main character is a vile rotten bastard - or, to sum it up with one of Dahl's exquisitely understated adjectives, "unscrupolous". He is also an enthusiast, a skilled entrepeneur, a team builder and a rational gambler. The reader is therefore left with the obligation of making up his mind. Which traits are values, and which are not? And why so, and is this analysis subject to the passing of time? Could it be that, under unusual circumstances such as those imagined here, some moral beliefs that I hold true could be questioned? And if not, why?
Of course, the political correct bigots on each side of the political spectrum will never get it. Characters do not have to be moral. A book does not have to be correct. We must find our own way - and the artists' freedom to imagine outrageous stories is a tremendous force for good along this journey.

El sensacional tío Oswald. El único, el irrepetible; el hombre que desde temprana edad destacó de todos los demás hombres en cuestiones de seducción.
El amante incansable, que hace ver a Casanova como un simple amateur. Todos los demás hombres a su sombra son un juego de niños.
Pero, ¿Cómo describir la personalidad de Oswald Cornelius? Egoísta y mezquino, un hombre de negocios sin escrúpulos, que va a lo que va. Un sibarita y hedonista en el sentido amplio de la palabra, el mismo lo reconoce.

Not my usual genre or subject of reading. Light hearted and funny read, well written but if you think too much into it, you'll start getting frustrated and annoyed at the non-pc themes you may find like some other reviews you will see. It's Roald Dahl after all, with his satirical and comical approach and sometimes dark humour. If you like books full of deep meaning, you'll probably not want to keep reading. (Side note - I thought the drug was more like ecstacy than date rape drug like some other reviews suggested).

I read this whilst recovering from surgery, so wanted to switch my brain off and have an easy read and not really think - which it indeed helped me do. I rate it 3 rather than 2 because there's no 2.5 and it's well written and I kept reading till the end at least.

A very entertaining bit of naughty ribald fun. The early going reminded me a little bit of Voltaire's Candide. A brisk read, silly and sexy.

so in contrast to the other review i found this to be a lower point for Dahl's works. Looking at only his mature work, his short stories are much more enjoyable then this novel. Oswald appears in one of his short stories ( I forget the title) and the anecdote told in that one is much more concise and interesting. I found this one to drag on. As a result, I highly recommend his short stories, (they're some of the most enjoyable works I have read) but I was a bit disapointed with this book.

So this is an ode to ignorance, misogyny, and rape apologism. It also sucks as a novel because the characters are all carton cutouts without any shade of depth or complexity. I couldn't care less about what happened to any of them, and the ending, which I think was supposed to elicit glee, left me cold.

2015 EDIT: Joke's on Dahl though because intelligence is inherited from the mother. Misogynists are idiots.

It's a comedy. It's only shallow in the sense that the entire thing is based around situational comedy.

At first I was going to compare it to a 'Carry On' film (and if you don't understand the reference, the humour may well not appeal). I, for one, would have put this book down out of boredom if it carried on (pun intended) like that.

Before long, the characters are wrestling with a wide variety of penises, of cows, then of men. I think the story appealed as a curiosity above anything else.

Is it sexist? Well, the main character is a cad, a thoroughly unpleasant person, less sympathetic than Flashman, less redeemable. He gets a comeuppance of sorts at the end (when the full scale of his dastardlyness reveals itself), so, when he dismisses women at every turn, as well as being racist, it's all quite deliberate.

Is it all a male fantasy? Is it date rape? Well, to start off with, the victims are all men. The men are all taken advantage of by a woman. If anything, the book is a revenge tale upon the sexuality of men towards women. But that's getting ahead of myself; this is a comedy. Are the men date raped? I mean, drugging people is pretty immoral, but date rape is more about making the victim sleepy, so that don't know what happened. The drug here just makes the men...more active.

Of course, the entire book is immoral. The main characters aren't very nice-although a woman embracing her sexuality and enjoying herself, never once letting the caddish main character tell her what to do, was quite refreshing.

So, a Carry On type story with a lot of 'throbbing members' and bizarre things done with sperm. I didn't personally find it especially funny, but it was mercifully short.

Roald Dahl is a genious! His imagination scope is unbelievable, from the fun-loving and colorful Charlie and The Chocolate Factory to this wicked "My Uncle Oswald"...

Anyone who read this must laughing his/her @ss off and that's a guarantee. The story is about a guy named Oswald who's in his 17 made quite a stir among the ambassadors of several countries who became his customers for a certain product that comes from a Blister Beetle that can produce the most powerful aphrosidiac in the world. Only takes 9 minutes and a 80 year old grandpa can shag any woman (or women) he like for app. 6 hours straight, hahaha...Anyway, his greatest "adventure" as a wannabe-billionaire is when he and his accomplices found ways to preserve sperms for a very very long time. He immediately gather a list including the names of famous people still live at his time (the setting is around post World War I), such as Picasso, Einstein, Freud, Renoir, as well as European kings, in order to collect their sperms, to be sold later for women who want to have offsprings from royalties/famous figures. You can imagine the craziness on his efforts to accomplish their goal. It is terribly hilarious!

Tsk tsk tsk....I can hardly wait to read Mr. Dahl's other grown-up novels.

Nope. Just nope.... sometimes there just aren’t words for it.

Alas, dear friends, '17 doth end
Thusly, my last review I moth send
If you're in dire need
Of Marcel Proust's seed
Here's Oswald's path to that happy end.
.....(And I won't ask why, nor will I spy,
.....Butt if you MUST tell, do it LOUD. And DEEP. And WELL.)

Quickly lost its humor and charm. I think I am a worse person after reading this.

It's supposed to be funny, but I can't see what's funny about men being drugged and women being raped in order for someone to make money. Plus, it's boring.