Roald Dahl the inventor - an inspiration piece
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Willy Wonka
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‘Invention, my dear friends, is 93% perspiration, 6% electricity, 4% evaporation, and 2% butterscotch ripple.’
Willy Wonka in the 1971 film of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
This month’s ‘Words & Pictures’ celebrates the genius that was Roald Dahl on the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. In this inspiration piece, I want to focus on just one aspect of this far-from-cuddly but many-faceted man – his inventiveness.
Immediately, many writers will think of his invented words – who would not love or at least admire such creations as horrigust, frothbungling and snozzcumber? Look how he has carefully separated the working parts of different words and then made a kind of cut-and-shut that actually works. All great fun.
But Dahl himself was also a practical inventor – and sometimes of serious things. He worked with an engineer and a neurosurgeon to create a ‘cerebral shunt’ – a valve for draining fluid from the brain. You can read more about it here in an article from the British Library.
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The "Little Dragon Carpet Sweeper" from "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" © Elliott Brown
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Girl inventing |
Over to you
Could one of your characters be an inventor? Could she make a life-saving device – or something wacky with a touch of Wallace and Gromit? Might there be invented words for this funky new technology? It doesn’t have to be the main character – maybe the antagonist makes fiendish devices. Like Dahl, let your inventiveness loose.
By Philippa R. Francis who also writes as K. M. Lockwood
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How I love Roald Dahl. I think he has actually been one of my influences. In my book, 'The Woppapotamus from Titan', I have used many nonsense words, which I have deceived my brain into believing to be real! Take the leader of Titan, The Proppapotamus, given the need to
ReplyDeleteexplore Earth, using one of their inventions - a PBT (Proppaboxatrix), find an amazing illustrator (Paul Morton) to draw it for you and you have a device for making you smaller, larger, reversing and forwarding time and giving loadsa fun to children from 6 and upwards. A lovely quote from Willie Wonka - 'a little nonsense now and then is cherished by the wisest men'. It might even enrich the life of non-believer Richard Dawkins!
Lovely Phillippa.
ReplyDeleteGene Wilder is my Willy Wonka.
Writing a Roald Dahl Books List is a very troublesome task, the difficulty lies in organizing a suitable and yet fair ranking. I must call upon my eight year old self, don't worry readers she will not be busy, more than likely sitting in a corner reading a book and giggling away to herself. So, when it comes to the magnificent work of Roald Dahl, I just need to ask, what did his stories truly mean to me?Dahl’s Willy
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