Boy (book)
First edition
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| Author | Roald Dahl |
|---|---|
| Illustrator | Quentin Blake |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Autobiography |
| Publisher | Cape (US) |
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Publication date
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1984 |
| Pages | 176 |
| ISBN | |
| Followed by | Going Solo |
Boy: Tales of Childhood (1984) is the first autobiographical book by British writer Roald Dahl. It describes his life from birth until leaving school, focusing on living conditions in Britain in the 1920s and 1930s, the public school system at the time, and how his childhood experiences led him to writing as a career. It ends with his first job, working for Royal Dutch Shell. His autobiography continues in the book Going Solo.
Roald Dahl's father Harald Dahl and mother Sofie Hesselberg were Norwegians who lived in Cardiff, Wales. Harald and his brother Oscar split up and went their separate ways, Oscar going to La Rochelle. Harald had lost an arm from complications after fracturing it: a doctor was summoned, but was drunk on arrival and mistook the injury for a dislocated shoulder. His attempt to relocate the shoulder caused further damage to the fractured arm, necessitating an amputation. According to Dahl, his only serious problem was not being able to cut the top off a boiled egg.
Harald Dahl had two children by his first wife, Marie, who died shortly after the birth of their second child. He then married Sofie Magdalene Hesselberg, Roald's mother. Harald was considerably older than Sofie; he was born in 1863 and she was born in 1885. By the time Roald Dahl was born in 1916, his father was 53 years old.
When Roald was three years old, his seven-year-old sister Astri died of an infection from a burst appendix . Only weeks later, Roald's father died of pneumonia. As narrator, Dahl suggests his father died of grief from the loss of his daughter. Roald's mother was forced to choose between moving the family to Norway with her relatives or relocating to a smaller house in Wales to continue the children's education in England, which is what her husband wanted.
Roald started at the Elmtree House Primary School when he was 6 years old. He was there for a year, but has few memories of his time there because it was so long ago.
Roald writes about different confectionery, his love of sweets, his fascination with the local sweet shop and in particular about the free samples of Cadbury chocolate bars given to him and his schoolmates for when he was a student at Repton. Young Dahl dreamt of working as an inventor for Cadbury, an idea he has said later inspired Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.Some of the sweets sold at Mrs Pratchett's sweet shop were: Lemon sherbets, pear drops and liquorish boot laces.
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