The Witches door Roald Dahl

The Witches
1. What is the title of the book?
The title of my book is The Witches.

2. Who is the author of the book?
The author of my book is Roald Dahl. He wrote many books for children.

3. How many pages has your book got?
My book has 201 pages.

4. Which edition of the book have you read?
It’s not mentioned in the book, but it isn’t the first edition because the this edition is published in 2001 and the first edition is published in 1983. Maybe it is the 41th edition? A quotation of this:

First published by Jonathan CapeLtd 1983.

First published in the USA by Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1983.
Published in Puffin Books 1985.
This edition published 2001
41

5. In what year was the first edition of the book published?
The first edition of the book published in 1983.
This edition of the book is published in 2001.

6. Where was the book published?
The first edition of the book published in USA.
It’s not mentioned in the book where this edition is published.

7. What is the name of the publisher?
The first edition is published by Farrar, Straus an Giroux.
This edition of the book is published by Puffin.

8. Give a short outline of the story, 50 – 150 words.
This is a story about Boy and his grandmother. His grandmother lives in Norway. In the beginning Boy lives in England. When Boy and his parents go to Norway, to visit Boys grandmother, they fall into a ravine. His parents are killed. Then, he stay with his grandmother in Norway. His grandmother tells him all about witches. Later, a man comes to Boy and his grandmother and tell his grandmother about the will of Boys father. In the will is written that when Boys parents die, that he stays by his grandmother. But he must stay with his grandmother in the house of Boys parents in England. Boys grandmother doesn’t like that, but they go to Engeland. Then, Boys grandmother becomes sick but she gets well rapidly. The doctor says: “You must go on holiday to the south of England. When they are there, Boy gets two white mouses of his grandmother. Boy wants to train the mice. It isn’t permitted in the hotel. He is looking for an empty room to train the mice. Then 200 women come in the room. Boy sees it are witches. He hears that they will change all children in to mice. Witches have the most amazing power of smell. They smell children of a large distance. They change Boy into a mouse. At the end Boy and his grandmother steal the drink from the witches to change all the witches into mice.

9. What do you think of the book and why do you think so? Give
examples ans quotations to back up your answer.
I think it’s a difficult book to read for a Dutch person, because the witches talk with an accent.


‘Classrooms vill all be svorrming vith mice!’ shouted The Grand High Witch. ‘Chaos and pandemonium vill be rrreigning in every school in Inkland! Teachers vill be hopping up and down! Vimmen teachers vill be standing on desks and holding up skirts and yelling ‘Help, help, help!’’ page 78

‘Rrrigt now, vee must all go out on to the Sunshine Terrace and have tea vith that rrridiculous Manager’. Page 102

I think the story is a little bit infantile. The story is about Boy and at the end he is a mouse.

‘I became a talking thinking intelligent mouse-person who wouldn’t go near a mouse-trap!’ Page 198

10. Make up a new title of the book. Explain why you have chosen this new title.
It’s difficult to do this, because there are many lines in the story.
I think the best title, apart from The Witches, is Boy and his grandmother, because Boy and his grandmother are the maincharacters in the book and are very important. Together, they have many adventures.

11. What do you know of the main character? (What does she/he look like? What are his good points? What are his bad points?) Give quotations to prove your answer.
The most important person in the book is Boy. He is seven years old. He lived with his parents in England. His grandmother lives in Norway. Boy and his parents are going to Norway, when they fall into a ravine. They are killed. Then, he stay with his grandmother in Norway. His grandmother tells him a lot about real witches. He is a very nosy. His bad point is that he’s cocksure. He love his mice.

A quotation about his bad point, he is entering an empty room witch he isn’t aloud to enter.


I decided to seek a safer place where I could carry on with the training. There must people surely be an empty room in this enormous hotel. I put one mouse into each trouser-pocket and wandered downstairs in search of a secret spot. The ground floor of the hotel was a maze of public rooms, all of them named in gold letters on the doors. I wandered throught ‘The Lounge’ and ‘The Smoking-Room’ and ‘The Drawing-room and ‘The Card-Room’ and ‘The Reading-Room’. None of them was empty. I went down a long wide corridot and at the end of it I came to ‘The Ballroom’. There were double-doors leading into it, and in front of the doors there was a large notice-board on a stand. The notice on the board said,
RSPCC MEETING

STRICTLY PRIVATE
THIS ROOM IS RESERVED
FOR THE
ANNUAL MEETING
OF
THE ROYAL SOCIETY
FOR THE PREVENTION
OF CRUELTY TO CHILDREN

The double-doors into the room were open. I peeped in. It was a colossal room. There were rows of chairs, all facing a platform. The chairs were painted gold and they had a little red cushions on the seats. But there was not a soul in sight.
I sidled cautiously into the room. What a lovely secret silent place it was. Page 49

12. Which other characters play an important role in the book? Write their names in a list and tell how they relate to the main character.
Boys grandmother is a very important person in the book, maybe she is a main character too.


Boys grandmother (the name isn’t mentioned) – Boys grandmother
Bruno Jenkins – Boys friend.
Mr Jenkins – Brunos father
Mrs Jenkins – Brunos mother
The Grand High Witch – The Grand High Witch
Mr Stringer – The Hotel Manager

13. Which person, apart from the main character, is your favorite and why? Explain your answer and give quotations to prove it.
I think Boys grandmother, because she tells beautiful stories.

‘There was a family called Christiansen. They lived up on Holmenkollen, and they had an old oil-painting in the livingroom which they were very proud of. The painting showed some ducks in the yard outside a farmhouse. There were no people in the painting, just a flock of ducks on a grassy farmyard and the farmhouse in the backgrond. It was a large painting and rather pretty. Well, one day their daughter Solveg came home from school eating an apple. She said a nice lady had given it to her on the street. The next morning little Solveg was not in het bed. The parents searched everywhere but they couldn’t find her. Then all of a sudden her father shouted, ‘There she is! That’s Solveg feeding the ducks!’ He was pointing at the oil-painting, and sure enough Solveg was in it. She was standing in the farmyard in the act of throwing bread to the ducks out of the basket. The father rushed up to the painting and touched her. But that didn’t help. She was simply a part of the painting, just picture painted on the canvas.’
Page 11 and page 12


14. Where does the story take place? Give quotations to prove your answer.
In the beginning of the story, the story takes place in Norway, in the house of Boys grandmother.

‘You will stay here with me,’she said, ‘and I will look after you.’
‘Aren’t I going back to England?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘I could never do that. Heaven shall take my soul, but Norway shall keep my bones.’ Page 8

Later, the story takes place in Engeland, in the house of Boys parents in Kent.

The next morning, we sailed for England and soon I was back in my old family house in Kent, but this time with only my grandmother to look after me. Page 35

15. When does the story take place? Give quotations to prove your answer.
The story take place in the Easter Term.

It’s Easter Term... Page 35

16. Give three adjectives to describe the book. Explain why you chosen these three adjectives and give quotations.
The first adjective to show the book is difficult, because the witches are talking with an accent and that’s difficult to read in English for a Dutch person.

The Grand High Witch grated her bony gloved hands against each other and cried out, ‘So each of you is owning a magnificent sveet-shop! The next move is that each of you vill be announcing in the vindow of your shop that on a certain day you vill be having a Great Gala Opening vith frree sveets and chocs to every child’.

Page 56

The second adjective to show the book is full fantasy, because Boy change in a mouse.

I was carried on to the platform with my arms and legs held tight by many hands, and I lay there suspended in the air, facing the ceiling. I saw The Grand High Witch standing over me, grinning at me in the most horrible way. She held up the smell blue bottle of Mouse-Maker and she said, ‘Now for a little medicine! Hold his nose to make him open his mouth!’
Strong fingers pinched my nose. I kept my mouth closed tight and help me breath. But I couldn’t do it for my long. My chest was bursting. I opened my mouth to get one big quick breath on air and I did so, The Grand High Witch poured the entire contents of the little bottle down my throat!
Oh, the pain and the fire! It felt as though a kettleful of boiling water had been poured into my mouth. My throat was going up in flames! Then very quickly the frightful burning searing scorching feeling started spreading down into my chest and into my tummy and on and on into my arms and legs and all over my body! I screamed and screamed but once again the gloved hand was clapped over my lips. The next thing I felt was my skin beginning to tighten. How else can I describe it? It was quite literally a tightening and shrinking of the skin all over my body from the top of my head to the tips of my fingers to the ends of my toes! I felt as thougt I was a balloon and somebody was twisting the top of the balloon was getting smaller and smaller and the skin was getting tighter and tighter and it was going to burst. Page 107, page 108 and page 109

The last adjective shows the sad side of the story, because his parents died.

Soon after my seventh birthday, my parents took me as usual to spend Christmas with my grandmother in Norway. And it was over ther, while my father and my mother and I were driving in icy weather just north of Oslo, that our car skidded off the road and went tumbling down into a rocky ravine. My parents were killed.
Page 6 and page 7