Tales of the unexpected door Roald Dahl

Biographical information:

Roald (pronounced roo-ahl) Dahl was born on September 13, in Llandarf.His both parents where Norwegian and when he was four years old, his father died of appendicitis.He worked for Shell-company, and for the RAF in Africa, he got shot and in 1942 he begins working at the British embassy in New York. In the same year, he writes his first article, ”Shot down over Libya”. One year later, he writes his first book: “The Gremlins”.In 1953, he marries Patricia Neal, with who he has 5 children, they divorced in 1983 and he re-marries with Felicity Crosland.

Title:

Tales of the unexpected

Year and place of the first print:

Great-Britain, 1979

Title explanation:

There are seven little tales in the book, and the end of each of them is very unexpected.

Genre:this is a book with little novels.

Subtitle + explanation:

No subtitle

Motto (with translation and explanation):

No motto

Plot:

In this book-report I will concentrate me on two of the stories. Dip in the pool and parson's pleasure.

Character descriptions:
Dip in the pool
:Mr. Boltibol is a man who likes to make a little bet; he also comes up with original ideas.

Parson’s Pleasure:
Mr. Boggis is a very good businessman who has good ideas for buying and selling antique stuff.

Short survey of the stories (max 150 wrds. per story):
Dip in the pool:
Mr. Boltibol is going to the USA by boat.In the evening there is a bet about the distance that the boat will make, Mr. Boltibol participates.The next morning the weather is much better than he had expected and the boat goes much faster than he had thought.Mr. Boltibol makes a plan to slow down the boat a bit. He goes to the deck and he sees a lady. He talks with her and then, at an unexpected moment he jumps from the deck, into the water.He screams “HELP, HELP!” but the woman doesn’t hear him, she thinks that he just wanted to swim, so she waves back...

Parson’s Pleasure:
Mr. Boggis is an antique retailer who buys his things very cheap and he sells them for very much money.He goes to farmers and buys some old furniture, and then he sells it as antique.One day, he comes at a farm and there he sees a commode that he could sell for at least 15 000 pounds.He says that he only wants to use the legs for a table at his house. They could never sell the commode for much money, so the farmers sell him the commode for 15 pounds.When he is getting his car, the farmers take an axe and the chop the legs off, “the man only wanted them, and you’ll never know what he would say when it wouldn’t fit in his car”...

Narrative structure:

Dip in the pool:
The story is told from Mr. Boltibol, and it is written in the present. This story is told chronologically.

Parson’s Pleasure:
The story is told from Mr. Boggis, and it is also written in the present. This story too is told chronologically.

Theme:

The theme of all the stories is the unexpected, surprising, feeling.

Opinion:

I liked it very much the style is humoristic.I didn’t understand all ends, but I understood the most of them.

extra assignment

1. Which story did you like best and why?
2. Which part(s) in it did you think most striking?

1. I Liked every story, but if I had to choose, I would take Parsons pleasure.For story, see above.I was surprised at the end; it was one of the few endings I didn’t expected. The plot was also funny, I thought. I liked the farmers, Roald Dahl really described them very good. It also was one of the fewer stories in which I could really identify myself. I hadn’t expected that the farmers would ever sell the commode to Mr. Boggis. I also liked the ending, because it was just something that I welcomed to him, I hadn’t any pity for him.

2. In this story, one striking part is the beginning, it explains how a man as Mr. Boggis earns money by buying his antique very cheap and selling it for antique prizes, this makes the end much less pitiful for Mr. Boggis, and it serves him.Also, when he first comes at the farm of the three men, they mistrust him. I think it striking how he let them trust him, to sell him the commode, at the end, they even “helped” him with loading the commode into his car by sawing the legs off, this shows one time more how sly he is.