Happy 100th Birthday, Roald Dahl: The Twits
Happy 100th Birthday, Roald Dahl. Thank you for being a terrific innovator in children’s literature. Your irreverence and humor in The Twits inspired Bulldog to become a better reader. For years we had tried to get him engaged and to read regularly on his own. He liked Harry Potter, and after we read books one and two aloud he read book three by himself, but then he strayed. It was hard to find something else to engage him, which encouraged him to read without being forced.
Then, last fall, the school librarian put The Twits in his hands. Normally he would shove the school library book into his desk, and it only saw daylight again the following week when it was time to return it. But The Twits made it into his backpack, so he could keep reading it at home. I heard loud laughter come from the living room, then, “Mom! Listen to this! Can you believe it?”
Once he stopped laughing, he read three or four pages to me, because they were hilarious and had to be shared.
Even now, a year later, he will put on his Mr. Twit voice and say, “Windows? Who wants windows? Then people are always looking in at you!”
But the most famous quote from The Twits is this, one that stayed on the White Board for at least a week:
A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly. You can have a wonky nose and a crooked mouth and a double chin and stick-out teeth, but if you have good thoughts they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.
After The Twits he went on to read The Witches, which definitely creeped him out, perfect for Halloween… and then we had a year where he almost always had a book in his hand.
Innovation comes in all forms. Engaging children’s literature is important to inspire imagination and impossible ideas. Roald Dahl’s stories entertain while putting that nagging thought in the back of the reader’s head: What if…?
And that leads to better innovation.