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The Witches

The Witches

by Roald Dahl and Quentin Blake
CD-Audio
Publication Date: 21/08/2013

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$27.99
Puffin Audiobooks presents a brand new recording of Roald Dahl's classic The Witches, read by actress Miranda Richardson. This audiobook features original music and 3D sound design by Pinewood film studios. The Witches have a motto- One child a week is fifty-two a year. Squish them and squiggle them and make them disappear. The Grand High Witch of All the World is the scariest of the lot, but one boy and the grandmother he adores have a plan to get rid of the witches for good.
ISBN:
9780141348377
9780141348377
Category:
Classic fiction (Children's / Teenage)
Format:
CD-Audio
Publication Date:
21-08-2013
Language:
English
Publisher:
Penguin Random House Children's UK
Country of origin:
United Kingdom
Edition:
4th Edition
Pages:
4
Dimensions (mm):
142x128x24mm
Weight:
0.18kg
Roald Dahl

When he was at school Roald Dahl received terrible reports for his writing - with one teacher actually writing in his report, 'I have never met a boy who so persistently writes the exact opposite of what he means. He seems incapable of marshalling his thoughts on paper!'

After finishing school Roald Dahl, in search of adventure, travelled to East Africa to work for a company called Shell. In Africa he learnt to speak Swahili, drove from diamond mines to gold mines, and survived a bout of malaria where his temperature reached 105.5 degrees (that's very high!). With the outbreak of the Second World War Roald Dahl joined the RAF. But being nearly two metres tall he found himself squashed into his fighter plane, knees around his ears and head jutting forward. Tragically of the 20 men in his squadron, Roald Dahl was one of only three to survive. Roald wrote about these experiences in his books Boy and Going Solo. Later in the war Roald Dahl was sent to America.

It was there that he met famous author C.S. Forester (author of the Captain Hornblower series) who asked the young pilot to write down his war experiences for a story he was writing. Forester was amazed by the result, telling Roald 'I'm bowled over. Your piece is marvellous. It is the work of a gifted writer. I didn't touch a word of it.' (an opinion which would have been news to Roald's early teachers!). Forester sent Roald Dahl's work straight to the Saturday Evening Post.

Roald Dahl's growing success as an author led him to meet many famous people including Walt Disney, Franklin Roosevelt, and the movie star Patricia Neal. Patricia and Roald were married only one year after they met! The couple bought a house in Great Missenden called Gipsy House. It was here that Roald Dahl began to tell his five children made-up bedtime stories and from those that he began to consider writing stories for children.

An old wooden shed in the back garden, with a wingbacked armchair, a sleeping bag to keep out the cold, an old suitcase to prop his feet on and always, always six yellow pencils at his hand, was where Roald created the worlds of The BFG, The Witches, James and the Giant Peach, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and many, many more.

Quentin Blake

Quentin Blake has been drawing ever since he can remember. He taught illustration for over twenty years at the Royal College of Art, of which he is an honorary professor.

He has won many prizes, including the Hans Christian Andersen Award for Illustration, the Eleanor Farjeon Award and the Kate Greenaway Medal, and in 1999 he was appointed the first Children’s Laureate.

In the 2013 New Year’s Honours List he was knighted for services to illustration.

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