The Twits

by Roald Dahl, Quentin Blake (Illustrator)

Overview

From the bestselling author of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and The BFG! 

Mr. and Mrs. Twit are the smelliest, nastiest, ugliest people in the world. They hate everything—except playing mean jokes on each other, catching innocent birds to put in their Bird Pies, and making their caged monkeys, the Muggle-Wumps, stand on their heads all day. But the Muggle-Wumps have had enough. They don't just want out, they want revenge.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780142410394
Publisher:	Penguin Young Readers Group
Publication date:	08/16/2007
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	112
Sales rank:	10,984
Product dimensions:	5.06(w) x 7.73(h) x 0.31(d)
Lexile:	750L (what's this?)
Age Range:	8 - 12 Years

About the Author

Roald Dahl (1916-1990) was born in Wales of Norwegian parents. He spent his childhood in England and, at age eighteen, went to work for the Shell Oil Company in Africa. When World War II broke out, he joined the Royal Air Force and became a fighter pilot. At the age of twenty-six he moved to Washington, D.C., and it was there he began to write. His first short story, which recounted his adventures in the war, was bought by The Saturday Evening Post, and so began a long and illustrious career.

After establishing himself as a writer for adults, Roald Dahl began writing children’s stories in 1960 while living in England with his family. His first stories were written as entertainment for his own children, to whom many of his books are dedicated.

Roald Dahl is now considered one of the most beloved storytellers of our time. Although he passed away in 1990, his popularity continues to increase as his fantastic novels, including James and the Giant Peach, Matilda, The BFG, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, delight an ever-growing legion of fans.

Learn more about Roald Dahl on the official Roald Dahl Web site: www.roalddahl.com

Date of Birth:

September 13, 1916

Date of Death:

November 23, 1990

Place of Birth:

Llandaff, Wales, England

Place of Death:

Oxford, England

Editorial Reviews

Mr. Dahl has written a few wonderfully funny and imaginative books. ''The Twits'' is not one of them. The movement of the plot is capricious. And the humor dwells on rather elementary physical jokes, only a few of which are funny. Basically this reads like a story reeled out at bedtime by a talented but distracted uncle who wants to pack the children off quickly. It needs pruning, paring, sharpening and some bolting down in order to go public and add luster to the already lustrous, and funny, name of Roald Dahl. -- New York Times

Karla Kuskin

The Twits-what a very unpleasant couple! Mr. and Mrs. Twit have nothing good to say about each other or anyone else. And we all know what happens when you are horrible to everyone -you begin to look as horrible as you are. Dahl has spared us nothing in his description of the couples' looks, smells, and actions. And Blake matches him with wonderfully nasty illustrations. To give just one exaample of Twit-like behavior, once Mr. Twit painted the branches of his big dead tree with horrible sticky stuff in order to catch birds for his dinner. When four little boys climbed the tree, they got stuck by the seats of their pants! Fortunately they realized they could escape, but they had to go home "with their bare bottoms winking at the sun." The Twits used to be monkey trainers, and a family of monkeys named Mugglewumps still lives in their garden. Now the Mugglewumps have decided to rebel. Monkeyshines and highjinks ensue, and the Twits get their just reward. Fun to read. 1998 (orig.

Children's Literature - Judy Silverman

Gr 2-4-Actor Simon Callow tackles one of Roald Dahl's most gruesome stories (Puffin, pap. 1998) with relish in this gleefully naughty audiobook. Mr. and Mrs. Twit are two of the most disgusting, nasty, and horrid characters in children's literature, from their repulsive looks (the story opens with a long, detailed description of Mr. Twit's unkempt beard) to the mean and horrible tricks they play on one another (Mrs. Twit enjoys hiding her glass eyeball in unexpected places and lacing the spaghetti with worms; Mr. Twit works for weeks to convince his wife that she has "The Shrinks"). Callow captures the dry humor of Dahl's narrative voice perfectly, and creates appropriately nasty voices for Mr. and Mrs. Twit as well. Unfortunately, the thick accents and loud tones of these voices often mean that the dialogue is difficult to understand. Still, Callow's able narration brings Dahl's ironic sensibilities to life, and a sense of satisfaction is inevitable when the terrible Twits come to an appropriately gruesome end.-Kathleen Kelly MacMillan, Maryland School for the Deaf, Columbus

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