Roald Dahl and his magic factory

[This post won the Starmark's 'Roald Dahl Day' contest]

Much like Enid Blyton, Roald Dahl is someone who should not be deprived from a child. If you haven't grown up reading Dahl, then you have had a flawed childhood, and if you never smelt the delicious pages of 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory', then you had an incomplete and largely insipid one.

The world not just lost a literary gem when he bid adieu from his mortal abode on a mournful day in 1990, but it lost a man who has been the foster parents to children all over the world and sprawling across many generations.

It is hard to describe the magic that Dahl could conjure and the legacy which he left behind in immeasurable amount. His characters were real, so brutally real that readers often feel that he is using their lives and peeping inside their hearts. His villains were so incorrigibly villainous that they create as much of an impact on the readers’ minds as do the protagonist heroes.

Over the course of his illustrious literary career, Dahl penned 19 children's books. One book which has had a deep influence in the hearts of many of his young female readers is 'Matilda'. It is the tale of a young girl who refuses to act as the subservient woman to this chauvinistic society. A true rebel, she protests against the established norms in her own way and with panache. This book gives a cathartic experience; it has a healing touch and offers liberty to the soul. ‘Matilda’ was also turned into a film and the celluloid version did full justice to Dahl's masterpiece, going on to notch 12 nominations for Tony Awards.

Here is a trivia for you fans. Roald Dahl always wrote on yellow paper and always with a pencil. Yellow was his favorite color.

And for his die-hard fans, here is his picture with his daughter. J