Everyone has heard of Willy Wonka. There is the actual candy company, the multiple movie versions, the video game, and, of course, there is the classic book that everything started with, written by Roald Dahl. It is the story of a good young boy in extremely poor circumstances that is raised to a height that only in his wildest of dreams could he have even begun to imagine; A tale full of chocolate, sweets, luck, wittiness, humor, Oompa Loompas, and a rise to greatness for one who needs it most. What more could a child want? Roald Dahl was very creative with his characters, and emphasized the traits of the children, parents, grandparents, and Willy Wonka himself in order to teach a point to his readers. Every room in Wonka’s factory was strange and clever, demonstrating the experimental nature of Wonka himself, and the consequences for each of the “naughty children” demonstrated the experimental, and wonderfully creative, nature of the author.
As an experimental story, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory encourages children to put aside the real, and boring, world for a few hours and enter the strange, yet wonderful, world in these pages. Wonka could do anything. I love how in the beginning of the story, when Grandpa Joe is telling Charlie who Wonka is and what he has done, Charlie tells his grandfather “But that’s impossible!” To which Grandpa Joe replies, “Of course it is! But Willy Wonka has done it!” Anything that could be imagined could be inside that fantastic factory. I loved the wordplay for some of the rooms and inventions! “Whipped cream isn't whipped cream at all if it hasn’t been whipped with whips, just like poached eggs isn't poached eggs unless it's been stolen in the dead of the night.” There is Beetle Juicing, Lickity Split Peas, Square Candies that Look Round, and, my favorite, the Bean Room: “All the Beans, Cocoa Beans, Coffee Beans, Jelly Beans, and Has Beans." Dahl came up with things that made the reader pause in surprise, think for a minute, and then burst out laughing. What he experimented with, caught the reader off guard, and yet was perfect for his story.
Dahl also chose and developed wonderful characters that pushed the extremes and chose odd, yet very fitting, punishments for the naughty children. All of the naughty children and their parents displayed characteristics that Dahl probably found repulsive and saw a growing trend in the real world, and so he exaggerated them in his book in order to, very obviously, give them the proper punishments that could only be actually accomplished in this realm of experimentalism.
Augustus Gloop is concerned with nothing but eating, and is fatter than Dudley Dursely. His gluttony lands him in a bit of a bind at Wonka’s. After falling into a river of chocolate, he is squeezed up a chocolate pipe and sent to the fudge room. The squeeze up the pipe squeezes most of the fat off of Augustus, and he leaves much lighter than he came.
Violet Beauregarde chews way too much gum. While it became popular to do so in the early 1900s, Violet could not be happy without it, and it became a disgusting habit. She chewed gum not yet fit for chewing in Wonka’s factory and blew up like a blueberry. She was “juiced” and returned to her normal size, but stayed an alarming shade of violet.
Veruca Salt is a spoiled brat that gets everything she wants from her parents. She runs into the Nut Room to grab a squirrel she it told she cannot have, and is deemed a “bad nut,” and sent down the garbage shoot by these intelligent squirrels. Her parents soon follow.
Mike Teevee does nothing but watched tv all day, and finds all other things nothing but an annoying distraction. His zeal for television causes him to rashly send himself through tv and end up the size of a Polly Pocket.
All of these children demonstrate selfishness and refused to listen to Wonka’s warnings. Dahl wrote these children in as a warning to his readers, and made the most bizarre, creative, and stylistically experimental consequences that befell them for their selfishness and greed.
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is truely a book of wonder and warning. It makes the reader laugh and it also makes them reflect a bit after reading the warning songs sung by the Oompa Loompas. It manages to teach in such a different way, that the story and lessons have lasted in the minds of the readers for decades.
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