Roald Dahl's Birthday

• English
• Middelbare school
• vwo
• Leerjaar 1,3

Goal - after this lesson: 

1. you will know more about Roald Dahl
2. you can make your own words - gobblefunk 'em

Which books by Dahl have you
read or films have you seen?

Before he became a writer Roald Dahl worked as a....?

What did you learn about Dahl's
writing routine?

What did you learn about
his writing chair?

Dahl's life 

Born in 1916 in Wales to Norwegian emigrant parents Dahl had an unhappy childhood. His father died when he was young and he spent many unhappy years at boarding school. During WWII he served as an RAF pilot. But his main profession was that of short story writer and novelist. 

Influences

Interestingly, his stories, characters and
settings are influenced by several things in his life. First of all there was his mother, telling him stories about trolls and giants. Then there were the summer holidays spent with his mother's family in Norway. Dahl used the happy memories from those trips in his books. On the other side, the cruel grown-ups at boarding school became the adult villains. The most interesting influence, however, was that of the Cadbury Chocolate Company, that tested chocolate on the children at his boarding school. Dahl dreamt of inventing a new chocolate bar that he would 30 present to Mr Cadbury. Hence the story, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. 

Roald Dahl got most inspiration from his stories from?

Gobblefunk words

As a writer, Dahl was famous for his
inventive, playful use of language. He invented words by taking a real word and
then mixing it up, or by adding a funny sound like -ozz, -izz, -iggle or -obble. Dr
Rennie, who edited the latest Dahl dictionary, said children could always
work out what the words meant: ‘You know that something lickswishy and
delumptious is good to eat, whereas something uckyslush or rotsome is
definitely not.’ 

A special language

The recently released Roald Dahl
Dictionary includes 8000 words – real and invented. The inventing of words, like he
did, had its own word: to gobblefunk. It is defined as ‘to play around with words to invent new words or meanings’. All readers are sure to have a favourite.
Maybe yours is frobscottle, because you end up whizzpopping when you drink it.

1. rummytot
2. snozcumber
3. tellytelly bumkin box
4. whizzpopper
5. fropscottle
6. phizwizzards
7. trugglehumper

Choose from: giant soda - sweet dreams - tv - nonsense - cucumber - fart - nightmare 

Now, try to invent some ‘gobblefunk words’ yourself. Think of six such words and write them down.

Goal - after this lesson: 

1. you will know more about Roald Dahl
2. you can make your own words - gobblefunk 'em

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