By Roald Dahl
Traditionally Roald Dahl's novels are grand and obscure, 'James and thr Giant Peach' is no exception. The protagonist James, is young boy forced to live with his two horrible aunts who treat him like a slave after his parents befell a tragedy being eaten by an escaped rhino. One day James encounters an old man who offers him some mysterious green glowing crocodile tongues. James follows the old mans instructions to make a potion with the tongues but trips and falls splilling it all over a peach tree. Enchanted by the concoction one of the peaches on the tree grows to a gargantuan size. Naturally his two Aunts proclaim the peach as belonging to them and the fruit becomes a major attraction. One night James sneaks outside to have a bite of the peach and ends up inside with an assortment of giant insects. James and the Insects travel across the ocean to the Empire States building where he confronts his greatest fear.
The language Dahl uses is simple and succinct, without over discriptive sentences, allowing the story to be very easy to follow. The book is devided into 36 chapters, consisting of two to three pages per chapter. Using small chapters allows the reader to feel a greater sense of achievement progressing through the novel, especially younger readers. The illistrations in the book although simple and black and white really bring the characters to life, even those that are not human and convey the tone of the story at each impass.
This novel follows the story structure of a journey, in this case away from misery towards belonging. Understanding the idea of a journey is important to students as it is an example of a transition and they can take many metaphorical and/or literal forms. The book repeatedly underlines the theme of 'belonging', through James plight to find where he belongs. This is an important theme to address in adolescent literature as many readers of that age demographic are just starting to think about where they fit into the world.
I have also written about James and the Giant Peach on our blog! It was interesting to see your different interpretation of the story and text analysis. I see a lot of similarities between our write ups which is a good sign that we have both successfully analysed the text.
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