ROALD DAHL is one of the greatest storytellers of all time. He pushed children's literature into uncharted territory, and almost twenty years after his death his popularity continues to grow. The man behind the mesmerising stories, however, has remained an enigma and his public persona was often controversial.
To his readers, though, Dahl was always a hero, and since his death his reputation has been transformed. Critics too now celebrate his wild imagination, quirky humour and linguistic elegance; while figures like Willy Wonka, the BFG and the Grand High Witch are recognised as immortal literary creations.
In this masterly biography, written with unprecedented access to Dahl's private papers and with reference to hundreds of newly discovered letters, Donald Sturrock reveals many hitherto hidden aspects of Roald Dahl's extraordinary life: his terrifying experiences as a fighter pilot; his years in Washington during the Second World War; the mental anguish caused by the trio of family disasters that struck him in the 1960s. These began when his son was hit by a taxi and crushed against the side of a bus, continuing two years later with the death of his seven-year-old daughter from measles, and concluding with the terrible stroke suffered by his first wife, the Oscar-winning actress Patricia Neal. How Dahl dealt with these disasters and how afterwards, in his mid-fifties, he fell in love for the first time, make unforgettable reading.