Meet the author

Roald Dahl.

Writer · United Kingdom · b. 1916

Roald Dahl: the canonical twentieth-century British children's author — subversive, darkly funny, plucky-child-vs-grotesque-adult tales (Matilda, The BFG, James and the Giant Peach) almost always illustrated by Quentin Blake.

Roald Dahl (1916–1990) was a British author of subversive, darkly funny children's books that have sold over 300 million copies worldwide and remain anchored to virtually every UK primary-school bookshelf. Born in Wales to Norwegian parents, Dahl flew Hawker Hurricanes for the RAF in WWII before turning to fiction. His children's titles, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Matilda, The BFG, James and the Giant Peach, The Witches, Fantastic Mr Fox, The Twits, Danny the Champion of the World, George's Marvellous Medicine, share a distinctive sensibility: plucky child heroes, grotesque adult villains, comic-grim peril, sudden cruelty, and final justice. Almost all are illustrated by Quentin Blake, and the joint output is generationally inseparable. The benchmark canonical-classic British children's author of the twentieth century.