Matilda
Roald Dahl, 1988
Graphic novels & humour FantasyYoung adultContemporary fiction
A tiny girl with a giant library card takes on the worst headmistress in England and wins by being cleverer than every adult around her. A brisk, witty read with a moral streak and a melancholy undertow, told in Dahl’s plain, mischievous voice.
Feels like melancholy. About morality.
Who it’s for
You may like it if you enjoy witty, slightly dark school stories where a clever child outsmarts ridiculous adults. The humour can tilt into harsh, cartoonish cruelty toward children, so it may not suit every young reader.
Why read it
It gives you a sharp, funny reminder that intelligence and kindness can be their own kind of power, even when the grown-ups are useless.
A page from the book
Every book she read was a ship sent out by someone who felt alone.
So Matilda’s strong young mind continued to grow, nurtured by the voices of all those authors who had sent their books out into the world like ships on the sea. These books gave Matilda a hopeful and comforting message: You are not alone. Roald Dahl.Dahl wrote in a shed at the bottom of his garden, on yellow legal pads, with six sharpened pencils, and rewrote the opening of Matilda many times.
Books that feel like this
Speak
Laurie Halse Anderson, 1999
A ninth-grade girl stops speaking after a party she can't explain. Her diary — wry, funny, furious — is how she starts to find a voice.
More by Roald Dahl
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Roald Dahl, 1964
A chocolate factory opens its gates to five children for a single day, and its owner has invented a hundred ways to make sugar strange.
Where to get it
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Questions readers ask
- Is Matilda for me?
- You may like it if you enjoy witty, slightly dark school stories where a clever child outsmarts ridiculous adults. The humour can tilt into harsh, cartoonish cruelty toward children, so it may not suit every young reader.
- What is Matilda like?
- A brisk, witty read with a moral streak and a melancholy undertow, told in Dahl’s plain, mischievous voice. Feels like melancholy. About morality.
- What should I read after Matilda?
- If you liked Matilda, try Speak (Laurie Halse Anderson), Dark Places (Gillian Flynn) and Anxious People (Fredrik Backman).
A taste of the feed
The argument for silence, made by someone who has tested it.
It’s easier not to say anything. Shut your trap, button your lip, can it. All that crap you hear on TV about communication and expressing feelings is a lie. Nobody really wants to hear what you have to say.
Speak · Laurie Halse Anderson
Even in a suicide fantasy, someone still has to make the coffee.
It was miserable, wet-bone March and I was lying in bed thinking about killing myself, a hobby of mine. Indulgent afternoon daydreaming: A shotgun, my mouth, a bang and my head jerking once, twice, blood on the wall. Spatter, splatter. “Did she want to be buried or cremated?” people would ask. “Who should come to the funeral?” And no one would know. The people, whoever they were, would just look at each other’s shoes or shoulders until the silence settled in and then someone would put on a pot of coffee, briskly and with a fair amount of clatter. Coffee goes great with sudden death.
Dark Places · Gillian Flynn
Why the happiest lives online look so exhausting up close.
The truth of course is that if people really were as happy as they look on the Internet, they wouldn’t spend so much damn time on the Internet, because no one who’s having a really good day spends half of it taking pictures of themselves. Anyone can nurture a myth about their life if they have enough manure, so if the grass looks greener on the other side of the fence, that’s probably because it’s full of shit.
Anxious People · Fredrik Backman
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