0:00:05 > 0:00:10Roald Dahl is one of the greatest children's writers of all time.
0:00:10 > 0:00:13His books are loved by tens of millions of young readers
0:00:13 > 0:00:15the world over.
0:00:15 > 0:00:19"Then she started swinging her round and round her head,
0:00:19 > 0:00:23"faster and faster, and Amanda was screaming blue murder,
0:00:23 > 0:00:25"and the Trunchbull was yelling,
0:00:25 > 0:00:28"'I'll give you pigtails, you little rat.'"
0:00:28 > 0:00:32They've been made into West End musicals
0:00:32 > 0:00:34and Hollywood films.
0:00:34 > 0:00:35Oh, my.
0:00:35 > 0:00:40Less well-known is where Roald Dahl came from.
0:00:40 > 0:00:41He was Welsh,
0:00:41 > 0:00:46born and raised in Cardiff in the 1910s and '20s,
0:00:47 > 0:00:51What happened during those early years in Wales helped to shape
0:00:51 > 0:00:54both his life and his books.
0:00:55 > 0:00:57"I'm watching you,
0:00:57 > 0:01:00"so keep your thieving fingers off them chocolates.
0:01:00 > 0:01:03"Either you forks out or you gets out."
0:01:05 > 0:01:08This is an untold Roald Dahl story
0:01:08 > 0:01:13of the triumphs and tragedies of his own Welsh childhood.
0:01:38 > 0:01:42Look around, and it's easy enough to find Roald Dahl's name in Cardiff
0:01:42 > 0:01:48today. He has public spaces named after him, shows and exhibitions,
0:01:48 > 0:01:51and plaques in his honour.
0:01:51 > 0:01:54But uncovering the story of Roald Dahl's Welsh childhood
0:01:54 > 0:01:57means digging a little deeper.
0:02:03 > 0:02:06Our tale begins a century ago in Llandaff,
0:02:06 > 0:02:08on the genteel fringes of Cardiff.
0:02:10 > 0:02:16Here, in the upstairs room of a fine house, a baby boy was born.
0:02:17 > 0:02:20BABY CRIES
0:02:20 > 0:02:26He was named Roald, unusual for a Welsh child.
0:02:26 > 0:02:32But his parents, Sofie Magdalene and Harald Dahl, were both Norwegian,
0:02:32 > 0:02:37and rapidly growing rich in the thriving Welsh capital.
0:02:37 > 0:02:39Industrial Cardiff was a sort of Klondyke.
0:02:39 > 0:02:42There was a boom going on.
0:02:42 > 0:02:45Cardiff, the greatest coal-exporting port in the world -
0:02:45 > 0:02:47there was money to be made here.
0:02:47 > 0:02:51Harald Dahl set himself up a supply business,
0:02:51 > 0:02:54providing everything that a ship pulling into Cardiff needed.
0:02:54 > 0:02:57So he provided that ship with the coal for its fuel,
0:02:57 > 0:03:00with its supplies, with its food for its next voyage,
0:03:00 > 0:03:03with its replacement ropes, with its pulleys,
0:03:03 > 0:03:05with its bits and pieces.
0:03:05 > 0:03:07That's the business, a one-stop shop.
0:03:07 > 0:03:09It was a very progressive idea.
0:03:13 > 0:03:16Harald Dahl's offices were in Cardiff's bustling docks.
0:03:16 > 0:03:20From his window, he could see the Norwegian Church,
0:03:20 > 0:03:23the social and religious hub of the city's
0:03:23 > 0:03:26prospering Norwegian community.
0:03:28 > 0:03:33It was here, in October 1916, that Roald Dahl was christened.
0:03:38 > 0:03:41Before too long, Harald's growing wealth,
0:03:41 > 0:03:43along with his growing family,
0:03:43 > 0:03:48were calling for a house somewhat larger than the one in Llandaff,
0:03:48 > 0:03:53and so they moved to rural Radyr, six miles north of Cardiff,
0:03:53 > 0:03:56and a home worthy of a fairy tale.
0:04:04 > 0:04:08"I remember it as a mighty house, with turrets on its roof,
0:04:08 > 0:04:12"and with majestic lawns and terraces around it.
0:04:12 > 0:04:16"There were many acres of farm and woodland,
0:04:16 > 0:04:18"and a number of cottages for the staff.
0:04:18 > 0:04:22"Very soon, the meadows were full of milking cows,
0:04:22 > 0:04:24"and the sties were full of pigs,
0:04:24 > 0:04:27"and the chicken run was full of chickens.
0:04:27 > 0:04:30"There were several massive shire horses
0:04:30 > 0:04:32"for pulling the ploughs and the hay wagons.
0:04:32 > 0:04:36"And there was a ploughman and a cowman and a couple of gardeners
0:04:36 > 0:04:39"and all manner of servants in the house itself."
0:04:47 > 0:04:50I think Ty-Mynydd was extraordinarily important,
0:04:50 > 0:04:53I think it was the kind of paradise... I mean,
0:04:53 > 0:04:56it was where he had his first memories,
0:04:56 > 0:04:58he grew up in this, for him,
0:04:58 > 0:05:03this utterly idyllic world of fields and pastures and animals
0:05:03 > 0:05:07and the freedom to roam, and a sense, I think, that, you know,
0:05:07 > 0:05:10the world was a very beautiful place.
0:05:10 > 0:05:13He and his sisters were able to walk through the fields.
0:05:13 > 0:05:16They all talked with enormous fondness and nostalgia
0:05:16 > 0:05:19about this place, and it meant a great deal to them.
0:05:19 > 0:05:21What life should be
0:05:21 > 0:05:24is kind of embodied in that building.
0:05:24 > 0:05:28Only echoes remain today of Ty-Mynydd,
0:05:28 > 0:05:31the lodge, the curve of its drive,
0:05:31 > 0:05:33and some of its woodland.
0:05:33 > 0:05:38But the spell the place cast on Roald Dahl never faded.
0:05:38 > 0:05:41He always chose to live in the countryside.
0:05:41 > 0:05:44And books like Danny, The Champion Of The World
0:05:44 > 0:05:49and Matilda are set in blissful, rural worlds.
0:05:49 > 0:05:51There's often this sense that,
0:05:51 > 0:05:53within the children's texts,
0:05:53 > 0:05:55that they want to return to some
0:05:55 > 0:05:58idyllic part of the countryside,
0:05:58 > 0:06:00an idyllic time in the past.
0:06:00 > 0:06:03In Matilda, Matilda wants to escape,
0:06:03 > 0:06:07and when she escapes, she escapes to something much more simple.
0:06:07 > 0:06:09She escapes to Miss Honey,
0:06:09 > 0:06:13and she does it going to Miss Honey's cottage,
0:06:13 > 0:06:16which is in the countryside.
0:06:16 > 0:06:19And it goes back... They talk about poetry as they go.
0:06:19 > 0:06:21It's done like a fairy tale.
0:06:30 > 0:06:33"Matilda saw a narrow dirt-path
0:06:33 > 0:06:36"leading to a tiny red-brick cottage.
0:06:36 > 0:06:39"The cottage was so small it looked more like a doll's house
0:06:39 > 0:06:41"than a human dwelling.
0:06:41 > 0:06:44"On either side of the path there was a wilderness
0:06:44 > 0:06:48"of nettles and blackberry thorns and long brown grass.
0:06:48 > 0:06:52"An enormous oak tree stood overshadowing the cottage,
0:06:52 > 0:06:55"its massive spreading branches seemed to be
0:06:55 > 0:06:57"enfolding and embracing the tiny building,
0:06:57 > 0:07:01"and perhaps hiding it as well from the rest of the world.
0:07:01 > 0:07:05"Miss Honey, with one hand on the gate, which hadn't yet opened,
0:07:05 > 0:07:08"turned to Matilda and said,
0:07:08 > 0:07:12"'A poet called Dylan Thomas once wrote some lines
0:07:12 > 0:07:16"'that I think of every time I walk up this path.'
0:07:16 > 0:07:22"Matilda waited, and Miss Honey, in a rather wonderful, slow voice,
0:07:22 > 0:07:24"began reciting the poem."
0:07:28 > 0:07:31At Ty-Mynydd, the young Roald Dahl
0:07:31 > 0:07:35was living in a real-life rural paradise.
0:07:35 > 0:07:37But that childhood world was about to be shattered.
0:07:39 > 0:07:43Deep one winter, Roald's elder sister, Astri,
0:07:43 > 0:07:45died of a burst appendix.
0:07:47 > 0:07:52Just seven weeks later, his father, Harald, died, too -
0:07:52 > 0:07:53some said of a broken heart.
0:07:55 > 0:07:59He was laid to rest in the local churchyard,
0:07:59 > 0:08:01the Celtic pattern on his headstone
0:08:01 > 0:08:05reflecting the roots he had put down in Wales.
0:08:07 > 0:08:11With her husband dead, Roald's mother, Sofie Magdalene,
0:08:11 > 0:08:15decided it was time for more practical living arrangements.
0:08:15 > 0:08:18The Dahls were moving house.
0:08:25 > 0:08:28Their new home was back in Llandaff,
0:08:28 > 0:08:31an attractive urban villa called Cumberland Lodge.
0:08:32 > 0:08:36This would be the scene of adventures worthy of Roald Dahl's own books,
0:08:36 > 0:08:39and the realm of Sofie Magdalene.
0:08:41 > 0:08:45She was the biggest influence on his life.
0:08:45 > 0:08:47She was intrepid,
0:08:47 > 0:08:52and I think that's what he really admired about her -
0:08:52 > 0:08:57that she... Fear didn't come.
0:08:57 > 0:09:00You know, she'd take them out on a boat
0:09:00 > 0:09:03without lifeboats in big, stormy weather.
0:09:03 > 0:09:05She was a strong...
0:09:06 > 0:09:10Oh, I wish I'd met her! Wonderful woman.
0:09:10 > 0:09:13They were being raised, most of the time, as, you know,
0:09:13 > 0:09:14by a single mother.
0:09:14 > 0:09:16Very formidable, strong single mother
0:09:16 > 0:09:19who was quite a personality in her own right.
0:09:19 > 0:09:23They really didn't conform to the normal middle-class values of
0:09:23 > 0:09:26the time, you know, where people were polite and behaved themselves.
0:09:26 > 0:09:28Roald's school friends, several of whom I spoke to
0:09:28 > 0:09:30when they were alive, you know,
0:09:30 > 0:09:31told me that going to stay at the Dahls'
0:09:31 > 0:09:35was basically like going to a madhouse where, you know,
0:09:35 > 0:09:36where anything went.
0:09:38 > 0:09:40Roald Dahl's children's books are famous
0:09:40 > 0:09:43for their irreverent, mischievous spirit.
0:09:43 > 0:09:46And at Cumberland Lodge in the 1920s,
0:09:46 > 0:09:49the young Roald was up to plenty of hijinks of his own.
0:09:52 > 0:09:56I think, without doubt, Roald was a mischief-maker.
0:09:56 > 0:09:59I think he was an inventive, unusual mischief-maker.
0:09:59 > 0:10:02I mean, he talks about constructing this elaborate chariot
0:10:02 > 0:10:06out of Meccano that would douse passers-by with water
0:10:06 > 0:10:09cos it ran down on a wire, which he could then release and drench people
0:10:09 > 0:10:12who were walking their dogs at the end of the garden.
0:10:12 > 0:10:13GIRL SCREAMS
0:10:13 > 0:10:15DOG BARKS
0:10:15 > 0:10:17And the same way, you know, his sisters would say
0:10:17 > 0:10:18that he would sometimes, you know,
0:10:18 > 0:10:21would send them up a tree, padded up with cushions,
0:10:21 > 0:10:24and fire air gun at them, just to see how far the pellets
0:10:24 > 0:10:25went into the cushions.
0:10:25 > 0:10:28None of the sisters seemed to have been remotely frightened
0:10:28 > 0:10:31by doing this - they just took it for granted that
0:10:31 > 0:10:33that's the kind of thing young kids did.
0:10:35 > 0:10:38But a big change was on the way for the young Roald Dahl.
0:10:39 > 0:10:41At the age of seven,
0:10:41 > 0:10:45his mother enrolled him at the nearby Cathedral School in Llandaff.
0:10:47 > 0:10:51It was to be his first taste of a regimented world,
0:10:51 > 0:10:54far removed from the free spirits of home.
0:10:56 > 0:10:59The Cathedral School, when Roald Dahl was a pupil,
0:10:59 > 0:11:01was a preparatory or prep school.
0:11:01 > 0:11:04It never held more than about 50 or 60 boys
0:11:04 > 0:11:06and most of them were boarders.
0:11:06 > 0:11:07There was a big classroom
0:11:07 > 0:11:09they called big school,
0:11:09 > 0:11:10with all the honours boards
0:11:10 > 0:11:11on the wall, described...
0:11:11 > 0:11:15always described as a dusty classroom for some reason and there
0:11:15 > 0:11:18were other classrooms round the back and a gym,
0:11:18 > 0:11:21which was very popular, and some fives courts.
0:11:21 > 0:11:22And this, erm...
0:11:22 > 0:11:25this is a hat that belonged to one of Roald Dahl's contemporaries
0:11:25 > 0:11:26in the school,
0:11:26 > 0:11:29so this is what Road Dahl would have worn.
0:11:29 > 0:11:30When they went to and from school,
0:11:30 > 0:11:35they would have passed the war memorial and they were expected to
0:11:35 > 0:11:37raise their hats or their caps when they passed
0:11:37 > 0:11:39it woe betide any boy who didn't.
0:11:39 > 0:11:44So this is what he would have had to raise in respect to the war dead.
0:11:45 > 0:11:48Roald Dahl wrote about his Llandaff school days
0:11:48 > 0:11:52in his colourful childhood memoir, Boy.
0:11:52 > 0:11:55His most vivid memory was of a remarkable adventure
0:11:55 > 0:11:58that wouldn't be out of place in his own children's books.
0:11:58 > 0:12:02He even gave it a name - The Great Mouse Plot.
0:12:02 > 0:12:03DOOR OPENS
0:12:03 > 0:12:04BELL RINGS
0:12:10 > 0:12:15We're standing here outside the centrepiece of The Great Mouse Plot.
0:12:15 > 0:12:19This is not, in fact, the Great Wall Chinese takeaway,
0:12:19 > 0:12:20but in Roald's day,
0:12:20 > 0:12:24this was Mrs Pratchett's sweetshop and these are the windows
0:12:24 > 0:12:27against which the young Roald would press his nose,
0:12:27 > 0:12:32looking at the boiled wonders and gobstoppers in jars beyond.
0:12:32 > 0:12:33DOOR OPENS
0:12:33 > 0:12:34BELL RINGS
0:12:36 > 0:12:39"The sweetshop in Llandaff in the year 1923
0:12:39 > 0:12:42"was the very centre of our lives.
0:12:42 > 0:12:48"To us, it was what a bar is to a drunk, or a church is to a bishop.
0:12:48 > 0:12:51"Without it, there would have been little to live for,
0:12:51 > 0:12:56"but it had one terrible drawback, this sweetshop -
0:12:56 > 0:12:59"the woman who owned it was a horror!
0:12:59 > 0:13:04"We hated her and we had good reason for doing so.
0:13:04 > 0:13:06"Her name was Mrs Pratchett.
0:13:06 > 0:13:08"She was a small, skinny, old hag
0:13:08 > 0:13:12"with a moustache on her upper lip and a mouth as sour
0:13:12 > 0:13:14"as a green gooseberry.
0:13:14 > 0:13:16"She never smiled,
0:13:16 > 0:13:19"she never welcomed us when we went in,
0:13:19 > 0:13:23"and the only times she spoke were when she said things like,
0:13:23 > 0:13:24"'I'm watching you,
0:13:24 > 0:13:27"'so keep your thieving fingers off them chocolates!'
0:13:27 > 0:13:31"or, 'I don't want you in here just to look around.
0:13:31 > 0:13:34"'Either you forks out or you gets out.'"
0:13:36 > 0:13:40The young Roald and his pals dream of getting their own back
0:13:40 > 0:13:42on the loathsome Mrs Pratchett.
0:13:42 > 0:13:49Then, one day, they find a dead mouse and Roald hatches a plan.
0:13:49 > 0:13:53They will give the old woman the fright of her life
0:13:53 > 0:13:57by putting the mouse in a jar of her sweets.
0:13:57 > 0:14:00"Thwaites handed me the mouse.
0:14:00 > 0:14:03"'I'm putting it in the gobstoppers,' I said.
0:14:03 > 0:14:06"'The gobstoppers are never behind the counter.'
0:14:06 > 0:14:10"Thus, everything was arranged.
0:14:10 > 0:14:13"We were strutting as we entered the shop.
0:14:13 > 0:14:17"We were the victors now and Mrs Pratchett was the victim.
0:14:18 > 0:14:23"She stood behind the counter and her small malignant pig eyes
0:14:23 > 0:14:27"watched us suspiciously as we came forward.
0:14:28 > 0:14:31"'One Sherbert Sucker, please,' Thwaites said,
0:14:31 > 0:14:32"holding out his penny.
0:14:33 > 0:14:37"When I saw Mrs Pratchett turn her head away for a couple of seconds,
0:14:37 > 0:14:42"I lifted the heavy glass lid off the gobstopper jar
0:14:42 > 0:14:45"and dropped the mouse in.
0:14:45 > 0:14:51"My heart was thumping like mad and my hands had gone all sweaty.
0:14:51 > 0:14:56"As soon as we were outside, we broke into a run.
0:14:56 > 0:14:59"I felt like a hero!
0:14:59 > 0:15:01"I WAS a hero!"
0:15:03 > 0:15:06The boys' triumph is short-lived, though.
0:15:07 > 0:15:11The following day, Mrs Pratchett is at the Cathedral School.
0:15:11 > 0:15:13She points out the miscreants to the headmaster
0:15:13 > 0:15:16and they are ordered to his dreaded study.
0:15:17 > 0:15:20And it ends with him, erm...
0:15:20 > 0:15:23It's this rather lurid description of him being caned by the...
0:15:23 > 0:15:27all the boys responsible for The Great Mouse Plot being caned by the
0:15:27 > 0:15:31headmaster with the evil Mrs Pratchett looking on
0:15:31 > 0:15:36like a sort of witch from the wings and urging the headmaster
0:15:36 > 0:15:38to beat the boys harder and harder.
0:15:38 > 0:15:39CACKLING
0:15:39 > 0:15:43It's very, very typically Roald Dahl, that scene.
0:15:45 > 0:15:49Roald Dahl seems never to have forgotten the punishment
0:15:49 > 0:15:51meted out to him.
0:15:51 > 0:15:56In books like Matilda, school is at best a dubious place -
0:15:56 > 0:15:58at worst, downright cruel.
0:15:59 > 0:16:01I mean, when you're talking about the nastiness
0:16:01 > 0:16:03and the cruelty of adults to children,
0:16:03 > 0:16:06I'm immediately reminded of Miss Trunchbull -
0:16:06 > 0:16:10huge, domineering and little tiny Matilda
0:16:10 > 0:16:14being in the power of someone cruel, nasty, stupid.
0:16:14 > 0:16:17And I think he taps into that brilliantly.
0:16:17 > 0:16:21It's not only that he remembers what it's like to be a child,
0:16:21 > 0:16:26but that he is, again, stalwart in the defence of children,
0:16:26 > 0:16:31and what he's saying to children is, "You CAN stand up to them.
0:16:31 > 0:16:34"You CAN defeat these evil people.
0:16:34 > 0:16:36"Just because they're bigger than you,
0:16:36 > 0:16:38"they are not smarter, they are not wiser.
0:16:38 > 0:16:41"Use your brains, hold yourself together.
0:16:41 > 0:16:43"They will be defeated."
0:16:44 > 0:16:49In childhood, Roald Dahl had his own real-life champion
0:16:49 > 0:16:50in the shape of his mother.
0:16:52 > 0:16:56When Sofie Magdalene discovered that her son had been beaten at school,
0:16:56 > 0:16:58she stormed to the house of the headmaster
0:16:58 > 0:17:02and gave him a piece of her mind.
0:17:02 > 0:17:06She was an extraordinary woman, ahead of her time -
0:17:06 > 0:17:09bold, well-read and with a wicked sense of humour.
0:17:12 > 0:17:14And although Roald's father was now dead,
0:17:14 > 0:17:18he also found at home an unlikely male role model.
0:17:22 > 0:17:26"The gardener that my mother engaged to look after everything outdoors
0:17:26 > 0:17:29"was a short, broad-shouldered, middle-aged Welshman
0:17:29 > 0:17:33"with a pale brown moustache, whose name was Jones.
0:17:33 > 0:17:38"But, to us children, he very soon became known as Joss Spivvis.
0:17:39 > 0:17:42"I adored him. I worshipped him.
0:17:42 > 0:17:45"I used to follow him around and watch him at his work
0:17:45 > 0:17:47"and listen to him talk.
0:17:47 > 0:17:51"Endless stories about his young days, Joss would tell me,
0:17:51 > 0:17:54"as he dug the kitchen garden or weeded the flowerbed.
0:17:54 > 0:17:57"And if it was raining, we would be in the potting shed
0:17:57 > 0:17:59"or in the greenhouse, or in the harness room.
0:18:00 > 0:18:03"He had the Welshman's love of speech and song
0:18:03 > 0:18:05"and when he described something to me,
0:18:05 > 0:18:09"his flowery sentences would hold me enthralled.
0:18:10 > 0:18:13"One of my most endearing memories of early childhood
0:18:13 > 0:18:16"was my friendship with Joss Spivvis."
0:18:24 > 0:18:27Roald's father Harald had been a keen gardener.
0:18:28 > 0:18:32Now Joss the gardener was becoming a father figure to the boy.
0:18:33 > 0:18:37He even took Roald to watch Cardiff City play football,
0:18:37 > 0:18:41the club flying high in the First Division.
0:18:41 > 0:18:42CROWD CHEERS
0:18:44 > 0:18:47But there was another, starker side of Welsh life
0:18:47 > 0:18:50that Joss revealed to the well-to-do Llandaff boy...
0:18:52 > 0:18:55..because the Dahls' gardener was a former Rhondda miner.
0:18:57 > 0:18:59"'Five o'clock in the morning, six days a week,
0:18:59 > 0:19:02"'we reported for work at the pithead,' Joss said,
0:19:02 > 0:19:05"'and I was always shivering, shivering, shivering.
0:19:05 > 0:19:07"'You don't half shiver at five in the morning
0:19:07 > 0:19:09"'when you're young and skinny.
0:19:11 > 0:19:12"'Then into the cage we all went
0:19:12 > 0:19:14"'and when they let go the winding gear,
0:19:14 > 0:19:16"'we all dropped like a stone
0:19:16 > 0:19:20"'into the black, black hole for miles and miles and it fell so fast,
0:19:20 > 0:19:24"'your feet left the floor and your stomach came up into your throat,
0:19:24 > 0:19:25"'and every time I went down,
0:19:25 > 0:19:28"'I thought the cable had broken and we were going to go right on
0:19:28 > 0:19:31"'falling until we came to the very centre of the Earth,
0:19:31 > 0:19:35"'where everything was white-hot, boiling lava.'"
0:19:39 > 0:19:40Many years later,
0:19:40 > 0:19:45Roald Dahl seemed to recall Joss Spivvis' words when he came to write
0:19:45 > 0:19:47one of his best-loved children's books.
0:19:48 > 0:19:51In Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, and in its sequel,
0:19:51 > 0:19:52Charlie And The Great Glass Elevator,
0:19:52 > 0:19:55those wonderful descriptions of terror,
0:19:55 > 0:19:56of the elevator
0:19:56 > 0:19:58in both those novels.
0:19:58 > 0:19:59Look carefully enough,
0:19:59 > 0:20:02and you realise that his description
0:20:02 > 0:20:04of the sudden drop of the elevator in
0:20:04 > 0:20:08Charlie And The Chocolate Factory is almost exactly the description
0:20:08 > 0:20:11you get of Joss Spivvis' first day in the mine.
0:20:11 > 0:20:14So at the heart of Charlie And The Chocolate Factory,
0:20:14 > 0:20:16you have the experience,
0:20:16 > 0:20:20the recalled experience of a Rhondda miner as a young child,
0:20:20 > 0:20:25the terror of that boy dropping into the shaft of a Rhondda mine.
0:20:25 > 0:20:27That, I think, is non-negotiable.
0:20:27 > 0:20:30The descriptions tally almost exactly.
0:20:36 > 0:20:38Back in 1925,
0:20:38 > 0:20:43the young Roald Dahl's time with Joss Spivvis was drawing to a close.
0:20:43 > 0:20:45In line with her late husband's wishes,
0:20:45 > 0:20:48Sofie Magdalene had decided to send her son
0:20:48 > 0:20:51to an English boarding school.
0:20:51 > 0:20:55And so, in September, the nine-year-old Roald
0:20:55 > 0:20:59boarded a paddle steamer bound for a strange new world
0:20:59 > 0:21:01across the Bristol Channel.
0:21:02 > 0:21:07His destination was St Peter's School in Weston-super-Mare -
0:21:07 > 0:21:11a place he later described as "a private lunatic asylum".
0:21:13 > 0:21:18The real trauma was being taken away from that loving family environment,
0:21:18 > 0:21:22you know, with this very rock-like strong mother
0:21:22 > 0:21:26and being hurled into a world that was entirely male,
0:21:26 > 0:21:31where there were all these arbitrary rules and regulations and orders and
0:21:31 > 0:21:33things to do and things not to do -
0:21:33 > 0:21:35you know, his own household, I think,
0:21:35 > 0:21:38was very free and easy by comparison and I think he found that
0:21:38 > 0:21:43truly traumatic and hard to adjust to and, you know,
0:21:43 > 0:21:46when he writes about how unhappy he was there,
0:21:46 > 0:21:47I'm absolutely certain that's true.
0:21:49 > 0:21:53In the freezing dormitory of St Peter's,
0:21:53 > 0:21:57the young Roald would align himself in bed so that he could sleep facing
0:21:57 > 0:22:01Wales, the distant land he could see far away across the water
0:22:01 > 0:22:03of the Bristol Channel.
0:22:06 > 0:22:09When Roald Dahl came to write his first children's book,
0:22:09 > 0:22:14James And The Giant Peach, he seemed to recall the sadness of these days.
0:22:16 > 0:22:21"Poor James, carrying nothing but a small suitcase containing a pair of
0:22:21 > 0:22:25"pyjamas and a toothbrush, was sent away to live with his two aunts.
0:22:26 > 0:22:29"Their names were Aunt Sponge and Aunt Spiker,
0:22:29 > 0:22:32"and I'm sorry to say that they were horrible people.
0:22:33 > 0:22:35"They lived in a queer, ramshackle house
0:22:35 > 0:22:38"on the top of a high hill in the South of England.
0:22:39 > 0:22:42"James could look down and see for miles and miles.
0:22:43 > 0:22:46"On a very clear day, if he looked in the right direction,
0:22:46 > 0:22:51"he could see a tiny, grey dot, far away on the horizon,
0:22:51 > 0:22:53"which was the house that he used to live in
0:22:53 > 0:22:56"with his beloved mother and father.
0:22:56 > 0:23:00"And just beyond that, he could see the ocean itself -
0:23:00 > 0:23:03"a long, thin streak of blackish blue,
0:23:03 > 0:23:07"like a line of ink beneath the rim of the sky."
0:23:13 > 0:23:18Throughout these troubled times, Roald's home remained in Wales.
0:23:19 > 0:23:22He wrote to his mother there every week,
0:23:22 > 0:23:26asking after Jones the gardener, the dogs and,
0:23:26 > 0:23:29rather less often, his sisters.
0:23:29 > 0:23:32Always, he signed himself simply "Boy".
0:23:33 > 0:23:39I think you can sense, even in those very early schoolboy letters,
0:23:39 > 0:23:42the storyteller kind of beginning to enjoy his craft.
0:23:42 > 0:23:46He often tells her stories that, you know,
0:23:46 > 0:23:50that have been told to him at school and then he starts to invent and he
0:23:50 > 0:23:54starts to use language in a funny way, and I mean,
0:23:54 > 0:23:57some of them are really, pretty remarkable for a young...
0:23:57 > 0:24:01for a young child, so, although I think he had no idea
0:24:01 > 0:24:03that that's what he was doing, I think, in some ways,
0:24:03 > 0:24:06he was cutting his teeth as a storyteller even, you know,
0:24:06 > 0:24:08writing home from St Peter's.
0:24:13 > 0:24:18In 1927, when Roald was ten, his mother and family left Wales,
0:24:18 > 0:24:20bound for Kent.
0:24:20 > 0:24:23With Harald Dahl dead and Roald destined to finish his education
0:24:23 > 0:24:27at public school, there was logic in a move to England.
0:24:30 > 0:24:35As a young man, Roald Dahl enjoyed a globetrotting life of adventure -
0:24:35 > 0:24:39as an oilman in Africa, a World War II fighter pilot,
0:24:39 > 0:24:43an intelligence officer and a Hollywood screenwriter.
0:24:45 > 0:24:48When the time came to settle down, it was in rural Buckinghamshire.
0:24:49 > 0:24:54Here, he wrote some of the greatest children's books of the 20th century,
0:24:54 > 0:24:56ground-breaking works that helped to redefine the genre.
0:25:01 > 0:25:06As the years went by, Roald Dahl cultivated an image -
0:25:06 > 0:25:08that of a maverick English country gentleman.
0:25:10 > 0:25:15Yet he always enjoyed returning to Wales, often for seaside holidays.
0:25:16 > 0:25:18On one of these trips,
0:25:18 > 0:25:23he made a pilgrimage to the former home of his literary hero.
0:25:23 > 0:25:28That man was also Welsh and a near contemporary - Dylan Thomas.
0:25:29 > 0:25:34He did, of course, adore Dylan's literature,
0:25:34 > 0:25:39and he'd heard about the hut that he wrote in
0:25:39 > 0:25:42and he was thinking at that time, you know,
0:25:42 > 0:25:46he was dealing with a family, a wife that was very ill, erm,
0:25:46 > 0:25:50a son that was very ill, a daughter that he'd lost,
0:25:50 > 0:25:53and he had to escape into the garden, you know,
0:25:53 > 0:25:56to get a bit of peace in order to write,
0:25:56 > 0:26:00and he heard about Dylan's hut, and he went down to see it, and it's...
0:26:00 > 0:26:02The hut at Gypsy House in Great Missenden
0:26:02 > 0:26:05is a complete replica.
0:26:06 > 0:26:10You know, he more or less measured it and, you know,
0:26:10 > 0:26:14where the door was and where the windows... It's a copy.
0:26:16 > 0:26:17Perhaps he felt...
0:26:19 > 0:26:24..Dylan could influence him a little, once he was inside.
0:26:24 > 0:26:28I don't know. And also, the connection with Wales,
0:26:28 > 0:26:31you know, that roots are very important.
0:26:33 > 0:26:35And...he felt that.
0:26:35 > 0:26:37He felt, you know, he was born
0:26:37 > 0:26:41and had a lot of his life, his young life, in Wales.
0:26:45 > 0:26:49Roald Dahl died in 1990, aged 74.
0:26:51 > 0:26:54At his funeral, his daughter read a Dylan Thomas poem.
0:26:56 > 0:27:01He was, and still is, one of the world's great storytellers.
0:27:03 > 0:27:07It's now 100 years since Roald Dahl was born in Wales,
0:27:07 > 0:27:10so what do the young Welsh readers of today think of him?
0:27:11 > 0:27:14You open it up, and then it's like you're in
0:27:14 > 0:27:16a completely different world.
0:27:16 > 0:27:21I think Roald Dahl's funny, humorous and a bit...
0:27:21 > 0:27:22bit naughty.
0:27:22 > 0:27:27Sometimes, when I'm sad, then I read them to make me laugh.
0:27:27 > 0:27:30When I read Matilda, I feel happy.
0:27:30 > 0:27:34I really like the way he makes up all the words and things like that.
0:27:34 > 0:27:36They're really funny.
0:27:36 > 0:27:38It's really kind of inspirational.
0:27:38 > 0:27:41I think Roald Dahl is wonderful.
0:27:43 > 0:27:47One of Roald Dahl's best-loved books is The BFG.
0:27:47 > 0:27:51At its end, the Big Friendly Giant meets the Queen,
0:27:51 > 0:27:54who orders that an enormous house be built specially for him
0:27:54 > 0:27:57in Windsor Great Park.
0:27:57 > 0:28:00There is, in the real world,
0:28:00 > 0:28:04an enormous house in Windsor Great Park owned by the Queen.
0:28:04 > 0:28:08Its name, as Roald Dahl surely knew, is Cumberland Lodge...
0:28:09 > 0:28:11..his own childhood home in Wales.
0:28:14 > 0:28:19I think, for Roald, Wales always stood for the countryside,
0:28:19 > 0:28:22somewhere that was happy, somewhere that was safe,
0:28:22 > 0:28:24somewhere that was secure,
0:28:24 > 0:28:28where he had some of the most happy, happy memories of his childhood.
0:28:28 > 0:28:31You know, Jesuit says, "If you can have a child till seven,"
0:28:31 > 0:28:36or whatever, "you've got them." I think Wales functioned in that way
0:28:36 > 0:28:37right throughout his life.
0:28:37 > 0:28:40This was a place where everything would be OK
0:28:40 > 0:28:43and I sort of think that that's what Wales meant for him.
0:29:12 > 0:29:14GLITTER BALL CHIRPS A "YOOHOO"
0:29:14 > 0:29:16# Oh, it don't mean a thing
0:29:16 > 0:29:19# If it ain't got that swing
0:29:19 > 0:29:21# Doo-wa, doo-wa, doo-wa, doo-wa, doo-wa! #
0:29:21 > 0:29:24Strictly: Mission Fabulous continues