Topic: aggressive women

“My Lady Love, My Dove”

Sections: Information | Plot Description | Teacher Ideas

Information

Plot Description

Spoiler warning! Arthur is happily married to Pamela, a very wealthy yet overbearing woman. They are awaiting some weekend guests, the Snapes, and Pamela isn’t looking forward to it. The only reason she invited them was that the Snapes are good bridge players and they play for a decent stake. Suddenly Pamela gets the idea that they should bug the Snapes’s room. Arthur doesn’t like the idea, but Pamela bullies him and reminds him that they’ve done similar things together in the past. “I’m a nasty person,” she says. “And so are you — in a secret sort of way. That’s why we get along together.” Arthur is eventually persuaded to hide a microphone in the guest room and run the wire to the speaker in the master bedroom. Later the guests arrive and everyone has a pleasant dinner. Afterwards they play bridge, and the Snapes have all the luck. The wife, Sally, makes one mistake though that costs them several hundred points. At the end of the evening the couples part and Pamela excitedly tells Arthur to turn on the speaker. They are astonished to hear Mr. Snape reprimanding his wife for her earlier bridge error. She apologizes, but he tells her that they’re just going to have to practice some more. Arthur realizes that they’re talking about a betting code which allows them to cheat and know all of their partner’s cards. Arthur isn’t sure what they should do about it, and waits for Pamela’s decision. Her words shock him: “Why, Arthur, this is a mar-vellous idea… Go fetch a deck of cards; we’ll start right away.”

Teacher Ideas

“Georgy Porgy”

Sections: Information | Plot Description | Reviews | Criticism and Analysis

Information

Plot Description

This story is actually quite disturbing, if you ask me. I’d definitely think twice before letting an impressionable child read it. It has some very vivid passages that can only be described as a Freudian nightmare come to life.

Spoiler warning! George is a vicar in a small country parish and has quite a problem with women. On one hand he is mad about them – the mere sight of a lady in high heels is enough excite him enormously. On the other hand, he can’t bear to touch them or be in close proximity to them. George doesn’t understand the reason for this paradox, but Dahl gives the reader an additional insight – George’s memories of his mother. She was apparently quite a free spirit and took pleasure in teaching her soon the “realities” of life. He quite simply adored her. One night, after a week’s worth of discussions about sex, she took him to the garage to see their rabbit Josephine give birth. As they marvelled at the miracle of life, Josephine began to swallow her new children whole. George screamed, and as he turned to his mother her large open mouth loomed over him and he fled shrieking into the night. She chased him across a highway and was struck by a car and killed. (Undoubtedly this incident affected George deeply and resulted in his subconscious attraction/revulsions towards all women.) Now grown, George tries everything to elude the parish widowers who constantly stalk him. They are persistent though, and George grows more and more desperate with each attempt to seduce him. Finally Miss Roach gets him drunk at a tennis party and catches him in an embrace out in the garden. He is too lightheaded to resist. As she goes to kiss him, though, he sees her large open mouth and begins to scream as she swallows him whole. He continues to narrate from his new home in her digestive system, although we the readers know that he has just simply gone mad. The padded room that he believes is located somewhere near her right kidney is actually in an asylum.

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Criticism and Analysis

“B***h”

Sections: Information | Plot Description | Reviews

Information

Plot Description

This very adult story is from Dahl’s book Switch B***h and probably shouldn’t be read by any children without the consent of their parents. With that in mind, I’m going to keep the plot/description rather simple and vague.

Spoiler warning! Oswald meets up with an olfactory chemist (a scientist of smells) who wants to isolate the human sex pheromone. They accomplish this feat and successfully test the new perfume, which they label “B***h.” Unfortunately the scientist’s lab assistant steals almost all of their supply and then Henri, the scientist, dies of a heart attack during exertions brought on by the pheromone. Armed with only a small remainder and unable to make more, Uncle Oswald decides to have some fun. He plants the liquid in a large flower corsage to be worn by an obnoxious woman sitting next to the President on live television. His plans derail, however, when she unknowingly releases the perfume in his presence in her hotel room. A spectacularly surreal sex scene concludes the story.

Reviews