The BFG
The Author
Every country in the world that had in the past been visited by the foul man-eating giants sent telegrams of congratulations and thanks to the BFG and to Sophie. Kings and Presidents and Prime Ministers and Rulers of every kind showered the enormous giant and the little girl with compliments and thank-yous, as well as all sorts of medals and presents.
The Ruler of India sent the BFG a magnificent elephant, the very thing he had been wishing for all his life.
The King of Arabia sent them a camel each.
The Lama of Tibet sent them a llama each.
Wellington sent them one hundred pairs of wellies each.
Panama sent them beautiful hats.
The King of Sweden sent them a barrelful of sweet and sour pork.
There was no end to the gratitude of the world.
The Queen herself gave orders that a special house with tremendous high ceilings and enormous doors should immediately be built in Windsor Great Park, next to her own castle, for the BFG to live in. And a pretty little cottage was put up next door for Sophie. The BFG’s house was to have a special dream-storing room with hundreds of shelves in it where he could put his beloved bottles. What is more, he was given the title of The Royal Dream-Blower. He was allowed to go galloping off to any place in England on any night of the year to blow his splendid phizzwizards in through the windows to sleeping children. And letters poured into his house by the million from children begging him to pay them a visit.
Meanwhile, tourists from all over the globe came flocking to gaze down in wonder at the nine horrendous man-eating giants in the great pit. They came especially at feeding-time, when the snozzcumbers were being thrown down to them by the keeper, and it was a pleasure to listen to the howls and growls of horror coming up from the pit as the giants began to chew upon the filthiest-tasting vegetable on earth.
There was only one disaster. Three silly men who had drunk too much beer for lunch decided to climb over the high fence surrounding the pit, and of course they fell in. There were yells of delight from the giants below, followed by the crunching of bones. The head keeper immediately put up a big notice on the fence saying, IT IS FORBIDDEN TO FEED THE GIANTS. And after that, there were no more disasters.
The BFG expressed a wish to learn how to speak properly, and Sophie herself, who loved him as she would a father, volunteered to give him lessons every day. She even taught him how to spell and to write sentences, and he turned out to be a splendid intelligent pupil. In his spare time, he read books. He became a tremendous reader. He read all of Charles Dickens (whom he no longer called Dahl’s Chickens), and all of Shakespeare and literally thousands of other books. He also started to write essays about his own past life. When Sophie read some of them, she said, ‘These are very good. I think perhaps one day you could become a real writer.’
‘Oh, I would love that!’ cried the BFG. ‘Do you think I could?’
‘I know you could,’ Sophie said. ‘Why don’t you start by writing a book about you and me?’
‘Very well,’ the BFG said. ‘I’ll give it a try.’
So he did. He worked hard on it and in the end he completed it. Rather shyly, he showed it to the Queen. The Queen read it aloud to her grandchildren. Then the Queen said, ‘I think we ought to get this book printed properly and published so that other children can read it.’ This was arranged, but because the BFG was a very modest giant he wouldn’t put his own name on it. He used somebody else’s name instead.
But where, you might ask, is this book that the BFG wrote?
It’s right here. You’ve just finished reading it.