the fantastic mr. roald dahl... and cocker and anderson

i feel that the english (ie correct) spelling of favourite/favorite is the most suitable for this post since so much of the subject matter is quintessentially english.

right know i am literally all a-quiver (seriously just got an exciting chill and quietly squealed - quietly so as to not attract attention from the interns busy at work on deadline which i should be too, but i digress) about this news that i just found on . one of my fave ever britpop heroes, jarvis cocker (of the incredibly cool pulp, or at least was of), is working on songs for an upcoming wes anderson flick. ok, that in and of itself is incredibly exciting. new jarvis songs. new wes flick. wes and jarvis! but it gets better. in made-for-tv terms, that's not all...

the film is going to be an animated (naturally) adaptation of roald dahl's fantastic mr. fox. cue squeal!!

for those of you who might not know, i am a huuuuge fan or mr. dahl and his work. he was one of those rare writers who really knew exactly how to write for children. not to look down on them, paint a sheltered world where nothing goes wrong, preach to them or anything of that nature. he wrote funny, honest books about good people who had bad things happen to them, bad people who had good things happen to them, kids who read books, mixed together scary mixtures, ate chocolate and poached pheasant (as in stole it, the old-fashioned british way, not cooked it). they were poor a lot of times, but that wouldn't stop them from having lots of fun, which would sometimes mean breaking rules and going against what some adults told them. brilliant!

fantastic mr. fox is one i am going to have to revisit, as my faves were the twits, matilda, both charlie books (chocolate factory and the oft-overlooked, but just as kooky and amazing, great glass elevator), his autobiographies, george's marvelous medicine (which prompted me to make my own mixture from every concoction i could find under the various sinks in our buckinghamshire home. thankfully i never went as far as trying to drink it, a testament to mr. dahl's ability to separate fact from fiction and turn out sensible children), the bfg (big, friendly giant for those not in the know), the giraffe, the pelly and me. the latter of which i had on tape, with roald dahl himself reading the story. i must dig up that tape. well into high school, if i remember correctly, i would listen to that tape to send me to another place.

the books, along with their ever-present illustrations by the brilliant quentin blake, might be one of the most vibrant memories of my childhood. they definitely did a good bit to mold me into the slightly odd, possibly mad, person that i am today. the possibility of being able to create a world such as dahl's was definitely influence enough for me to start writing at a tender age, and never truly stop. i still have a picture of roald dahl sitting on my filling cabinet next to my desk at home, where i used to do my freelance writing. dahl is somewhat past middle age, sat at his desk in his shed at the end of his garden, looking up from some writing, peeking over his spectacles with a funny smile on his face, as if to say, "oh hello, what do you want?" in a cheeky way.

obviously in so many ways he does remind me of my own family, namely my dad, who i still miss dearly. reading those books definitely takes my mind back to the incredibly silly (proudly so), vastly intelligent man who was my dad.