Difference between revisions of "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory"

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Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a 1964 children's novel by British author Roald Dahl. The story features the adventures of young Charlie Bucket inside the chocolate factory of eccentric chocolatier Willy Wonka. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is perhaps Roald Dahl’s best-known story. The story of Charlie Bucket, the five Golden Tickets, the Oompa-Loompas and the amazing Mr Willy Wonka has become firmly embedded in our culture since it was first published in 1964. Conservative estimates suggest the original book has sold over 20 million copies worldwide; it is now available in 55 languages. <ref>https://www.roalddahl.com/roald-dahl/stories/a-e/charlie-and-the-chocolate-factory#synopsis</ref>
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[[File:9780141365374.jpg|thumb|250px|Cover of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory book]]
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Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a children's novel written by British author Roald Dahl in 1964. The story follows the adventures of Charlie Bucket inside the chocolate factory by the famous chocolatier, Willy Wonka. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is one of the Roald Dahl’s best-known story. Conservative estimates suggest the original book has sold over 20 million copies worldwide; it is now available in 55 languages.<ref>https://www.roalddahl.com/roald-dahl/stories/a-e/charlie-and-the-chocolate-factory#synopsis</ref> The story was originally inspired by Roald Dahl's experience of chocolate companies during his schooldays. Cadbury would often send test packages to the schoolchildren in exchange for their opinions on the new products.<ref>[https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-14896806 "Repton School 'helped inspire Dahl' to write Charlie"]. BBC. 12 November 2015. [https://web.archive.org/web/20181014053337/https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-14896806# Archived] from the original on 14 October 2018. Retrieved 21 June 2018.</ref> By the time, chocolate factories are very protective of their chocolate-making process which became one of the main ideas that inspired Dahl to write the story.
  
[[File:9780141365374.jpg|thumb|Cover of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory book]]
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==Plot==
  
== Plot ==
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The film tells the story of a poor child named Charlie Bucket who visits Willy Wonka's chocolate factory after finding a Golden Ticket in a chocolate bar out of luck along with four other children from around the world. In the factory, Charlie and his friends are aided by his workers, Oompa Loompa, a race of small people who help him operate the factory. During the tour, the four "bad" children give in to their individual vices and are ejected from the tour in darkly comical ways.<ref>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlie_and_the_Chocolate_Factory#cite_ref-2</ref> Charlie and his grandfather are the only guests who remain until the end of the factory tour. Therefore, Wonka congratulates him for "winning" the factory. It turns out that Wonka has a hidden motivation for the tour to whom he will only reveal after he learns every color of each child. In the end, Charlie is invited to live in Wonka's factory together with all his family members.
  
Charlie Bucket lives on the outskirts of town with his poverty-stricken family: his parents and all four grandparents. Each day on his way to school, Charlie passes the best and biggest chocolate factory in the world, run by the secretive Willy Wonka. When Charlie’s father loses his job, things go from bad to worse. Grandpa Joe tells Charlie that in the past, competitors stole Wonka’s candy-making secrets, and the factory shut down. Later, the factory resumed production, but no one was ever seen entering or leaving. One day, Wonka announces that he has hidden golden tickets in five Wonka chocolate bars, with the prize of a tour of the factory and a lifetime supply of Wonka products for each child who finds a ticket. Wonka-mania encircles the globe, and one by one four of the tickets are found. Charlie finds money sticking out of a snowbank and buys himself two Wonka chocolate bars; the second contains the last golden ticket.<ref>https://www.britannica.com/topic/Charlie-and-the-Chocolate-Factory-by-Dahl</ref>
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==Controversy==
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===Charlie Bucket===
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[[File:Oompa loompa.jpg|thumb|The original Oompa Loompas based on the novel]]
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The widow and the biographer of the British children’s writer, Felcity Dahl, mentioned to BBC that Charlie Bucket, the main character of the book supposed to be a black kid.<ref>https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/15/books/roald-dahl-charlie-black.html</ref> In [http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0930zvp the interview] with BBC, Felicity Dahl said that, ''".. his first Charlie he wrote about was a little black boy. It was his agent who thought it was a bad idea when the book was first published to have a black hero. People would ask why."'' Unfortunately, the idea of having a black hero or main character was opposed by Dahl's agent. It was then the reason why Charlie Bucket became white as recently known. No further details were provided about the discarded storyline.<ref name=theguardian>https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/sep/26/charlie-and-the-chocolate-factory-began-as-anti-racist-novel-claims-academic</ref>
  
On the day of the tour, Wonka takes the five children and their parents inside the factory, which is a wonderland of confectionery creations that defy logic. They also meet the Oompa-Loompas, a race of small people who help him operate the factory.
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===Oompa Loompas===
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Oompa Loompas are workers who work in Willy Wonka's factory. Originally, they were meant to depict hard-working but mischievous Africans [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pygmy_peoples pygmies] who were brought to the factory to make candy. The importation of African Oompa-Loompas into the factory had connotations of slavery. In later edition of the work, Dahl revised their portrayal, turning the Oompa Loompas into fancy dwarf-like creatures from a made-up country, Loompaland.<ref name=theguardian />
  
During the tour, the four "bad" children give in to their individual vices and are ejected from the tour in darkly comical ways. Augustus gets sucked up the pipe to the Fudge Room after drinking from the Chocolate River, Violet blows up into a giant blueberry after chewing an experimental stick of three-course dinner gum, Veruca is thrown down the garbage chute after trying to capture one of the nut-testing squirrels and is considered a "bad nut," and Mike gets shrunk down to the size of an ant after being sent by Wonkavision. The Oompa-Loompas sing about their specific behavior each time disaster strikes the child. At last, Wonka tells Charlie that, because of his respectful behaviour, he is being given the chocolate factory
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==reference==
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{{reflist}}
  
== Controversy ==
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[[Category:Black-Targeted Racism in Children's Literature]]
According to [https://redtri.com/classic-kids-books-with-racist-stereotypes/slide/2 this site], Charlie and the Chocolate Factory classic book is thought to be racist because In the Dahl’s original 1964 plot, the Oompa Loompas were not orange with green hair. All things being equal, they were portrayed as dark dwarfs "from the most profound and haziest piece of the African wilderness where no white man had been previously." It wasn't until after readers discredited the very clear subjection connotations of the Oompa Loompas, that later forms of the content remixed their skin tone from dark to white
 
 
 
== reference ==
 
{{reflist}}
 

Latest revision as of 09:00, 15 March 2021

Cover of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory book

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a children's novel written by British author Roald Dahl in 1964. The story follows the adventures of Charlie Bucket inside the chocolate factory by the famous chocolatier, Willy Wonka. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is one of the Roald Dahl’s best-known story. Conservative estimates suggest the original book has sold over 20 million copies worldwide; it is now available in 55 languages.[1] The story was originally inspired by Roald Dahl's experience of chocolate companies during his schooldays. Cadbury would often send test packages to the schoolchildren in exchange for their opinions on the new products.[2] By the time, chocolate factories are very protective of their chocolate-making process which became one of the main ideas that inspired Dahl to write the story.

Plot

The film tells the story of a poor child named Charlie Bucket who visits Willy Wonka's chocolate factory after finding a Golden Ticket in a chocolate bar out of luck along with four other children from around the world. In the factory, Charlie and his friends are aided by his workers, Oompa Loompa, a race of small people who help him operate the factory. During the tour, the four "bad" children give in to their individual vices and are ejected from the tour in darkly comical ways.[3] Charlie and his grandfather are the only guests who remain until the end of the factory tour. Therefore, Wonka congratulates him for "winning" the factory. It turns out that Wonka has a hidden motivation for the tour to whom he will only reveal after he learns every color of each child. In the end, Charlie is invited to live in Wonka's factory together with all his family members.

Controversy

Charlie Bucket

The original Oompa Loompas based on the novel

The widow and the biographer of the British children’s writer, Felcity Dahl, mentioned to BBC that Charlie Bucket, the main character of the book supposed to be a black kid.[4] In the interview with BBC, Felicity Dahl said that, ".. his first Charlie he wrote about was a little black boy. It was his agent who thought it was a bad idea when the book was first published to have a black hero. People would ask why." Unfortunately, the idea of having a black hero or main character was opposed by Dahl's agent. It was then the reason why Charlie Bucket became white as recently known. No further details were provided about the discarded storyline.[5]

Oompa Loompas

Oompa Loompas are workers who work in Willy Wonka's factory. Originally, they were meant to depict hard-working but mischievous Africans pygmies who were brought to the factory to make candy. The importation of African Oompa-Loompas into the factory had connotations of slavery. In later edition of the work, Dahl revised their portrayal, turning the Oompa Loompas into fancy dwarf-like creatures from a made-up country, Loompaland.[5]

reference