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  • Published: 20 October 2011
  • ISBN: 9780143106340
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 160
  • RRP: $39.99

James and the Giant Peach




A new and delectable Deluxe edition of this wonderful classic, with a cover designed by Jordan Crane

A stunning 50th-anniversary deluxe edition of Roald Dahl’s beloved James and the Giant Peach, featuring
—a new introduction by Aimee Bender, the New York Times bestselling author of The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake
—cover art by the award-winning cartoonist Jordan Crane
—the original interior art from the 1961 first edition
—French flaps and deckle-edged paper

James and the Giant Peach is a perennial bestseller about a boy’s magical journey across the sea, by one of the most beloved storytellers of our time. When James, a boy stuck living with his cantankerous aunts, is given magic crystals by a sympathetic wizard, he accidentally drops them at the foot of the peach tree outside his house, causing one of the fruits to grow the size of a house. Inside he finds oversized insects who promise him deliverance from his aunts, and soon the giant peach is rolling downhill, bound for the Atlantic Ocean and beyond on a magnificent adventure that will take James and his new friends far indeed.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

  • Published: 20 October 2011
  • ISBN: 9780143106340
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 160
  • RRP: $39.99

Other books in the series

Boy

About the author

Roald Dahl

When he was at school Roald Dahl received terrible reports for his writing - with one teacher actually writing in his report, 'I have never met a boy who so persistently writes the exact opposite of what he means. He seems incapable of marshalling his thoughts on paper!' After finishing school Roald Dahl, in search of adventure, travelled to East Africa to work for a company called Shell. In Africa he learnt to speak Swahili, drove from diamond mines to gold mines, and survived a bout of malaria where his temperature reached 105.5 degrees (that's very high!). With the outbreak of the Second World War Roald Dahl joined the RAF. But being nearly two metres tall he found himself squashed into his fighter plane, knees around his ears and head jutting forward. Tragically of the 20 men in his squadron, Roald Dahl was one of only three to survive. Roald wrote about these experiences in his books Boy and Going Solo. Later in the war Roald Dahl was sent to America. It was there that he met famous author C.S. Forester (author of the Captain Hornblower series) who asked the young pilot to write down his war experiences for a story he was writing. Forester was amazed by the result, telling Roald 'I'm bowled over. Your piece is marvellous. It is the work of a gifted writer. I didn't touch a word of it.' (an opinion which would have been news to Roald's early teachers!). Forester sent Roald Dahl's work straight to the Saturday Evening Post. Roald Dahl's growing success as an author led him to meet many famous people including Walt Disney, Franklin Roosevelt, and the movie star Patricia Neal. Patricia and Roald were married only one year after they met! The couple bought a house in Great Missenden called Gipsy House. It was here that Roald Dahl began to tell his five children made-up bedtime stories and from those that he began to consider writing stories for children. An old wooden shed in the back garden, with a wingbacked armchair, a sleeping bag to keep out the cold, an old suitcase to prop his feet on and always, always six yellow pencils at his hand, was where Roald created the worlds of The BFG, The Witches, James and the Giant Peach, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and many, many more.

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Praise for James and the Giant Peach

"This newly-illustrated edition of an avowed children's favorite has all the makings of a classic match-up: Milne had Shepard, Carroll had Tenniel, and now Dahl has Smith...author and illustrator were made for each other, and it's of little consequence that it took almost 35 years for them to meet" --Kirkus.