James and the Giant Peach

James and the Giant Peach is a children's book by Roald Dahl, originally illustrated by Nancy Ekholm Burkert, first published in the USA in 1961 by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. and then in London in 1967 by Allen & Unwin.

Synopsis

James Henry Trotter, an ordinary four year old boy, has had a happy life but is orphaned as a result of a bizarre and terrible accident (his parents were supposedly swallowed by a rhinoceros). He is sent to live with his two horrid maiden aunts, Spiker and Sponge, who subject him to a variety of physical and mental abuse and treat him like a slave.

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One day while chopping wood in the garden, James, then age seven, meets a strange man who, mysteriously, knows James's plight and gives him a small sack containing the ingredients for a magic potion, the consumption of which, the stranger promises, will bring James wealth, happiness, and great adventure. Unfortunately, while running back to the house to hide the sack, James trips and drops it. It bursts and its contents sink into the ground and vanish without a trace - or so it then seems. James is horrified at the loss of what seemed to be his only opportunity for escape from his wretched aunts. But things take another odd turn when a long-barren peach tree in the garden puts forth a single fruit which grows to almost twice the size of the tree. One night, James, who has been shoved out of the house, crawls inside the giant peach, where he finds a most bizarre group of friends: a giant grasshopper, centipede, spider, ladybug and several other giant insects. The peach, with the help of the centipede, breaks off the tree, rolls over and flattens James' two aunts, and into the Atlantic Ocean, where their adventures really begin.

Related Topics:
Peach - Grasshopper - Centipede - Spider - Ladybug - Insects

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A film version of the same name was released in 1996, directed and co-produced, respectively, by The Nightmare Before Christmas collaborators Henry Selick and Tim Burton. It featured a combination of live-action and stop-motion animation.

Related Topics:
Film version of the same name - 1996 - The Nightmare Before Christmas - Henry Selick - Tim Burton - Stop-motion

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