Sunday, August 11, 2013

Book review: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

“I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living.” 
― Dr. Seuss


How would you feel when the vocabulary book, say Power of Words made easy (name changed) had a lot of cartoon illustrations and rhythmic poems to teach you those big, elusive words? Learning of so many graduates for GRE, CAT and various other exams would have been so much easier! I see 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' in the same light for kids.

This one is a delight to read, so rhythmic and breezy. There is a poor honest boy called Charlie who lives with his parents along with 2 sets of grandparents in a dilapidated house. A world famous mysterious chocolate factory exists in his home town about which he has heard a ton of stories from Grandpa Joe. Charlie luckily comes in possession of one of the four golden tickets for a visit to the factory. The factory's owner Mr. Willy Wonka becomes the host to show Charlie and three other winners his proud factory. What follows in the story is how each of those other 3 kids (a glutton, a spoilt brat and a TV maniac) get thrown out of the factory even before the complete tour is done.

This book stretches kids' imagination by pushing the brain to imagine tens of incredible mechanisms in a factory and delights the readers through a lenient dash of poetry throughout the story. The characters in the book are eccentric stereotypes of the world and kids will get to know a hell lot of describing words. The imagery in the book is just what kids would enjoy. Since the book is all about chocolates, the kids will have one problem reading this book - they can never put it down!!

I recommend this book to all adults who are interested in reading literature with word play and rich imagery. I am sure even adults' vocabulary would be enriched after this reading experience. This book is typically for kids of age 8-12 with appropriate grade level hold on English.