Stepping Stones

Matilda (A Summary)

Roald Dhal 

          It's a funny thing about mothers and fathers. Even when their own child is the most disgusting little blister you could ever imagine, they still think that he or she is wonderful.

         Some parents go further, they become so blinded by adoration they manage to convince themselves their child has qualities of genius.

        There is nothing very wrong with all this. It is the way of the world. It is only when the parents begin telling us about the brilliance of their own offspring.

         School teachers suffer a good deal from having to listen to this sort of twaddle from proud parents, but they usually get their own back when the time comes to write the end-of-term reports.

         One comes across parents who take opposite line, who show no interest at all in their children. Mr. and Mrs. Wormwood were two such parents. They had a son named Michael, and a daughter named Matilda in particular as nothing than a scab.

         Matilda is a super-smart sensitive and brilliant little girl who's woefully misunderstood by her parents. Mr. and Mrs. Wormwood treat her as a scab, not a daughter- a scab to be endured until the time comes to flick her away to the next country, or preferably farther.

         It is bad enough when parents treat ordinary children as though they were scabs and bunions, but it becomes somehow a lot worse when the child in question is extraordinary, and by that sensitive and brilliant.

         When Matilda was only two years old, she already knows how to write her name. When she was three years old, she already knows how to cook and how to take care of herself. At the age of five, she can't only ready children's books with pictures in it, but also novels written by Dickens, Hemmingway, Kipling, and Steinbeck. She goes to the public library in their town everyday all by herself. Mrs. Phelps, the librarian, was really amazed of the intelligence of this little girl. Still, her parents think her just a nuisance. So she decides to get her own back.

          Matilda's car salesman father, in his loud checked suit, and her platinum-haired mother are no match for her sharp genius.

         When she was already six years old, she attended school at Crunchen Hall Primary School and there she met her best friend named Lavender, her lovely teacher named Miss Honey, and their cruel Headmistress named Miss Truncbull.

         One day, when Matilda and her classmates and schoolmates attacked by Miss Trunchbull, the Headmistress who could teach Wackford Squeers a thing or two about punishment, the child prodigy discovers that she has an extraordinary psychic power (move the things or whatever she wants around her) that can save her school from the cruelty of Miss Trunchbull and especially her lovely teacher Miss. Honey.