Sections: Information | Plot Description
Information
- First published:
- January 31, 1959 issue of The New Yorker
- Also known as:
- Connections:
- Pheasant poaching plot is very similar to Danny the Champion of the World
- Shares characters with “Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life,” “Mr. Hoddy,” “Mr. Feasey,” “Rummins,” and “The Ratcatcher” (collectively known as the “Claud’s Dog” series from Someone Like You), as well as “Parson’s Pleasure.”
- Related books:
- 5 Bestsellers Including Over 40 Tales of the Unexpected
- A Roald Dahl Selection: Nine Short Stories
- Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life
- Kiss Kiss
- Selected Stories of Roald Dahl
- Skin and Other Stories
- Spectrum One
- Stories from The New Yorker 1950-1960
- The Best of Roald Dahl
- The Collected Short Stories of Roald Dahl
- The Complete Short Stories: Volume Two
- The Roald Dahl Omnibus
- Trickery
- Magazine publications:
- Audio Books:
- “Einsatz / Der Weltmeister” read by Martin Benrath and Josef Manof
- “The Champion of the World” read by Stephen Mangan
- Kiss Kiss read by Tamsin Greig, Juliet Stevenson, Adrian Scarborough, Stephanie Beacham, Derek Jacobi, Stephen Mangan
Plot Description
This story, originally published in Dahl’s book Kiss Kiss, is another of the “country stories” that deals with Claud and his friends in the English countryside. (It’s not considered part of the original “Claud’s Dog” series, though.) The narrative centers on two men and the extraordinary method for poaching pheasants one of them invents. If it sounds familiar, it’s because Dahl later reworked the entire plot (and character names and huge chunks of dialogue) into the children’s book Danny the Champion of the World. That book, in turn, had a portion which was later developed into The BFG. As you can see, Dahl definitely approved of recycling his best ideas.
Spoiler warning! Readers of the earlier “Claud’s Dog” series in Someone Like You will undoubtedly recognize the title character Claud back in action. This time the story begins in media res as Claud and his cohort Gordon prepare 196 raisins to take with them poaching in Hazel’s Wood. Gordon’s idea was to fill the raisins with seconal from sleeping pills and knock the birds unconscious. They manage to get in and out of the wood unscathed, bagging 120 birds and dropping the sacks off in a hired taxi. The next day they wait by their filling station for Bessie Organ, the vicar’s wife, to deliver the birds in a specially constructed baby carriage. Before she gets there, though, the powder begins to wear off and the birds all fly out and settle down on the filling station. Horrified, Claud and Gordon know that Victor Hazel will be appearing soon.