7.2 /10 1 Votes7.2
Author Subject Hunting, magic Genre Fantasy | 3.6/5 Goodreads Country United States Originally published 1966 Page count 40 LC Class PZ7.D1515 Mag | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Cover artist Pène du Bois (first),Marriott, Ross, Blake Publisher Harper & Row (first), George Allen & Unwin (first UK) Characters Mr. Gregg, Mrs. Gregg, The girl with the magical finger, William, Phillip Similar Roald Dahl's Willy Wonka, Roald Dahl's The Twits, Charlotte's Web, Stuart Little, Matilda the Musical | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
The Magic Finger is a fantasy story written by Roald Dahl in 1962. It was first published in the United States, by Harper & Row in 1966, as a picture book illustrated by William Pène du Bois. Allen & Unwin published a Pène du Bois edition in the U.K. in 1968. Later editions have been illustrated by Pat Marriott, Tony Ross, and Quentin Blake.
Synopsis
The narrator is an 8-year-old girl who hates hunting, particularly from the neighboring Gregg family. She tries to talk the Gregg family out of it, but either they laugh at her, or they ignore her completely. The girl possesses an ability known as the Magic Finger, which is triggered whenever she gets upset and sees red. She will then blast a beam of magical energy from her finger that can permanently disfigure the person she is upset at. After turning her teacher, Old Mrs Winter into a cat, she swears that she will never use the finger again. However, she gives in to temptation and uses it again when she finally has had enough of the Greggs' mocking of her hatred for hunting.
The next day, the Gregg Family wake up as tiny people with bird wings replacing their arms and their house is taken over by 4 human-sized ducks with human arms instead of wings. The Greggs are forced to leave their house behind and build a nest in one of the trees in their garden where they spend the night. The next morning, they wake up to find the large ducks with the Gregg Family's guns standing under their tree, threatening to shoot the Gregg Family in the same way that they have shot the ducks. Mrs Gregg begs the ducks not to kill her, her husband or their 2 children, right before one of the ducks speaks to them, revealing that her own children were killed by the Gregg family on their last hunting trip. The Gregg Family promise never to hunt again and the spell is broken, with the Gregg family changed back into normal humans and the ducks returning to normal.
The next day, the girl goes to the Gregg Family's house and finds them smashing up their guns and setting up graves for the birds that they killed. They have even changed their surname to "Egg". The girl feels that things may have gotten a little out of hand but then hears a gun fired by another neighboring hunting-mad family, the Coopers. She then sets off, telling the Eggs that the Coopers will be nesting in the trees that night; in some versions of the book, an illustration at the end shows the Cooper family sitting in a nest, having fallen victim to the Magic Finger's same curse as the Eggs before.