This is a great question to ask, because in his preface to
this excellent work, Dahl himself says that this is "not an autobiography." However, let
us be aware of how he defines autobiography:
An autobiography is a book a person writes about
his own life and it is usually full of all sorts of boring
details.
Dahl claims that
this novel is not an autobiography because he would never "write a history" of himself.
However, at the same time he says he will communicate a series of incidents from his
life that have remained firmly in his mind. He final words in the preface are that "All
are true." The definition of an autobiography is a text that tells the life of a person
that is written by that person. So, in spite of Dahl's protestations otherwise, this is
an autobiography, and an excellent example of one. A biography is a text based on a
person's life that is not told by that person.
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