Sungguh buku yang liar! Kalau rajin baca Roald Dahl pasti sudah tidak asing dengan keliaran imajinasinya yang membuahkan, antara lain, Matilda dan Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Tapi kali ini dia membawa imajinasinya ke dimensi lain yang jauh lebih dewasa, My Uncle Oswald.Pernahkah terpikir bisa punya anak dari tokoh-tokoh hebat dunia seperti Monet, Picasso, Einstein, Puccini, Bernard Shaw atau dari raja-raja Eropa yang tak tersentuh? Tidak harus menikah dengan mereka tentu saja, karena peluangmu paling-paling satu banding seribu. Tapi dengan membeli sperma mereka. Sperma asli bersertifikat! Oswald yang genius dan selalu mendambakan tantangan memilih cara yang tidak biasa untuk meraup uang, yaitu dengan menjual sperma milik tokoh-tokoh terkenal. Tidak sendirian pastinya. Dia dibantu profesornya yang menciptakan wadah penyimpan sperma agar bisa tahan hingga puluhan tahun, dan gadis cantik keturunan Persia, Yasmin, yang menjadi 'pancingan' agar para lelaki hebat itu bisa berejakulasi. Tapi gadis cantik saja tentu tidak cukup. Toh maestro-maestro seni seperti Puccini hampir tiap hari didekati wanita cantik yang mengaguminya. Maka Oswald pun melibatkan bubuk Sudanese Blister Beetle yang dibelinya di Sudan setelah mendengar cerita seorang veteran tentara Inggris. Dengan bubuk ini, dijamin lelaki paling steril pun bakal panas dingin melihat perempuan, apalagi perempuan secantik Yasmin.Sulit untuk tidak cengar-cengir selama membaca buku ini. Dahl dengan cueknya menggambarkan tokoh-tokoh itu sesuka hati. Ada yang ternyata masih perawan eh perjaka, ada yang selalu 'on' bahkan tanpa bubuk Blister Beetle, ada yang gay, walaupun ada juga yang sangat menyenangkan dan sempurna sebagai laki-laki. Tokoh mana yang seperti apa, sebaiknya sih baca sendiri. Nanti jadi nggak lucu lagi kalau diceritain :DPintarnya Dahl, dia memilih setting tahun 1919, sehingga hal-hal yang mustahil terjadi di masa modern bisa saja terjadi di masa itu. Misalnya, hanya dengan sepucuk surat berkop palsu Kerajaan Inggris, Yasmin bisa diterima di ruang pribadi raja-raja Eropa. Alasannya, saat itu Inggris baru menang perang jadi raja-raja lainnya tidak ingin membuat Inggris marah dengan menolak 'utusan' mereka yang hanya punya waktu sebentar untuk mampir. Mau dicek lewat telepon juga tidak mungkin, karena saat itu Alexander Graham Bell pun masih dianggap orang gila dengan penemuannya yang tidak mutu!Komentar-komentar yang rada rasis juga bertebaran di buku ini, karena Oswald menceritakan pengalamannya tidur dengan banyak perempuan dari berbagai suku dan bangsa. Menambah 'keliaran' buku ini.Tapi itu bukan masalah besar. Buka pikiran lebar-lebar, dan bacalah buku ini sambil tertawa. Dijamin ampuh mengusir bete :D
The nameless narrator has revealed snippets of the lovable, lascivious Uncle Oswald's life in other collections ("Taste" and "Switch Bitch"), but this is the only novel--brief though it is--dedicated solely to the diaries of "the greatest fornicator of all time." I've said it once and I'll say it again, there is simply a shortage of good books focused on erotic humor. This story is rather a caricature of all sexual values that have ever existed. The story's main person, Oswald Cornelius (who is called "Uncle" because the whole story is quoted from his "diaries" by a nephew), is, according to Dahl, "the greatest rogue, bounder, connoisseur, bon vivant and fornicator of all time". He seems to get every lady, not regarding age or whatever else, into bed with utmost ease. This gentleman comes across a lot of absolutely ridiculous adventures that are all described in this wicked book. This story takes place around 1912, when Oswald is barely seventeen. In spite of his young age, he is already a great diplomat and communicator. When he hears about a mysterious African Sudanese beetle that--when stamped to powder--increases a man's potency highly, he's the first to go on expedition to Africa and get hold of some of these beetles. He accomplishes his mission and gets back to Europe where he sells his "high-potency pills" at exorbitant prices to people from all over the world. What struck me about him was that although he had a rule never to sleep with a woman more than once, he was remarkably equalitarian in his relations with a partner. When he meets the beautiful Yasmin Howcomely, she becomes an equal partner in his ventures. They sleep together twice, but there are no regrets that the relationship does not continue. Oswald never "uses" a woman for pleasure, he merely enjoys the company they give, never forcing more than is desire by the woman.The life of a commercial sperm broker has a few surprises even for a sophisticated bon vivant, and Dahl manages his signature sting-in-the-tail ending even in one of his lightest comic works. I can absolutely recommend this book for anyone who likes a very lucid and deliciously weird story. Book Details: Title My Uncle OswaldAuthor Roald DahlReviewed By Purplycookie
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Book Review: My Uncle Oswald, by Roald DahlI always enjoyed Dahl's brilliant and witty writings as a child, so it's no surprise that I equally enjoy his more adult themed books as well. When I was teaching, I used to use his short story "Lamb to the Slaughter" as an excellent example of situational irony. "Lamb" was originally published by Harper's in the early 50's. (Many of the best writers were published in Harper's and The New Yorker back in those days).A few years back, I discovered his "Omnibus" which left me enthralled, enchanted and chomping at the bit for more. After a brief hiatus to read the entire works of Fitzgerald, I finally came back to my old friend, Roald. I was not prepared for what I read this time around. This is not quite the Dahl I knew.Our hero is Uncle Oswald, described as "the greatest fornicator of all time." In this book, much to my chagrin, I finally found out what a snozzberry was. I wish I didn't know. But what has been seen, cannot be unseen. But like Icarus, I guess I flew too close to the sun!The book is raunchy and raucous and randy, without actually taking the reader through a play by play into the depths of erotica. So, in essence, it's a clean kind of dirty. Oswald likes the finer things in life (don't we all?), thus he realizes at the tender age of 17 that he must accrue as much wealth as possible to enable him to live the lifestyle that he is clearly destined to live.How does he do it? He discovers the most powerful aphrodesiac in the world, of course. He tells of his discovery to a smarmy scientist, who comes up with the idea to unknowingly give this substance to famous men and to then, consequently, collect the seed of famous and genius level men and to then sell it. Enter Yasmin, stage left. Yasmin is an integral part of the plan, as she slips this drug to kings, sculptures, doctors and dutifully collects the DNA. The result is hilarious as the drug hits these dignified men and they transform from articulate men into crazed beasts. She unwittingly nearly kills some of the older geniuses as the concoction of the beetle and her shenanigans kick into high gear. Yasmin ends up having to stab some of them in the "bum" with hatpins in order to calm them down to a manageable and somewhat reasonable level. Some of the men that Yasmin "gets with" are Freud, Puccini, Rachmaninoff, Einstein and Monet. But the coup de grace actually occurs AFTER all of these salacious events. Can you guess what it is?I laughed out loud countless times while reading this goofy, epic odyssey. Dahl is one of a kind, and he is sorely missed by fans and connoisseurs of his work.
—Lynn Hoffmann
Es difícil imaginarte a uno de tus autores infantiles favoritos escribiendo una sátira sexual, pero Roald Dahl consigue qyue te rías de la misma manera que cuando leías sus historias de la fábrica de chocolate. Aúnque se hable mucho de sexo y las sucesivas escenas de alcoba sean el hilo que une las distintas escenas creo que este libro es sobre todo un retrato muy desenfadado de algunas de las personas más famosas de los años veinte, de la falsa moralidad, de la fama...Y entre risas y sonrisas puede que descubra la manera de ser inmensamente rico como el tío Oswald.
—Xan
I laughed and cried out loud at the ludicrousness and obscenity of the diary record of “My Uncle Oswald”. This book is obscene, it is not erotic. Do not prepare to climb into bed early one night with this adult fantasy as a sexy treat. Roald Dahl’s adult work is Charlie and the Chocolate factory gone Oswald and the Sex factory. Sex is imagined in every shape and form and nationality and flexibility (heels hooked around the neck, WTF?) till all that candy makes you sick. All centered around a scheme to collect sperm in straws from King Alfonso, Renoir, Monet, Picasso, Stravinsky, Matisse, Proust, Joyce, the Royal Families the world over – and the insane plotline around it. It could even scare you there all alone by the nightlamp, with its gluttonous ideas of insatiable, ravenous and meaningless earthly pleasure. I shudder! And why is it, I wonder, that the male protagonist beds thousands of young aristocratic women while the female protagonist gets her turn with a bunch of wheelchair bound alte kackers who can no longer hold their own paintbrush? I shudder again! Dahl’s imagination does what only his can do; cook up hilarious hairbrained unattractive and testosterone injected male fantasies of unlimited wealth and women. There is a concoction of pickled humans, beetle potion for arousal, octopus in stomachs, frozen sperm kings, twists to the end, ask not what else. Just be forewarned; it is imaginative and grotesque, and will contribute absolutely nothing of value to your life. But then again, you weren’t looking for value, were you? So much is the real takeaway: I will never read a Dahl book to my seven year old son the same way again.
—Frieda Vizel
