Roald Dahl was one of the most successful children's book writers of all time. The author of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and James and the Giant Peach, he was also a deeply troubled man about whom opinion is still divided. War hero, spy, connoisseur, philanthropist, family man who had to confront an appalling succession of tragedies, Dahl was also a fantasist, a bully, and a self-publicizing troublemaker who attracted accusations of racism and misogyny. In this first full-length biography, Jeremy Treglown tells the story of Dahl's adventurous, myth-making life from childhood on, and traces the author's literary career from its beginnings in wartime propaganda in the early 1940s, his New Yorker stories and Hollywood screenplays, through his (at first reluctant) move into writing for children, to his unequaled commercial success. Based on numerous interviews, including interviews with Dahl's wife of thirty years, Patricia Neal, and Dahl's personal correspondence, Roald Dahl is an enlightening - and disturbing - literary portrait of one of the century's renowned personalities.