Roald Dahl's sketches for memoir sell at auction for £24,000

BBC News

18-06-2025

Original sketches done by children's author Roald Dahl for his memoir have sold for nearly £24,000.Dahl, who was born in Llandaff, Cardiff, produced the sketches in black ballpoint pen for the book Boy, which was published in 1984.Over his almost five-decade long career, these are the only book sketches he ever did.They sold in Edinburgh for £23,940 as part of Lyon & Turnbull's books and manuscripts sale on Wednesday.
In the book, Dahl - who moved to Buckinghamshire and died in 1990 at the age of 74 - wrote about his childhood exploits, including playing a prank with his friends on the local sweetshop owner, Mrs Pratchett, by putting a dead mouse in a gobstopper jar. To accompany this tale, Dahl drew a mouse lying on top of the sweets with its legs in the air.The drawings were found in an envelope which belonged to the late Ian Craig, from Ipswich, who was art director at the author's publishing firm, Jonathan Cape, in London.The sketches were sold as part of the production archive from Mr Craig's estate and included Mr Craig's own designs, as well as the publisher's original page layouts and correspondence.Dominic Somerville-Brown, Lyon & Turnbull's rare books and manuscripts specialist said: "This archive is unique in the Roald Dahl canon – it's very rare to find material by his own hand."This is reflected in the price achieved which also demonstrates the enduring popularity of his children's stories 35 years after his death."