I’m not a massive reader, I must admit. This is probably why I am not a very good writer either. So why am I replying to this Daily Prompt?

Well… I am going through a bit of a nostalgic series. When I was a kid I really enjoyed Roald Dahl’s stories. A few weeks back, my colleague Sara mentioned she was reading The Witches – one of my absolute favourites. I couldn’t resist. I grabbed a copy for my Kindle and devoured it, moved on to Stories of the Unexpected (and More), and now I am three quarters through The BFG – right at the point when they meet the Queen of England and are about to have breakfast with her. So exciting!

Obviously, when I was a kid, I read them in Italian. Now, reading the originals, I find them even more fascinating – I like paying attention to the language, the expressions Dahl uses, the made-up words.. I studied English linguistics during my Bachelors and the part I enjoyed the most was understanding the reason behind rules and expressions. I remember studying a book written by my Lecturer, defining the various tenses and the describing the role of each particle in the sentence. A bit nerdy if you want but very interesting. Sometimes, while reading The BFG on the tube, I like fantasising about how Dahl might have created words like scrumdiddlyumptious or swizzfiggling, their possible Italian translations and how hard to understand these would be for a foreigner.

Probably Boy‘s next. I adore the bit with Meg Ryan reading it in You’ve Got Mail and I still have a mental image of my old primary school literature book’s page capturing that exact excerpt.

Any fans out there? Any suggestions?

In response to The Daily Post’s writing prompt: “That Stings!.”

A shortish Note: the picture was taken using manual focus Friday evening before sunset. I have always been scared of manual focus as I am hardly able to succeed. Most of the times I just end up having headaches – remember my post on the Lensbaby? However, after watching a workshop held by Chris Burkard, I’ve had second thoughts. It’s still very hard for me to see when the subject is actually on focus but I’ll try to experiment more over the next few weeks. Any advice, my fellow photographers?