The Giraffe and the Pelly and Me

Roald Dahl's The Giraffe and the Pelly and Me is a short, song filled story for 5 year olds about a boy, an empty old shop and three animals who clean windows without ladders.

What happens

Billy tells it himself. There's a locked up wooden house near where he lives with THE GRUBBER still painted across the front of it. His mum says a grubber used to mean a sweet-shop.

So that's his one big wish. He would fill it top to bottom with Sherbet Suckers and Sugar Snorters and Butter Gumballs.

Someone buys it before he can. Then a bathtub comes flying out of an upstairs window and lands in the road. So does a lavatory. So does a rocking horse.

The next day there's a brand new red door, twice as tall as it needs to be. And a head appears at the top window.

The new owners are a Giraffe, a Pelican and a Monkey. They've spent every penny on the house and they're all starving, so they've gone into the window cleaning business.

Their method is the best bit. The Giraffe is the ladder. The Pelly's beak is the bucket (the top half slides away into his head, which he is very proud of). The Monkey does the actual polishing.

They need a human to help, and that's how Billy gets hired as their Business Manager.

Almost everything they say comes out as a song. Your reader will hear the rhythm straight away and probably join in. The Pelly moans about wanting a fish in verse. The Monkey goes on about walnuts being scrumptious-galumptious.

The Giraffe only eats the pink and purple flowers of the tinkle-tinkle tree, which is a problem for later.

Their first job is the Duke of Hampshire's house. It has six hundred and seventy seven windows and every one of them is filthy.

One warning, and it's a small one. The Duke is a shouty old gent and when he thinks the Pelly is pinching his cherries he roars for his gun and says he'll have the bird shot for breakfast. It's played as him being ridiculous rather than frightening. Still, if your child takes talk of guns seriously, you might want to be in the room for that bit.

It's a book of daft made up words and things that shouldn't be possible. The Giraffe's neck can grow, for one, and Billy gets to watch it happen.

What to read next

If they like Dahl in this mood, try Esio Trot next. Mr Hoppy wants to help a tortoise grow bigger and the whole plan turns on a chant in backwards tortoise language.