Dahl was a master of exaggeration, particularly in his portrayal of characters, which are either extremely nice or extremely nasty. In his wonderfully evocative descriptions, he uses inventive similes and metaphors to keep the writing lively. Roald Dahl said, ‘if a person is nasty or bad or cruel you make them very nasty very bad and very cruel and, if they are ugly, you make them extremely ugly’. Despite the extreme nastiness of Dahl’s baddies, his heroes and heroines – who are nearly always children – never allow evil to triumph.