The Twits

“What a lot of hairy-faced men there are around nowadays.

When a man grows hair all over his face it is impossible to tell what he really looks like.

Perhaps that’s why he does it. He’d rather you didn’t know.”

These lines from the book’s opening chapter introduce the narrator and the narrative style. These lines are a call to the reader, inviting them to step into the narrator’s headspace and hear his innermost thoughts, both about the stories and things he feels strongly about (beards). In real life, Dahl had a particular hatred for beards, and these lines show how much of himself Dahl put into his writing. The line between fiction and reality blurs, and this excerpt also sets up Mr. Twit as an exploration of Dahl’s views on beards and the people who wear them. In this way, Mr. Twit is also a gross exaggeration of bearded men.

“Mr. Twit was a twit. He was born a twit. And now at the age of sixty, he was a bigger twit than ever.”

This passage is part of the introductory chapter for Mr. Twit, and it calls to the effects of aging. Dahl wrote The Twits later in his career, meaning he had firsthand experience of how people change as they age. These lines imply that people are who they are and only become more set in their ways with the passing of time. Mr. Twit has always been a twit, which is defined as a fool or annoying person.