The main aim of this study is to analyse the grotesque characterization of adults in four novels by Roald Dahl, from Michail Bachtin’s definition of the carnival-grotesque in Rabelais and his world. From this view I have examined how the conflict between children and adults is described in these books, and to what extent the grotesque motifs have a function in this conflict.

For this purpose I have applied theories of the literature-grotesque by Michail Bachtin, and of the meaning and function and – in this context – the necessity of fright and horror in children’s fiction, in particular by Bruno Bettelheim and J.A. Appleyard. The result of the analysis suggests that the books contains obvious and distinct grotesque elements and that Dahl’s popularity among children, and opposition among critics, should be due to this elements. Taken together, these circumstances give cause for the epithet “subversive grotesques for children” for Roald Dahl’s children’s books, and that Dahl can be said to deconstruct the conventional perception of childhood.