Charlie And The Chocolate Factory

Grandpa Joe is 96 years old. He lives with his wife, Grandma Josephine, as well as the other Buckets. Due to the family’s poverty, Grandpa Joe shares a bed with Grandma Josephine, Grandpa George, and Grandma Georgina. Being frail, he is bedridden until Charlie’s Golden Ticket motivates him to accompany his grandson to Wonka’s Factory.

Grandpa Joe is established as a likable character through his childlike wonder. He becomes “as eager and excited as a young boy” when talking to his grandson Charlie about the wonders of Wonka’s Factory (10). In contrast to the skepticism of the other adults, he joyfully accepts Mr. Willy Wonka’s confusing mysteries. Grandpa Joe is rewarded for his imagination and joy with getting to live the rest of his days in the factory.

Mr. Willy Wonka is the mysterious chocolatier who owns the internationally renowned Wonka’s Factory. He dresses in dapper clothing—including a black top hat, velvet tailcoat, green trousers, gray gloves, and a gold-topped walking cane. He produces his chocolate in creative, wondrous ways, such as using a waterfall to mix concoctions. Such inventions characterize Mr. Wonka as brilliant and eccentric. He releases five Golden Tickets hidden in candies in order to find a deserving heir for his factory; he wants a “good sensible loving child” with a love for his art (151).

Augustus Gloop finds the first of Mr. Willy Wonka’s Golden Tickets. He is nine years old and very overweight—with “great flabby folds of fat [that] bulged from every part of his body” (21). Roald Dahl uses Augustus’s weight as a characterization tool to illustrate his extreme Greed and Gluttony; his hyperbolic fatness is typical of Dahl’s humor, which frequently utilizes exaggeration. The boy’s family name also speaks to this exaggeration, the soft sound of “Gloop” evoking the very chocolate river in which he learns a valuable lesson.

Augustus is celebrated for his insatiable eating by his family and community, but at Wonka’s Factory, he is punished by being sucked up a pipe (after ignoring Mr. Wonka’s pleas to stop contaminating the chocolate river). He leaves the factory very thin due to the effects of the pipe. It is implied that Augustus is a dynamic character who learns the perils of overindulgence and will live with more temperance from now on.

Veruca Salt is the second winner of Mr. Willy Wonka’s Golden Tickets. She operates as a foil to Charlie Bucket, who offers to share his one chocolate bar—given as a birthday gift—with his poor family. On the other hand, Veruca’s father buys thousands of Wonka bars and orders his many factory workers to unwrap them until a Golden Ticket is found. Veruca’s screams of “Where’s my Golden Ticket! I want my Golden Ticket!” characterize her as overindulged and selfish (25). At Wonka’s Factory, she continues to make demands (of an Oompa-Loompa and squirrel) to her pandering father. As for family names, “Salt” starkly contrasts with Charlie Bucket’s sweet nature.

Veruca bursts into the Nut Room despite Mr. Wonka’s cautioning and is sent down a garbage shoot after being deemed a “bad nut” by the discerning squirrels. Like Augustus, the reader is left with the impression that Veruca’s experience will change her for the better. The Salts meekly leave the factory “covered with garbage;” Veruca’s parents are punished for their role in spoiling Veruca (149).

Violet Beauregarde wins the third of Mr. Willy Wonka’s Golden Tickets. She is a loud, precocious child who is obsessed with chewing gum. Her habit of sticking used gum onto elevator buttons characterizes her as inconsiderate. Violet ignores Mr. Wonka’s request to not try the three-course gum in the Inventing Room and is punished for her disobedience by being turned into a giant blueberry; she is juiced by the Oompa-Loompas but remains a vivid, appropriately violet color. As with the other children, the reader hopes her experience will correct her behavior.