Horror as a way to warn about strangers

Roald Dahl uses horror as a way to warn young readers about strangers in his novel “The Witches”. Roald Dahl, who has noted that writing children’s books is especially important because of the messages and wisdom they impart on young readers, spares no such expense to do so in this novel. In order to make his points, however, Dahl uses examples in horror.

The narrator explains to the reader early on in the novel that witches are real, and they are not the silly, cartoon-like versions people always expect - they are evil demons in disguise. The narrator contends that witches may be any woman, anywhere, and that witches are nearly indistinguishable from real women. The same is true of criminals, for which the witches stand in. Criminals may appear to be absolutely normal people on the outside...