This year’s festival took place on Saturday 5 July and was themed on the popular story of ‘The Twits’. 

The spectacular Roald Dahl Parade kicked off at 11am and featured a multitude of characters and themes from The Twits including giant puppets, as well as music and other original artwork, created by young people from across the Vale. After the parade there was be plenty to see and do.

If you wish to download and look at this year's Roald Dahl festival booklet please follow the link below.

Roald Dahl Revolting Rhymes Competition with Mix 96 - Competition Winner

As part of this year's festival a Revolting Rhymes Competition was held by our good friends at Mix 96.  The competition asked young people to write a rhyme of between 100 and 500 words.  They had to use their imagination and write your own ‘revolting rhyme’, with your own characters and themes, similar to the Roald Dahl Revolting Rhymes. 

The winner was Amie Ing who is age 11 from Aylesbury.  Her poem Three Billy Goats Gruff can be downloaded via the link at the bottom of the page.

Roald Dahl Parade

The streets of Aylesbury were brought to life with a colourful parade of artwork, carnival, music, dance and costumes. During the weeks leading up to the festival fourteen local
primary schools, three secondary schools, and community groups worked with artists to create characters from the popular Roald Dahl story The Twits.

Larger than life puppets paraded through the streets of Aylesbury. Beginning at the Civic Centre the parade wound its way up through the Market Square, around Kingsbury then back down through the Market Square, finishing at the Civic Centre.

The parade also featured music and street theatre including Samba bands Sol Samba and Sambuka.

Kingsbury activities

Kingsbury was a thriving area of music, street theatre and children’s craft activity led by the AVDC Play Services together with the Queens Park Arts Centre. An information stand was also available to help visitors make the most of their day.

AVDC Play Services Craft Activities

Aylesbury Vale District Council’s Play Services offered children the opportunity to make a variety of The Twits themed craft activities including Mr Twit beards, Roly-poly birds, Mrs Twit’s glass eye, Jumping frog, Muggle-wump monkey badge and a colouring and quiz sheet.

Queens Park Arts Centre The Twits children’s activities

Queens Park Arts Centre provided a wealth of art and craft activities for children throughout the day complete with giant heads of The Twits made out of wire and papier-mâché. Children were able to help to make their beards and decorate them with horrible bits, have fun making birds from willow and tissue paper for the Twits’ tree and learnt how to make their favourite characters out of clay. 

Samba Bands

Visitors were able to join the crowds in Kingsbury as Samba bands Sol Samba and Sambuka kept them entertained.

Festival of Twits

Ramshacklicious Theatre Company presented Road to Nowhere, an extraordinary concoction of contemporary clowning, storytelling and live music.

Aylesbury Library Fun Day

Visitors were able to join in a fun day of craft activities and story-telling at Aylesbury Library. The library was joined again by the Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre and their ever-popular face painters. The day started early for our youngest visitors with a special Bounce and Rhyme for the under 5s at 10am. Older children wereable to find out more about this year’s ‘sporty’ Summer Reading Challenge, and the whole family were able to browse through the book sale and follow the exciting Treasure Trail from Kingsbury, where there were even more fantastic library and Adult Learning activities.

The Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre presents Phizz-whizzing storytelling and craft sessions

Festival goers wer able to come along and meet the Museum’s wacky storytellers who shared some noisy Revolting Rhymes for all the family. They were able to drop in anytime and get creative making their own Twits mask and try out some of the crodsquinkling craft activities, quizzes and wondercrump wordsearches.

Buckinghamshire County Museum Roald Dahl Festival Fun Day

Visitors were able to meet the Twits and have a whizzpopping day of free activities at the Museum: make a Muggle-wump, a Roly-Poly bird and re-create Mr Twit’s grisly beard to take home. Hear how extremely nasty Mr and Mrs Twit are with storytelling throughout the day or just sit back and listen to our Jazz band in the garden café.

St. Mary’s Church Activity Day

At St Mary's visitors could take part in a variety of fun craft activities, visit the belltower and enjoy an afternoon of entertainment, including a performance by St Mary’s Singers and the Doorways Dance Group, an integrated group for people with and without disabilities. The Refectory was also open to provide refreshments - complete with delicious home-made cakes!

King’s Head Roald Dahl activities

The National Trust's King’s Head ran a children's book swap shop, for children to bring along the children’s books they’ve already read and swap them for ones they want to read now. There was also several Twits-themed fun activities, and superb storytelling in the house! Special Roald Dahl inspired refreshments were available, with the bookshop and coffee shop open for business as usual!

Roald Dahl Prize Trail

A family prize trail led from the information point in Kingsbury via all of the various activity venues and finish at Aylesbury Library. Explorers could collect clues along the way for a chance to win some fantastic prizes.

The Roald Dahl Festival Partners

• AVDC Arts Development
• Buckinghamshire County Museum and Roald Dahl Children’s Gallery
• Aylesbury Library
• Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre in Great Missenden
• St Mary’s Church
• The King’s Head
• Queen Park Arts Centre
• AVDC Play Services
• Aylesbury Civic Centre

Date Updated: 30/07/08