Roald Dahl The Landlady Analysis

During the story the Landlady by Roald Dahl, we meet a naive character named Billy, who is going Bath for a job and decides to spend the night at a Bed and Breakfast. We then start to realise the lady who hosts him is showing signs of being insane. She also uses a certain cleverness and trickiness to capture Billy. Finally, she is very welcoming to Billy, which ultimately ends in him trusting her and will lead to his downfall. To start off, it all begins when Billy first arrives and she starts showing minor signs of paranoia.

In the story we see evidence of the Landlady being insane. One of these times is when Billy first arrives at the Bed and Breakfast as she is explaining the house. After he asks if there is a room, she says “It’s all ready for

The first thing is the sign on the door, which for some reason Billy finds incredibly enticing and it draws him into the bed and breakfast. He notices the lettering “ It said BED AND BREAKFAST” (107) this is an important thing, as it is what draws Billy into her trap. She is very welcoming to Billy, like in the first scene when he walks up to the bed and breakfast and rings the doorbell. This is followed by an almost instantaneous reaction of the landlady opening the door and she says “Please come in” (108)in a very friendly manner. While this may seem normal, as he was considering going to a hotel where the people there aren’t as friendly it would help make the whole place seem better. Then, later on in the story when he starts to question who she really is, she changes back to being quite friendly by offering “What about supper my dear” (110) this completely changes everything, and when he declines she later offers him tea and biscuits which sadly is assumed to be poisoned and we can only assume she has finally fooled poor Billy and that he is now resting stuffed in her Bed and