Matilda Chapters Summary

 

Summary: Chapter 10: Throwing the Hammer

Matilda gets along well with her classmates. She becomes friends with a girl named Lavender, and the two admire each other’s adventurous spirit. Matilda and Lavender meet an unpleasant, older student named Hortensia on the playground. Hortensia tells them about “The Chokey,” a small closet with walls covered in broken glass and sharp nails, where Miss Trunchbull puts kids to punish them. Children who do not stand up straight are cut and poked by the glass. Hortensia tells them of the times that she has been sent to The Chokey, for putting syrup on Miss Trunchbull’s chair and for putting itching powder in the drawer where Miss Trunchbull keeps her gym shorts. 

Matilda and Lavender realize that Hortensia has a rebellious spirit like their own. Hortensia also warns them that Miss Trunchbull sometimes picks up students and throws them, since she used to compete in the hammer throw for Britain at the Olympics. While on the playground, Miss Trunchbull yells at a small girl named Amanda for having pigtails. Amanda tries to argue, and Miss Trunchbull picks her up by the pigtails, spins her around and tosses her over the fence. Matilda asks if the parents ever complain, but Hortensia explains that most parents are just as afraid of Miss Trunchbull as the students.

Summary: Chapter 11: Bruce Bogtrotter and the Cake

Lavender tells Matilda that Lavender’s father would be very angry if he found out that the headmistress had thrown her over a fence by her hair. Matilda explains that no one would believe the story, and that was the secret to Miss Trunchbull’s success. Everything that she did was unbelievable. The two girls decide that Miss Trunchbull is not crazy, but very dangerous. 

All the students are sent to the Assembly Hall. Miss Trunchbull enters, holding a riding-crop (a whip for horses). Miss Trunchbull calls Bruce Bogtrotter to the front. She accuses him of stealing a slice of chocolate cake from her. He eventually admits to it. Miss Trunchbull calls in the school cook, who brings a very large chocolate cake. Miss Trunchbull yells at Bruce, telling him that he must eat all of it in front of everyone. Bruce struggles at first but eventually gets into a comfortable rhythm, eating slice after slice. Matilda can sense that all the students are quietly hoping that he succeeds, instead of Bruce getting sick in front of everyone. Bruce finishes the cake, after Miss Trunchbull threatens to lock him in The Chokey if he doesn’t. She becomes angry and smashes the empty plate over Bruce’s head, but it doesn’t hurt him. Miss Trunchbull screams at Bruce and leaves. 

Summary: Chapter 12: Lavender

Miss Honey tells the students that Miss Trunchbull has a custom to take over every class for one period each week. She will be taking over Miss Honey’s class on Thursday afternoons. Miss Honey warns her students that they must be very clean and must be on their best behavior. They should not argue, answer back, or try to be funny. She then tells them that Miss Trunchbull always asks for a pitcher of water and glass to be on the teacher’s desk when she teaches. Lavender volunteers to get the pitcher and glass each Thursday. Lavender feels that she must punish Miss Trunchbull, joining Hortensia and Matilda in their heroic daring deeds at school and home. Lavender catches a harmless, but dangerous looking, newt from her garden pond and hides it in her pencil box. She takes the newt to school and does not tell anyone about it. Lavender gets a blue, ceramic pitcher and water glass after lunch on Thursday. She puts the newt inside the pitcher while the classroom is empty. Then, she returns to the other students on the playground outside, so that she does not get caught.

Analysis: Chapters 10–12

The proverbial battlefield that Matilda finds herself on at school is familiar territory, as she has existed and thrived against all odds in the battlefield that is her home. By attending school, Matilda doesn’t escape the cruelty of her home life but, instead, discovers that the children at her school are engaged in never-ending combat against Miss Trunchbull, the enemy of all children. The oppression she has experienced at home unites her with her classmates who face oppression from Miss Trunchbull almost daily. This common enemy brings the students together, and Matilda, who is quite familiar with the strategies required for such battles, is ready to engage her warrior mentality and ups her trickster game to help them all prevail in this hostile environment.

Matilda and her schoolmates form a silent coalition to resist the cruelties of Miss Trunchbull by finding ways to annoy and embarrass her. Just as Matilda has played pranks on her parents, she learns that Hortensia, an older student at school has played pranks on Miss Trunchbull in the past. Hearing about Miss Trunchbull’s cruel punishments from Hortensia fuels Matilda and Lavender’s desire to continue to challenge her and the metaphor of a battle becomes more pronounced: students versus Miss Trunchbull, or children versus adults. It’s obvious that Miss Trunchbull is an adult who should not be allowed around children as she abuses and terrorizes the children in her charge.

The small victories in the students’ battle with a formidable enemy such as Miss Trunchbull demonstrate that everyone has the right to defend themselves, and with courage and perseverance no foe is unbeatable. The students have had to stand up to Miss Trunchbull independently since most parents would find it hard to believe that Miss Trunchbull carries out such outrageous acts. The parents that do know of her are scared of her themselves. The narrator points out that even caring parents who want to protect their kids sometimes fail to do so. When the children stand up against Miss Trunchbull themselves, as in the case of Bruce Bogtrotter and the cake, nothing enrages Miss Trunchbull more. She is infuriated when she is unable to evoke a submissive and terrified response from those she tries to victimize. The students, however, continue to do to Miss Trunchbull what Matilda has done to her father at home. They use their cleverness and their smarts to exact revenge on intimidating and uncaring adults.

Summary: Chapter 13: The Weekly Test

Miss Trunchbull stands in front of the class and tells the students that they are all “nauseating little warts.” She says that she should try to kick as many out of school as she can, so she doesn’t have to deal with them for the next six years. She examines the students’ hands to see if they are clean. She tells Nigel that he is disgusting and makes him stand in the corner. She asks him some spelling words, and he responds correctly. Miss Trunchbull then lifts Rupert by his hair after he answers a multiplication problem wrong, and she lifts Eric by his ears after he gets a spelling word wrong. Miss Honey is worried about the safety of the students and tries to stop Miss Trunchbull, but Miss Trunchbull ignores her. Miss Trunchbull then tells Miss Honey that she should try to be like the mean teacher in Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens. Matilda says that she has read that book, but Miss Trunchbull does not believe her. When she finds out that Matilda is Mr. Wormwood’s daughter, Miss Trunchbull says that he is a crook, as the car he sold her no longer works and was full of sawdust. She tells Matilda that she will be watching her closely.

Summary: Chapter 14: The First Miracle

Miss Trunchbull sits behind the teacher’s desk and tells the class that she thinks that small children are disgusting. Her idea of a perfect school is “one that has no children in it at all.” When she pours herself a glass of water, the newt slides out of the water jug and lands in the glass as well. Miss Trunchbull yells and jumps out of her chair. Lavender warns her that the newt probably bites. Miss Trunchbull quickly accuses Matilda of putting the newt in the jug. She threatens to kick Matilda out of school. Matilda says repeatedly that she did not. The two argue until Miss Trunchbull threatens to beat Matilda with a belt. Once everyone is seated, Matilda concentrates on the glass with the newt in it. She experiences a very strange feeling, as if her eyes were connected to millions of invisible little arms. She uses her mind to push the glass onto Miss Trunchbull. The newt spills on Miss Trunchbull, who immediately becomes very angry. She blames Matilda, but Miss Honey tells her that nobody in the classroom moved. Miss Trunchbull marches out of the room and slams the door. Miss Honey lets the class go to the playground for the rest of the day.