Charlie and the Chocolate Factory | Chapter 5 : The Golden Tickets | Summary

Summary

Mr. Bucket excitedly reads the newspaper article aloud. Willy Wonka has decided to allow five children to visit his factory. He will give those five a tour of the factory and show them all its "secrets and magic." At the end of the tour all five winners will be given lifetime supplies of chocolate and candy.

Golden Tickets have been placed in five random chocolate bars, which may be "in any shop in any street in any town in any country in the world," anywhere that Wonka's candies are sold.

Grandpa Joe is elated. Wouldn't it be wonderful if Charlie found one of the tickets? Sadly, Charlie says there isn't a hope. But Grandma Georgina reminds him his birthday is next week. He'll get a chocolate bar then.

Analysis

Here's another chapter that's studded with fairy-tale touches: golden tickets, a lifelong supply of candy, only five children will be chosen, and those five could live anywhere in the world. It's true: Charlie doesn't have a hope. The odds against him are overwhelming.

It's a touching sign of Charlie's sweetly melancholic nature that he himself realizes he has no chance of finding a ticket. At this moment he seems more mature than his grandparents—a sad detail. Luckily, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a fairy tale, if a modern one. Charlie won't have to be sad, and the reader won't be kept in suspense, for very long.

Mr. Wonka is comically self-important. Here he calls himself "the candy-making genius whom nobody has seen for the last ten years." Other hints at his vanity will surface throughout the book, but they'll always be good-natured. After all, he's worth it—especially from a child's perspective.