26
The Television-Chocolate Room
The Teavee family, together with Charlie and Grandpa Joe, stepped out
of the lift into a room so dazzlingly bright and dazzlingly white that they
screwed up their eyes in pain and stopped walking. Mr Wonka handed
each of them a pair of dark glasses and said, ‘Put these on quick! And
don’t take them off in here whatever you do! This light could blind you!’
As soon as Charlie had his dark glasses on, he was able to look around
him in comfort. He saw a long narrow room. The room was painted
white all over. Even the floor was white, and there wasn’t a speck of
dust anywhere. From the ceiling, huge lamps hung down and bathed the
room in a brilliant blue-white light. The room was completely bare
except at the far ends. At one of these ends there was an enormous
camera on wheels, and a whole army of Oompa-Loompas was clustering
around it, oiling its joints and adjusting its knobs and polishing its great
glass lens. The Oompa-Loompas were all dressed in the most
extraordinary way. They were wearing bright-red space suits, complete
with helmets and goggles – at least they looked like space suits – and
they were working in complete silence. Watching them, Charlie
experienced a queer sense of danger. There was something dangerous
about this whole business, and the Oompa-Loompas knew it. There was
no chattering or singing among them here, and they moved about over
the huge black camera slowly and carefully in their scarlet space suits.
At the other end of the room, about fifty paces away from the camera,
a single Oompa-Loompa (also wearing a space suit) was sitting at a black
table gazing at the screen of a very large television set.
‘Here we go!’ cried Mr Wonka, hopping up and down with excitement.
‘This is the Testing Room for my very latest and greatest invention –
Television Chocolate!’
‘But what is Television Chocolate?’ asked Mike Teavee.
‘Good heavens, child, stop interrupting me!’ said Mr Wonka. ‘It works