Matilda Wormwood, also known by her adoptive name Matilda Honey, is the title character of the bestselling 1988 children's novel Matilda by Roald Dahl. She is a highly precocious five and a half (six and a half in the 1996 film) year old girl who has a passion for reading books. Her parents do not recognize her great intelligence and show little interest in her, particularly her father, a secondhand car dealer who verbally abuses her. She then gets adopted by Miss Honey, who has taught her at her school, who is very nice to her and does notice her intelligence. She discovers she has telekinetic powers which she uses to her advantage. In the BBC Radio 4 two-part adaptation of the novel, she is played by Lauren Mote, and in the 1996 film, she is portrayed by American actress Mara Wilson. In the 2022 film, she is played by Alisha Weir. Fictional biography Matilda is a young girl of genius intelligence, having developed skills such as walking and speech at an early age. At 18 months she was able to converse at an adult level, and was reading on a par with adults by the age of four. However, these characteristics are ignored or dismissed by her parents who want her to watch television in order to discourage her literacy skills. Matilda, in return, plays practical jokes on her parents (her father in particular), such as replacing her father's hair tonic with her mother's platinum blonde hair dye and gluing her father's favourite hat to his head with "Super-Super Glue". Books Matilda has read a variety of books, especially at the age of four, when she read many in six months: Animal Farm by George Orwell Black Beauty by Anna Sewell Brighton Rock by Graham Greene Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky Gone to Earth by Mary Webb Great Expectations by Charles Dickens Ivanhoe by Walter Scott Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë Kim by Rudyard Kipling Moby-Dick by Herman Melville Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens Peter and Wendy by J.M. Barrie Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen Ramona Quimby by Beverly Cleary Tess of the d'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss The Good Companions by J. B. Priestley The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck The Invisible Man by H. G.