In Roald Dahl’s The Twits, Mr and Mrs Twit keep monkeys.
The Twits own a group of caged monkeys and force them to perform in a planned upside-down circus. The monkeys are intelligent and observant, and they eventually help turn the tables on their unpleasant owners. Their presence gives the book both its comic animal characters and its central rebellion against cruelty.
The Twits was published in 1980 and illustrated by Quentin Blake. Mr and Mrs Twit are deliberately disgusting, spiteful characters whose behavior drives the story’s pranks and punishments. The book’s humor depends on exaggeration, but its treatment of the monkeys also highlights the Twits’ selfishness and mistreatment of animals.
The monkeys are sometimes confused with the giraffe, pelican, and monkey in The Giraffe and the Pelly and Me. That later book features a window-cleaning business, whereas The Twits centers on the caged animals and the couple’s escalating tricks.