The Way Up To Heaven

Content Warning: This section of the guide contain descriptions and references to abuse and coercive control, accident, and death.

The narrative interest of “The Way Up to Heaven” rests heavily on the ambiguous choice and behavior of Mrs. Foster, and the ethics of these. This ethical question focuses on the morality of omission of action. In the United States, criminal law states that everyone has a moral and legal duty to assist someone in danger if they are able to do so safely. A deliberate lack of action is an “omission” and may make the person culpable. The United States is unusual in having this law, and this may contextualize Roald Dahl’s choice of New York for the story’s setting and readership. A British writer, Dahl lived in New York in the 1950s, but few of his stories are set in America. It is possible that America’s law of omission was of particular interest to Dahl as an ethical question, because in Britain, the law does not compel a bystander to aid another person in danger. The presence of the law adds real jeopardy to Mrs. Foster’s decision beside the story’s broader testing of ethical boundaries.