Through the Looking Glass: Further Adventures and Misadventures in the Realm of Children’s Literature, by Selma G. Lanes (2004)

Last week, we looked at Selma G. Lanes (1929-2009) and her initial book of collected essays and reviews, Down the Rabbit Hole, published in 1972.  This book was a significant watershed in serious criticism of the genre, and Your Correspondent recommends it highly.  More than 30 years later, Lanes returned with another collection of essays and reviews, Through the Looking Glass: Further Adventures and Misadventures in the Realm of Children’s Literature.  Does the latter book measure up to the former?

Actually, Lanes’ follow-up is not only worthy of its predecessor in every way, but in many instances quite superior.  Featuring essays and reviews written between the early 70s and 90s, Lanes continues to show a keen critical acumen and love for the subject.  Her voice is one that is greatly missed.

As would be expected from one of the first critical champions of Maurice Sendak (1928-2012) , Lanes writes about both his mid-and-late career triumphs with real sensitivity.  She also tackles the enigma that was Edward Gorey (1925-2000), a unique talent in children’s publishing in particular, and the art world in general.  Anyone familiar with Gorey’s spidery pen-and-ink drawings has a ‘take’ on him, but it was Lanes who described it best for me with the phrase “arctic detachment.”  She also argues, cogently, that Gorey was not a children’s illustrator at all, but rather a sometimes visitor to this realm.  Gorey’s sense of humor, his flights of fancy and his worldview were too mordant, too bizarre and too bleak for children, and many of his best books (The Gilded Bat comes to mind) are children’s books in name only.  Lanes summarizes his peculiar charm nicely.

Also excellent is Lanes’ chapter on the latter life of Beatrix Potter, who, once she was married and living in the Lake District she so dearly loved, turned away from her fabulous children’s books with nary a second thought.  Oddly enough, it was American collectors and publishers who kept the cult of Potter alive, and it is largely through their efforts that she is remembered today.  Kudos to Lanes for this bit of insight.

Useful, too, is her look at the letters of fairy tale master Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) and American writer, editor and publisher Horace Elisha Scudder (1838-1902), of Boston, Massachusetts.  Scudder, in letter after letter over the course of many years, slavishly worked to get authorized editions of Andersen’s books in the US; he also sent the Great Man many of his own stories and books.  Scudder, it seems, barely registered as a human being to the Great Man, who was too involved, too remote and too icy a character to respond in any human way.  All of Andersen’s heart, it seems went into his work, with nothing leftover for the man himself.

Lanes writes perceptively on the drawings of Ernest H. Shepard (1879-1976), who brought A.A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh to graphic life, and was the ideal artist for Kenneth Grahame’s Wind in the Willows.  Shepard, it seems, understood whimsy (Milne) and English countryside philosophizing (Grahame), and was able to capture both with his pen.  Also valuable is Lanes’ chapter on New Yorker writer E. B. White (1899-1985), who also wrote the classics Charlotte’s Web and Stuart Little.  Lanes argues that his brevity, style and honesty were all reflections of his inner self; a man who finely hones his talents and his emotions until they were worthy of a public airing.  White is a type much missed in the contemporary world.

But Lanes’ best chapter, as in the previous book, is on the evils of the culture of Political Correctness and how it neuters literature and emotion, and how poisonous it is in particular to children’s literature.  On one hand, Lanes bemoans an atmosphere that seeks to find intolerance when there is none.  She is against expurgated versions of Dr. Doolittle, The Five Chinese Brothers, and the illustrated Yankee Doodle because she believes that children (a) are smart enough to understand historical context and (b) read for insights on character and not to underscore racial prejudices.  On the other hand, she also (rightly) abhors books that exist for no other reason than to make certain groups of people feel better about themselves.  As Lanes wisely put it: Now propaganda is an entirely legitimate and worthwhile endeavor when undertaken in a life-enhancing cause.  But those of us who choose books for children should be both willing and able to recognize the difference between propaganda and literature.

There is a great deal more in Lanes’ book (including insight on Winsor McCay, historian Roger Sale, and an excellent essay on Harry Potter written shortly before her death), and all of it smart, wise and very, very human.  Through the Looking Glass is still in print, and can be found at Books of Wonder in New York and online.  If you are even remotely interested in the subject, get it.

Return to the Hundred Acre Wood, by David Benedictus with Decorations by Mark Burgess

Regular readers of The Jade Sphinx know of our deep and abiding respect for that extremely difficult art form, children’s literature.  Those who neither understand nor respect this exacting art form do not appreciate just how difficult a task it is.  However, when children’s lit is touched with something like genius, then the result is something that can be savored by children and adults alike.

Critics cite the Winnie-the-Pooh books by A. A. Milne (1882-1956) as the last great contribution to the first wave of children’s classics; a period ranging roughly from the Victorian era through the early 1920s.  Milne approaches something close to the sublime in his stories – they are delightful nonsense that, upon reflection, actually make a great deal of sense.

Milne’s genius was to take the stuffed animals owned by his son, Christopher Robin, and create a whole imaginary world in which they could live.  The animals, Pooh, Owl, Rabbit, Eeyore, and Kanga and Roo, all have well-defined personalities and (sometimes obsessive) character traits.  There is a distinctly … English flavor to the Pooh books, almost as if Milne brought a child’s-eye view to one long, summer tea party.  In the hands of any other less-gifted author, Pooh would be too sweet and indigestible by half; but Milne creates a world of remarkable charm, gentle kindness and great humanity.  In the simplicity of Pooh and those around him, we often see the best (and most ridiculous) parts of ourselves.

Milne was blessed in his illustrator, E. H. Shepard (1879-1976), who created a series of delicate and subtle drawings to enliven the corpus.  Those who know Pooh only through the sometimes garish Disney interpretation are missing the subtlety and quiet of the originals.  Shepard also drew the definitive illustrations for Wind in the Willows, so he was instrumental in the success of two great classics of the genre.  (Sadly, later in life, Shepard thought Pooh overshadowed his more serious work…)

Milne ended the Pooh books with a beautiful coda of Christopher Robin growing up, and putting aside childish things while promising to always have a special place in both his heart and his memory for the denizens of the Hundred Acre Wood.  It was a masterful way to preserve the integrity of his creation, while assuring that it would also always be alive to anyone who could open themselves to childish wonder. 

So, it is with a bit of surprise that the Trustees of the Pooh Property Trust would think that a sequel, some 80 years after the fact, was either necessary or desirable.  But in 2011 the Trust entrusted the property to author David Benedictus (born 1938), and the illustrations to Mark Burgess (born 1957), who sought to emulate Shepard’s style.  The results were, at best, mixed.

Pastiche is a ticklish thing to pull off.  (Your Correspondent has been guilty of literary pastiche himself.)  While it is possible to imitate a voice, it is nearly impossible to imitate genius.  As a result, the new writer seeks to introduce something new and original to separate the new work from the original; but then … when individuality is introduced, there is no longer any point to the pastiche.

Benedictus is tasked with having Christopher Robin return from boarding school (fortunately, there’s no mention of the 80 year lag; Robin must be the most abominable student!), and beguiling a summer idyll with his old friends at the Hundred Acre Wood.  Now older, he involves his friends in a spelling bee, cricket, and playing school.  This is all right in-and-of-itself, but where Benedictus fails is that his work is Milne and water: sometimes he gets the tone just right, but when he doesn’t the whole enterprise comes crashing down. 

Not that there aren’t moments to savor.  I had a smile for most of the reading, and found much of Return to the Hundred Acre Wood charming.  However, Benedictus bows to contemporary tastes a little too often, and the note is jarring. 

For example, he introduces a new character, Lottie the Otter, clearly as a sop to political correctness, seeing that the only other female in the tales is the motherly Kanga.  Lottie never works for a moment; she is too contemporary a creation to blend seamlessly with Pooh and company, and the character is fairly obnoxious, to boot.

So, despite many inspired moments (Benedictus seems to understand both Owl and Rabbit very well), we often feel that someone is trying to breathe life into a creation not their own.  And while the drawings by Burgess are certainly serviceable, but no one would mistake them for Shepard.

Pooh buffs should stick with the originals; but for the casual reader, Return to the Hundred Acre Wood is undemanding fun.

Here is an except from the opening:

Who started it? Nobody knew. One moment there was the usual Forest babble: the wind in the trees, the crow of a cock, the cheerful water in the streams. Then came the Rumour: Christopher Robin is back!

Owl said he heard it from Rabbit, and Rabbit said he heard it from Piglet, and Piglet said he just sort of heard it, and Kanga said why not ask Winnie-the-Pooh? And since that seemed like a Very Encouraging Idea on such a sunny morning, off Piglet trotted, arriving in time to find Pooh anxiously counting his pots of honey.

“Isn’t it odd?” said Pooh.

“Isn’t what odd?”

Pooh rubbed his nose with his paw. “I wish they would sit still. They shuffle around when they think I’m not looking. A moment ago there were eleven and now there are only ten. It is odd, isn’t it, Piglet?”

“It’s even,” said Piglet, “if it’s ten, that is. And if it isn’t, it isn’t.” Hearing himself saying this, Piglet thought that it didn’t sound quite right, but Pooh was still counting, moving the pots from one corner of the table to the other and back again.

“Bother,” said Pooh. “Christopher Robin would know if he was here. He was good at counting. He always made things come out the same way twice and that’s what good counting is.”

“But Pooh . . .” Piglet began, the tip of his nose growing pink with excitement

“On the other hand it’s not easy to count things when they won’t stay still. Like snowflakes and stars.”

“But Pooh . . .” And if Piglet’s nose was pink before, it was scarlet now.

“I’ve made up a hum about it. Would you like to hear it, Piglet?”

Piglet was about to say that hums were splendid things, and Pooh’s hums were the best there were, but Rumours come first; then he thought what a nice feeling it was to have a Big Piece of News and to be about to Pass It On; then he remembered the hum which Pooh had made up about him, Piglet, and how it had had seven verses, which was more verses than a hum had ever had since time began, and that they were all about him, and so he said: “Ooh, yes, Pooh, please,” and Pooh glowed a little because a hum is all very well as far as it goes, and very well indeed when it goes for seven verses, but it isn’t a Real Hum until it’s been tried out on somebody, and while honey is always welcome, it’s welcomest of all directly after a hum.

This is the hum which Pooh hummed to Piglet on the day which started like any other day and became a very special day indeed.

If you want to count your honey,

You must put it in a row,

In the sun if it is sunny,

If it’s snowy in the snow.

And you’ll know when you have counted

How much honey you have got.

Yes, you’ll know what the amount is

And so therefore what it’s not.

“And I think it’s eleven,” added Pooh, “which is an excellent number of pots for a Thursday, though twelve would be even better.”

By the Christmas Fire

Posterity has not been particularly kind to Samuel McChord Crothers (1857-1927), but we here at the Jade Sphinx have been paging through his 1908 book, By The Christmas Fire with great satisfaction.  This book is happily available for free download to your Kindle or e-reader, and can be had, for example, at Manybooks.net.

Crothers was a Unitarian Universality minister at the First Parish in Cambridge, Massachusetts.  He is the author of many then-popular essays, collected in The Understanding Heart (1903), The Gentle Reader (1903) and The Pardoner’s Wallet (1905).  Crothers was a graduate of Wittenberg College and the College of New Jersey, earning his divinity degree at Union Theological Seminary in 1877.  He was first a Presbyterian minister before converting to the Unitarian church in 1882.

Most of his essays appeared in the Atlantic Monthly and reading them, one has the sense of a profound and sweet soul.  His is the type of gentle intellect and warm-hearted humanity that calls to us at the Christmas season.  (Look at his photo above.  Does he not bear a remarkable resemblance to A. A. Milne, author of the Pooh books?)  By The Christmas Fire is broken up into several essays, including Christmas and the Literature of Disillusion, The Ignominy of Being Grown-up and Christmas and the Spirit of Democracy.  Here is a snippet from The Ignominy of Being Grown Up where Crothers talks of the transition from happy childhood to adulthood:

What becomes of these imaginative, inquisitive, myth-making, light-hearted, tender-hearted, and altogether charming young adventurers who start out so gaily to explore the wonder world?

The solemn answer comes, “They after a while are grown-up.”  Did you ever mediate on that catastrophe which we speak of as being “grown-up?”  Habit has dulled our perception of the absurd anti-climax involved in it.  You have only to compare the two estates to see that something has been lost.

You linger for a moment when the primary school has been dismissed.  For a little while the stream of youthful humanity flows sluggishly as between the banks of a canal, but once beyond the school limits it returns to nature.  It is a bright, foaming torrent.  Not a moment is wasted.  The little girls are at once exchanging confidences, and the little boys are in Valhalla, where the heroes make friends with one another by indulging in everlasting assault and battery, and continually are “refreshed with blows.”  There is no question about their being all alive and actively interested in one another.  All the natural reactions are exhibited in the most interesting manner. 

Then you get into a street car, invented by an ingenious misanthropist to give you the most unfavorable view possible of your kind.  On entering you choose a side, unless you are condemned to be suspended in the middle.  Then you look at your antagonists on the opposite side.  What a long, unrelenting row of humanity!  These are the grown-ups. You look for some play of emotion, some evidence of curiosity, pleasure, exhilaration, such as you might naturally expect from those who are taking a little journey into the world … Growing is like falling – it is all right so long as you keep on; the trouble comes when you stop.

By The Christmas Fire is a little book – it can easily be read in two sittings.  It is common at this time of year for us to fall back into the Christmas novels of our youth – A Christmas Carol, Little Women, The Chimes – but with so much wonderful holiday material out there in the public domain, it seems a shame not to do a little exploring ourselves this holiday season.  Start with By The Christmas Fire – it does not disappoint.