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Cover: Jon Klassen
Cover: Jon Klassen
‘Here in the real world, bad things happen.’ (p 106)
Wow!
This is me, at the end of reading this book.
‘His heart had lifted right out of his chest, as if it had been reborn as a bird, and was now soaring somewhere near the top of the watchtower. . . And the view from there was terrific.’ (p 117)
Here (in the real world) is one of our finest contemporary novels for young readers. Think Holes; think The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas; think The Giver; think Goodnight Mister Tom; think Breadcrumbs. Sara Pennypacker’s is not like any of these books in the slightest, except in its stature, except in its importance within the canon of children’s literature, except in its potential to change the thinking, the understanding, the resolve of those who read it - and perhaps to change the world a little too.
‘I don’t think you should just take it when bad things happen. But I don’t want things to be magically what they’re not. I want them to be what they could be. And somebody has to want that, or nothing bad will ever get better.’ (p 223)
And if that sounds preachy then I have given the wrong impression. I have scarcely read a book with so much to say that is less preachy. It is simply what it is.
Simply Wow!
And what it is is simple. At least it is on the surface.
I often admire books that do not patronise their young readers, but help them into the sophisticated narrative complexities that much of the finest literature has to offer: split storylines, varied viewpoints, time slips, or whatever. This book has none of these things. Its story starts at the beginning and runs through to its end. It is written in simple, generally direct sentences, with a good deal of realistic dialogue thrown in. It is constructed in simple, short chapters. It is directly narrated through detailed incident that shows you clearly what is happening, how its characters behave, what they are thinking.
However, Sara Pennypacker’s simplicity is highly sophisticated and very clever indeed. She can reveal and explore characters through a few perfectly chosen words and she crafts a storyline where every small, credible action and encounter pertinently develops themes that are at once intensely personal and profoundly universal. She renders small, apparently insignificant things, redolent with significance: the planting of papaya seeds in used snack cans; the catapulting of mud at the ruins of an abandoned church; the wearing of mirrored sunglasses. It is so cleverly, complexly simply, that I find it breathtaking.
The ‘simple’ story involved two principal characters. Ware is a dreamer, an artist, apt to spend time in ‘a world of his own’.
Sometimes he wished he lived back in the Middle Ages. Things were a lot simpler then, anyway, especially if you were a knight. Knights had a rule book - their code of chivalry - that covered everything. . . If you were a knight you knew where you stood. Too often, Ware wasn’t even sure he was standing. Sometimes he felt as if he were wafting, in fact. A little drifty.’ (p 14)
He is the only child of highly extravert, social and capable patents, a sports fanatic of a father, and an organising planner of a mother.
‘His mother . . .operated from a clear code. . . “If you aren’t thinking three steps ahead,” she would say, “you’re already four steps behind.” The trouble was, Ware hadn’t the faintest clue how to unravel an advice-puzzle like that.’ (p 14)
Ware feels he is inadequate, a let down to them, not the son they really want. He thinks he needs to become someone else to become ‘normal’. Thankfully, however, there comes along for him one hot summer of avoiding ‘ Recreation Camp’; a piece of waste ground and a girl from the ‘’real world; an injured grandmother and an uncle who gives him a film camera.
Jolene is the cynic, the pragmatist - largely. She is an embodiment of the injunction to ‘get real’. When Ware complains something isn’t fair, she repeatedly tells him that he isn’t in ‘magic fairness land’. Yet she saves dandelions by transplanting them, insisting it is not right to kill them just because they grow in the wrong place. In fact she is more than a little obsessed with things not getting thrown away, not being trash. Turns out she has good reason. And the fact that her tragically difficult home life situation is explored more through implication that explanation, renders her not simply touching as a character, but deeply moving.
‘People aren’t things. You can throw things away. Usually you shouldn’t. But sometimes, things are trash. But people are never trash.’ (p 103)
Wow, American style!
The dialogue between there two young protagonists can be very funny indeed, in a dry American way. It is also sometimes very Harold Pinter, or even Samuel Becket, when they appear to be having a conversation, but each actually continue individual thought lines regardless of the other.
The book has much to say about family and about friendship. More than this though, though, I liked Here in the Real World so much because it vindicates quiet, ‘antisocial’ , artistic boys. Nay, it celebrates them. And I joyously welcome every word, every page, every chapter of it for doing so. As someone who, as a child, had little feeling for sport and feared being made to ‘join in’, as much as Ware does, as boy often happy with my own company, buried in a book, or simply dreaming and imagining, I too was often made to feel ‘not a real lad’. How I would have taken comfort and strength from Ware’s realisation that he did not need to try to become what others wanted him to be:
‘What I really want is for it to be okay that I’m not someone else.’ (p 252)
And, of course, Ware’s right to be himself is everybody’s right to be themselves.
Sure (as they say), the social context of this book is very American, and children over here will need just a little familiarity with the cultural language use, if they are to get what’s going on. But they almost certainly have this from watching The Simpsons anyway, so what’s the big deal?
Wow with wings!
Over everything this is a book about what can and can’t be done, be achieved, in ‘the real world’, the world where bad things happen. It is not a sentimental book that implies ours is ‘magic fairness land’ or that we can make it so. But it is a route map to what we can and should do. It is a story for our times, and for all times. It is the ultimate story of hope. The only hope we have. We all have to cling on to it, just as all our children should read this glorious book.
‘You’re right. (In the read world) bad stuff happens. But the real world is also all the stuff we do about the bad stuff. We’re the real world too.’ (p 282)
Note:
When you get that far, try listening to the final movement of Sibelius Symphony No 5 to accompany the final chapter of Here in the Real World.