Posted by Colin Turner on March 27, 2001 at 01:06:51 from 212.47.65.54:
In Reply to: Re: 4eva posted by Robert Dilley on March 26, 2001 at 17:09:19:
Thanks, Robert. It's not the enthusiasm, but the way it's portrayed. I'm interested in the way AR shifts his viewpoint. Usually, everything is seen, very seriously, through the eyes of the children but there are occasional shifts of perspective where AR seems to be inviting us to see them through adult eyes.
The example which has always struck me most forcibly is in WH when Captain Flint returns to the houseboat and the tremendous effort which has gone into preparing for the Polar expedition and with which this reader, at least, completely identifies, is revealed as "a pile of rabbit skins", "unfinished mittens" and "a great pyramid of empty tins". In other words, the mess that absorbed children unconsciously create around them. Even now, when I reach this point it seems as if AR is betraying his characters and demeaning them by portraying them as a bunch of impractical kids.
In the same way, grog-swilling is an essential part of the essence of the imaginative world which the children create and inhabit but, when adults are involved, it's almost as if AR is saying that all you need to keep kids happy is to ply them with party food.
The swaying (tension, if you like) between adult and child points of view is something that has long fascinated me about AR's writing and I'm still not sure why some passages, like those I've quoted, should give me a feeling of unease about AR's belief in, and identification with, his characters.
Think I'll go and raid my hoard of chocolate now.
Colin Turner