Tuesday, May 6, 2008

On stories for children.


I was going to write about T.S Eliot because I think if you've read Eliot you've at least touched on every great influence in the English language ~ but that's not really possible without discussing the man & I don't like the man so I'm not. Instead I want to briefly talk about the man I consider the most brilliant writer for children of the 20th century: Alan Garner. If you click on the piccie it will take you to more information ~ I hope. I'm not very good at these things.

I used to work in a Children's library & I still own children so children's books still fascinate me & one of the saddest things I've been witnessing is the dumbing down of our children's literary acumen. I see library shelves stacked with Charmed or Babysitter, or Saddle Club books but finding a copy of the Wizard of Oz, or Little Women or Alice through the Looking~Glass sends you into the bowls of the library to Stack where they keep all the books no~one reads any more.

Now there is nothing wrong with a babysitter book occasionally if that's what takes your fancy but a steady diet will ruin your appetite for good literature because good literature the babysitter books are not.

Garner's books, on the other hand, are good literature. His sense of place & language is superb. He writes beautifully & that, as you have probably gathered from my previous post, is important to me. However his books are not for the faint of heart & one could certainly argue they're not even strictly children's books. However they are in my favourite genre & more than Tolkien, more than Lewis, who merely used mythology as hooks for their stories, mythos is integral to Garner's stories. His retelling of the welsh legend of Blodeuwedd as a modern fairy tale is one of the most powerful, most frightening things I have ever read in my life ~ & that is Garner's genius for me. He understands that fairy tales are not, were never, *twee*. They were frightening & powerful & terrifying.

He is also succinct. The Owl Service is short. The language is truncated but Garner's ear for language is brilliant. The Welsh sounds Welsh, the English very much upper class English.

Now I didn't read the Owl Service as a child. Way too frightening for someone like me. I came to it as an adult already knowing the story of Blodeuwedd having read the Mabigonion as a child. I do do things backwards & I'm not sure my mother would have approved had she actually known what was inside the covers but Welsh mythology sounds so harmless. So I thought I knew the story, which in the best Celtic tradition is a love triangle. Blodeuwedd is the woman made of flowers for Lleu. Gronw is the one she loves. She betrays one for the other & is punished by being turned into an owl. A simple enough story that Garner takes & twists with the premise that the ancient sorrow never ended so that this is a story that can be read on more than one level & that is unusual for a children's book. The bitterness & betrayal has passed from generation to generation & manifests in strange & powerful ways perpetuating the ancient bitterness in the best Celtic tradition. So thinking I knew the story I never saw the end coming. Every time I re~read this story I feel the same shock, the same delight, that it has not turned out as I expected.

I have a very extensive personal children's library. I own many of the classics & enjoy them enormously but if I had to choose just one book & say this is a *must read* it would be this one. For pace, for style, for plot, even morally, I don't own anything to compare with the Owl Service. It does not surprise me it won the Carnegie medal.

19 comments:

Anonymous said...

I found the most wonderful second hand bookshop in Uralla the other day -- shelves and shelves of Mary Grant Bruce and loads of other children's classics. Was going to call you to see if you wanted any specific MGB titles, but got sidetracked by the Natural History section. Sorry; next time.

Siano

Constance said...

I am in disgust at myself when I remember a time when I used to read "Fluff" books. I can't believe I would waste time reading bodice-clutching tripe! I realize as I have grown older that I want something of substance! I have numerous books (biographies as well as others) that are lined up in a nice, neat rowm waiting for me to begin them. In fact, just last night Charlie asked what I would like for Mother's Day (do you celebrate Mum's Day down under?)Naturally I mentioned a book I have been eyeballing for quite some time. I loved to read as a child and I have never lost my love for a good book!
Connie

Anonymous said...

I think you would enjoy the 1969 TV adaptation of the novel that has just been released by Network DVD -- it's a masterpiece.

Ganeida said...

Siano, any of the early or any of the late *Dimsie* books ~ I've got the 4 in the middle thanks to mum.

Any Marguerite de Angeli or Kate Seredy. There are others but they're the most pressing for starters. Lol. Are you coming up? And if if was you recommending the BBC series ~ man! That scared me 1/2 to death as a kid. I watched about a whole 5 minutes! And I'm not sure I would do any better all grown up. I'm such a scaredy cat.

Connie, you read bodice rippers? I'm impressed. Truely. I've never been able to read them. I laugh too hard. Like you I rarely read fiction any more but I read a lot of archaeology & a lot of homeschooling stuff for preference.

Anonymous said...

No, I didn't recommend the BBC series (which BBC series would that be? :-)

Am hoping to get to Brisbane on the 12th and will be in touch shortly thereafter. At the moment I don't have access to a landline and don't have any mobile reception where I'm staying, so phone contact is limited. Wish I could help with the logisitics of Ditz's concert, but as it is am supposed to be in about 4 places this weekend already, and am trying very hard to cling to the original idea -- that I am up here to see my mother. So far, I've been doing everything but!

Stay sane, and I hope to see you next week.

Siano

PS: I have some of Gavin Maxwell's autobiographies if you're interested: rather dark, but he does the Scottish Hebrides nicely.

Anonymous said...

"The Owl Service" film was made by Granada, not the BBC.

Alcibiades

Ganeida said...

Thanks for the clarification Alcibiades. I never checked sources & only retain the vaguest recollection of what I saw over thirty years ago.

Anonymous said...

The DVD of "The Owl Service" is excellent technically, as well. And there's a fascinating 30 minute film of Garner ("The Edge of the Ceiling") talking about the influences on his life and work, with great shots of the landscape, his present house and the bedroom of the cottage in which he was ill for most of his childhood. This cottage was the setting for "Elidor"

Alcibiades.

Ganeida said...

Rhanks, Alcibades. I must try & get hold of it. I have *A Fine Anger*, which was a fascinating read too, where Garner talks about his writing & gave me one of the loveliest words I've ever found. Can't use it thugh 'cause no~one ever knows what it means.

Anonymous said...

Sorry, Ganeida; can't let you get away with that one :-) Spit Garner's 'lovely word' out...

Did I ever tell you that he was the first boyfriend of one of my older sisters' friends?

Siano

Ganeida said...

lol. The word is &mithered* ~ no go ahead & ask me what it means!

Anonymous said...

The etymology is Middle English 'mitheren', 'to confuse'. It's modern meaning, found mainly in the north-west of England, is 'to confuse', 'to pester', 'to irritate', 'to distract', 'to disturb' -- for all of which it is the standard word. For example, a mother will say to a child that repeatedly asks for something, "Give over mithering."

Alcibiades.

Ganeida said...

That works. According to Garner ~ & I can't get my hands on my copy of A Fine Anger to quote exactly ~ it means to be confused/dazzled by the light ~ & that is certainly the context in which he used it. A (Christmas?)play I think, from memory.

Alcibiades, that's an odd user name to choose, if I may say so. My Greek history's a little shonky but didn't Alcibiades betray his city, Athens, in the Peloponnesian war? Which begs the next question; is Greek history your area of interest/ serious scholarship? Curious, not meaning to be rude.

Ganeida said...

fom A Fine Anger:

The word *mithered* occures in chapter 4 (p 77 of my copy). The reference is to Holly From The Bongs (a nativity play ~ which I haven't read)

''I cannot see.
Me eyes are mithered
By that light
Outside...''

Lovely.

Ganeida said...

Oops: clarification. A Fine Anger: a critical introduction to the work of Alan Garner by Neil Philip. He quotes Garner & deals with everything up to The Lad of the Gad(1981)

Anonymous said...

Aha. You have me. I'm an Oxford classicist (Latin, Greek, Philosophy, Ancient History). Alcibiades is who I'd have liked to have been. He was a polymath, politician, philosopher, lover of Sophocles, and an athlete [Olympic champion]. Having been stiched politically in Athens by the opposition, he switched to the enemy of Athens, Sparta, and seduced the queeen, providing evidence. He said: "I left my cap on the bed. I have always wanted a son to be a king in Sparta" This provoked a war, on which he gave intelligence against Athens to Sparta. He finally fell foul of both sides and was ambushed in his tent with a shepherd's daughter. In exchange for her life, he agreed to come out naked, armed with only a cloak and a sword. They filled him with arrows. What a way to go.

Alcibiades-by-proxy.

Ganeida said...

OK, I did wonder because I remembered Alcibiades had been a pupil of Socrates but I couldn't work out which aspect of his personality attracted you ~ general, philosopher, athlete, scholar or politician. However that does leave me wondering what on earth brought you to what I believe is termed a *mummy blog* ~ a homeschooling one at that! Not that you're not welcome but my scholarship is certainly not of an Oxford standard & my interest in Ancient History is very much predisposed towards the Celtic.

Anonymous said...

Does Bloduedd appear in C.S. Lewis's Narnia books? I've just seen a trailer for the forthcoming Narnia movie (Prince Caspian) and there is a scene in it that looks so like the creation of Bloduedd.

Siano

Ganeida said...

Short answer, No. However the archetype is typically Celtic & I suspect someone with Lewis' scholarship is much more likely to have drawn from something like Macbeth (think the 3 witches) which itself drew on a Celtic tale. Someone else may have used poetic lisence but I haven't seen the trailer so it's a little hard to know to what you're referring. I'll go have a look.