Hey there, this is MJ.
While I was reading Peter Pan for Fortress Fiction, or listening to it I should say,
I got about four chapters and I thought, this book is so good, it's so interesting, I don't
just want to talk about it in a single episode later on, I want to talk about it a lot.
I want to talk about it a minute at a time maybe.
I'll do shorts talking about it because it's such an interesting book, it's so dense, there's
so much going on, and it's a really weird book because it's written for children, but
it has a very adult perspective, but it's not inappropriate at all, but it does make
reference to things that kids wouldn't get or shouldn't get, and it's really interesting
the way that it carries itself, the way it presents itself to children.
It's very much like an adult telling these stories to the children, and almost has interactions
like the children are asking questions or wondering about things, and the speaker is
telling them some of the stuff and glossing over other things, and it's really interesting,
and I don't know, it's a fascinating story so far.
Still, one of the things I find most interesting is the characterization of Mr. or Mrs. Darling,
rather, and the idea that she faintly remembers Peter from her own childhood, and she dismisses
to Wendy that she could have actually met Peter because Peter Pan would be a man now,
and he'd be her age, so I guess he'd be able to be her father if it works that way, but
it doesn't, and Wendy knows somehow that he's not, that he's actually her age and size,
it says, and that's interesting.
There's other things that I mentioned about how Wendy knows things about Peter or about
the goings on or doings of Peter without really logically being able to understand or be in
a position where she knows about them.
She's pretty sure that he placed his pipes at the foot of her bed or at the window in
the nursery, and she shouldn't know that.
She's been asleep during these things, and yet somehow, magically, she knows about it,
and it's really interesting.
There's a very, I don't know, there's a very interesting approach to the magic of it all,
because there's definitely magical things going on here, and it's, I don't know, it's
a little bit of an absurdist world that Barry's created in Peter Pan, but it's also not.
It's something more, it's something different, and I don't quite understand what he's doing
or where he's coming from or what his paradigm is.
I don't know what the paradigm is that he's using for this story, so it's interesting.
There's a thing about how mothers tidy up their children's minds at night, and they
literally get down on their hands and knees and they pull the things out of their kids'
minds and then fold them up and tuck them in, and they put the bad stuff at the bottom,
where it's crammed and hard to reach, and they put the good stuff up at the top so it's
fresh and ready for the next day.
It's a beautiful and sweet and lovely idea, and a very loving idea, but it also doesn't
sugarcoat things.
It says that the mothers will hold things up to themselves like a kitten because they
adore it, it's so sweet, and then they'll find other things that are important and they'll
push them away from themselves.
I don't know, it's so absurdist and it's so magical, but it's also very honest and
acknowledging the reality of life and how parents will be put off by things that their
children do or things that their children say, and they'll wonder, where did that come
from in my kid?
It's a really interesting psychological and sociological and really honest examination
of things.
Also, it's funny, there's other absurdist elements like they weren't sure they could
afford to keep the kids, and George Darlan did all these calculations to figure it out
that he'd keep them, and it's Wendy, John, Michael.
Michael's doing this, keeping Bailey's quick by like three rooms and they get rid of him
or something like that, which sounds crazy.
Maybe there's a darker truth to that, but I think it's just a funny way to put things.
And then something else, something else, something else, oh, Ligneana, she's a Newfoundland dog
and she's literally their maid.
They met her at Kensington Park and she followed them home and she's their maid.
She's literally their maid and that's totally normal to them.
I mean, it's abnormal.
That she has the capacity to be their maid is normal.
That she's a Newfoundland dog and it might be embarrassing for them to have a dog as
a maid as opposed to a woman is sort of embarrassing.
George Holmes is good for his image, his public image, but she's totally capable to treat
everything that she needs to do with the children and she's treated almost as if she's a human.
She doesn't stick with the other human maids or nurses or whatever at school to wait for
the children since she didn't bring them back home and things like that.
And she doesn't like to get the night off and the night the children disappear is, well,
there's nothing night off.
That's when something else happens.
But it mentions specifically that Ligneana, the dog, has a night off for shooting at the
children and misses her own girls instead.
And I don't know, it's just like, it's a crazy, absurdist world with lots of magic
and lots of whimsy and it's very interesting.
And I don't know, it's interesting how the people are very put together because it all
feels really real and meaningful as well as being very whimsical and magical.
So it's pretty interesting.
I really look, this is going to be my statement for the time reading through it, listening
to the book.
And like I said, it was so good.
The book chapter was in and I decided I got to start the book over and talk about chapter
by chapter because it's just too cool not to.
I hope you enjoyed that.
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