Peter's Room, chapter by chapter read-through: Introduction

[lilliburlero.livejournal.com]

NOTE: I'm posting on behalf of legionseagle, who's taking over the readthrough for the duration of Peter's Room, for which, many thanks. Below is her introduction to the book. More detailed discussion points to follow later today, but do feel free to get stuck in.

--L.B.

So we start the Peter's Room Chapter by Chapter read-through. Peter's Room is probably my favourite Forest; I flip between that and The Cricket Term probably with the seasons.

Peter's Room is so very much a winter book, with its sparse, evocative depiction of a place the Marlows have only previously seen not just during the summer holidays, but as a holiday destination. Now they're starting to see themselves as part of the local community; tentatively and unsure of their welcome, but definitely as residents and not visitors.

Weather matters. Snow might mean the death of animals, not just the children being cooped up indoors or able to go tobogganing.

Before getting into the detailed analysis of the first three chapters, it's worth setting out some overarching questions about themes and tropes in the books as a whole. If Autumn Term and End of Term examine (and subvert) many of the tropes of the classic school story, and Falconer's Lure began life as a summer holiday pony book, where does Peter's Room fit within children's literature?

This leads into the second question; what, exactly, is Peter's Room about? And why? The blurb on the inside flap of the dust-sheet of the Faber edition is absolutely clear; whoever wrote it sees Peter's Room in the grand tradition of didactic fiction, whose apogee is The History of the Fairchild Family.

As usual, there is more in Miss Forest's story than appears on the surface, and this time – interwoven with the Merricks' Twelfth-Night party, Ginty's growing friendship with Patrick and a splendid account of a local Meet – she gives a clear warning of the dangers inherent in make-believe prolonged beyond the proper age.

The whole of fiction could be condemned (and in many times and places has been condemned) as "make-believe prolonged beyond the proper age."

Hopefully, the read-through will bring out more subtleties with the theme than the blurb suggests. So, have at it!

Comments

[occasionalhope.livejournal.com]

I'd say an overriding theme of PR is, not just the conscious "make-believe"/roleplay of Gondal, but illusion, counterpointed with disillusionment. Reality breaking in on people's (often mis)interpretation of things and relationships.

And it's certainly AF's most self-consciously *literary* book.

[serriadh.livejournal.com]

Yes, definitely. And 'make-believing' about yourself* as a way of not facing up to questions of character, or making life easier.


*though Forest has less of a problem with Nicola being a brave stalwart Arctic Explorer than she with Ginny being a flighty romantic heroine, but perhaps that's also because Ginny's involves other people.

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

In later parts of the read-through I want to get into comparisons between Peter's Room and Mansfield Park, specifically the Play scenes. Because, again, Fanny doesn't not participate (well, doesn't act - she certainly participates as far as sewing costumes, hearing lines, calming ruffled temperaments and so on goes - I've just fallen heavily in love with Slings and Arrows and I'm now seeing Fanny and Anna as soul-mates) but she sees everything going wrong and is miserable about it.

And that's a case where people are using a play in order to advance agendas they aren't prepared to own up to in real life, and, indeed, where they can use the layer of distance the acting gives them for plausible deniability (and, yes: I did just compare Patrick to Henry Crawford).

[serriadh.livejournal.com]

Oh, fascinating. And yes, I'm never sure whether Forest's problem is with not letting play-acting be play-acting, or whether she's against make-believe prolonged beyond a certain age.

(And I meant 'Ginty' not 'Ginny', natch)

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

I'd hope she'd be too self-aware as a writer of fiction not to take the "make-believe prolonged beyond a proper age" line simpliciter (though I've been disappointed before to discover statements I was sure authors put in as an OTT bit of self-conscious characterisation actually being things they believed; it's one of the reason I'm so delighted Forest kept herself to herself.

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

I like the idea of illusion counterpointed with disillusion - we do have a reference to Prospero's "cloud-capped towers' at the outset.

[antfan.livejournal.com]

where does Peter's Room fit within children's literature?

I find it hard to think of any parallels at all. There are books like Marianne Dreams (or maybe even Tom's Midnight Garden?) where the protagonists creates a fantastical world, due to their own psychological need, which then develops a frightening reality of it's own. But those books have a supernatural element to them.

There are also loads of books where children role play in real life (ranging from Little Women, to Swallows and Amazons, to Harriet the Spy etc, etc) but it's typically seen as a good thing. Though Anne of Green Gables does almost drown herself as the Lady of Shallott.

Mansfield Park does seem very relevant though.

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

Of course, in A Little Princess Sara Crewe's ability to role-play is pretty close to being a life-saver (and certainly a sanity-saver).

I think when we move from Little Women to Good Wives Bhaer starts to sound the warning bell, but then Bhaer's such an awful wet-blanket at the best of times, and certainly the next generation don't seem to be affected by it much.

[antfan.livejournal.com]

Jo's sensational stories - yes, hard to believe they really did any harm. I was also thinking of the sisters modelling themselves on Pilgrim's Progress.

Returning to Jane Austen - I suppose Northanger Abbey might be another parallel, with Catherine's Gothic imaginings distorting her perceptions of reality?

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

Yes; though Henry comes to appreciate that Catherine isn't so far off in her assessment of his father's character.

[mrs-redboots.livejournal.com]

I think the difference is that the Little Women and the Swallows and Amazons crowd are doing something practical with their role-play - okay, sailing on Windermere may not be the most practical of occupations, but it does require all your concentration while you're doing it, and being an explorer or an Amazon pirate is secondary to that. And the March girls all have work or school to be getting on with, and you remember how disastrous it was when they decided to take time just for themselves and do nothing practical....

Here, you have the children sitting around doing nothing except Gondal, and getting totally involved with, and carried away by (except perhaps Nicola) the role-play itself.

Teenagers putting on a play for the adults

[(Anonymous)]

I think Peter's Room subverts a common trope from children's literature as well. At one point Rowan (I think this is right) says that she hopes they are not planning to put on a play at the Merrick's party. It made me think of how common a theme that is in children's books: the talented children who get together to write and produce a play/ pantomime/ musical to delight the adults. (My children belonged to a drama group as teenagers, and occasionally the group did just that; I can witness that those plays were invariably a low point, as even teenagers who do a lot of acting seem to have no concept of pacing a production when they do their own. And their interpretation of adult behaviour is always excruciating.)

In Peter's room, there is no play, no furious stitching of improbably good costumes, no admiring adults laughing and wiping away a tear; apart from being (this,throughout I think) far too well written, it is what teenagers actually do, more akin to modern larp than Mansfield Park/ Pamela Brown and Antonia Forest's own Prince and the Pauper. CB

Re: Teenagers putting on a play for the adults

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

My own personal view is that what we read is a sort of distillation of what's actually happening "on the ground" - there clearly are bits that are actually acted, bits that are dialogue and so forth, but I don't know how the narrative structure is stitched around them.

Re: Teenagers putting on a play for the adults

[(Anonymous)]

At one point Ginty says "Let's get up and act this bit properly!" - (roughly), so a lot of it is obviously meant to be story telling. CB

Re: Teenagers putting on a play for the adults

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

Oh, yes, I agree a lot of it is narrated, but I'm sceptical about the relationship between what appears on the page and what the characters actually hear - for one thing, there's bound to be a lot more "Sorry, I dropped your chestnuts' and "Can someone take that dog out?" sort of interruptions.

[purplerabbits.livejournal.com]

Peters room was my first Forest and I only picked iy up in the library cos it sounded a bit like Dungeons and Daragons turns real kind of fantasy fiction, if that makes sense (it was a Thing at the time). I was surprised at what it was, from the blurb, but it obviously stuck with me :)

[legionseagle (from livejournal.com)]

Actually, that's exactly what the role-playing games friend said to me this afternoon: it sounds like (she hadn't read it) a D&D group falling badly off the rails. If you've got that sort of experience we'd appreciate that perspective. After all, Forest is writing about 15 years before D&D becomes a Thing, but it may have been a thing, if that makes sense.

[thekumquat.livejournal.com]

Peter's Room was published in 1961 - the Gondaling and fear of being taken over by characters and that it's self-indulgent, unlike preparing a play for an audience, read to me exactly like the fretting that ensued when my cousins got into D&D 10-15 years later.

[antisoppist.livejournal.com]

The book I found most similar to Peter's Room was Rona Jaffe's Mazes and Monsters, which is about D&D going wrong and was originally written in 1981 when that sort of fretting was happening.

[(Anonymous)]

I read Peter's Room at pretty much exactly the same time as my group of friends (I was twelve or so) got heavily into D&D and I tried to play so as to stay friends with them but could not get interested in it at all. I spent one game pretending to pay attention and another game reading Busman's Honeymoon under the table, and then I stopped playing and drifted away from my friends. So I identified very strongly with Nicola and her total indifference to Gondal.