Notes For October 21st, 2021
Though Bridge To Terabithia is a very 1970s novel, its timeless themes of friendship, sudden, unexpected tragedy, and coping with loss are still relevant today, with the epidemic of school shootings and other unexpected acts of violence like terrorist attacks.
Katherine Paterson said that she agreed with the criticism that she only scratched the surface of the grieving and healing processes; her publisher had asked her to tread delicately in those waters. In reality, the tragic death of Lisa Hill, the inspiration for the book, had a long lasting impact on her and her son David, and remains with them still.
This Day In Literary History
On October 21st, 1977, Bridge To Terabithia, the classic novel by the famous American children's book writer Katherine Paterson, was published. It was inspired by a real life tragedy that affected the author and her son.
Katherine Paterson had already established herself as an acclaimed and popular children's author with her first two books, The Sign Of The Chrysanthemum (1973) and Of Nightingales That Weep (1974), when her eight-year-old son David lost his best and only friend.
Her name was Lisa Hill. She was a bright, vivacious, and imaginative little girl. While at the beach with her family, Lisa was struck by lightning and killed. David Paterson was devastated and traumatized by his sudden loss, and his mother was deeply affected by it as well. She was battling breast cancer at the time.
After publishing her third novel, The Master Puppeteer (1975), Katherine Paterson and her son still struggled to cope with Lisa Hill's death. So, for her next book, she decided to write a story about a close friendship between a young boy and girl cut short by tragedy.
The boy learns the value of friendship, then must use the inner strength his friend gave him as he struggles to cope with his loss. Paterson would later say that writing the book was a therapeutic exercise that helped her and David make some sense out of a senseless tragedy.
Bridge To Terabithia is set in Lark Creek, a small town in rural Virginia. The novel opens with 10-year-old farm boy Jess Aarons going out for a morning run before breakfast.
The introverted, artistically gifted Jess has no friends, but hopes to win his peers' admiration and respect when school starts by becoming the fastest boy in the fifth grade and winning the races held during recess.
When Jess returns from his practice run, we get a look at his bleak home life. His family is large and poor. His two older sisters, Brenda and Ellie, are mean to him. His younger sisters, May Belle and Joyce Ann, adore him, but also annoy him, as he must share a bedroom with them.
His mother favors her daughters over her son and always yells at him. Jess's father lavishes affection on his younger daughters but is emotionally distant from his son and shows him no affection. He's often gruff and foul tempered, especially to Jess.
With money so tight that he has to commute over an hour each way to Washington, D.C. to work as a day laborer because farming doesn't pay enough to support the family, Mr. Aarons is rarely in a good mood.
At school, Jess's teacher is a nasty, foul-tempered, obese older woman named Mrs. Myers, nicknamed "Monster Mouth" by her students for obvious reasons. The music teacher, Miss Edmunds, is young and pretty, and the only adult in Jess's world who seems to care about him.
She admires his artistic talent and encourages him to keep drawing. She's a non-conformist like Jess - she wears jeans to class and no lipstick. She's also a hippie and plays folk songs on her guitar for the kids. Jess sees Miss Edmunds as a "diamond in the rough," and has a huge crush on her.
Jess's artistic talent is a source of consternation for his ignorant father, who worries that a passion for drawing poses a threat to his only son's masculinity:
He would like to show his drawings to his dad, but he didn't dare. When he was in first grade, he had told his dad that he wanted to be an artist when he grew up. He'd thought his dad would be pleased. He wasn't. "What are they teaching in that damn school?" he had asked. "Bunch of old ladies turning my only son into some kind of a..." He had stopped on the word, but Jess had gotten the message. It was one you didn't forget, even after four years.
Into Jess's dark world comes a ray of sunshine in the form of a new girl who moves in next door. Leslie Burke is Jess's age. She's an intelligent, vivacious tomboy from the city whose parents are both writers.
The Burkes are wealthy, but don't own a TV set. They prefer that their daughter call them by their first names (Judy and Bill) instead of Mom and Dad. They're liberal and non-religious.
The Aaronses, like most people in Lark Creek, are Christian fundamentalists, but they only attend church once a year - on Easter Sunday - because Mrs. Aarons "got mad at the preacher."
Jess and Leslie don't become friends when they first meet. Leslie joins Mrs. Myers' class and then runs against the boys in the races at recess. Unfortunately, she beats Jess in the heat, eliminating him from the races and crushing his dream of being the fastest kid in the fifth grade.
Nevertheless, when Gary Fulcher, a bully, refuses to let Leslie run in the finals because she's a girl, Jess stands up for her. Fulcher lets her run, and she beats him. She outruns the other boys as well, humiliating them. That's no way to start a friendship, but soon, Jess and Leslie become inseparable.
Deciding that she and Jess need a place of their own, Leslie chooses a forest clearing on the other side of a creek bed near their homes. In order to reach their secret land, they swing across the creek bed on an old rope tied to a tree branch.
Leslie names their magical land Terabithia. There, they rule as king and queen, though Jess, who is in awe of Leslie, feels unworthy of being her king. In Terabithia, Jess and Leslie grow closer as she draws him into her world of imagination.
There, no enemies - not the imaginary giants from Leslie's stories or their real-life foes can defeat them. Leslie builds up Jess's low self-esteem and makes him feel good about himself. Nervous around them at first, Jess grows close to Leslie's parents as well, as they too introduce him to a world he never knew existed.
Together, there's nothing that Jess and Leslie can't do. When another bully, Janice Avery, steals food from Jess's little sister May Belle, he and Leslie get even by playing a brilliantly conceived and executed practical joke to humiliate Janice in front of the other kids.
Later, when Leslie tells Jess that she heard Janice crying in the girls' bathroom, he talks Leslie into reaching out to her. They learn that she is being abused by her father - brutally beaten - which is why she became a bully.
Though Jess likes Leslie's parents, he's uncomfortable having her over at his house. His sisters tease him about his "girlfriend," his mother hates Leslie's boyish looks and clothes, his father keeps "fretting that his only son did nothing but play with girls," and both his parents are "worried about what would become of it."
The most moving scenes between Jess and Leslie take place at Christmas. As the holiday approaches, while other kids are happy and excited, Jess is racked with anxiety and dread. There's so little money this year that he has to chip in with his older sisters to buy May Belle a Barbie doll. And, after he buys presents for his other family members, he won't have anything left to buy Leslie a present:
He was angry, too, because it would soon be Christmas and he had nothing to give Leslie. It was not that she would expect something expensive; it was that he needed to give her something as much as he needed to eat when he was hungry.
But then one day, on the way home from school, he sees a sign that says "Puppies Free." On Christmas Eve afternoon, Jess and Leslie exchange presents in Terabithia. She adores her new puppy, whom she names Prince Terrien. Then she gives Jess his present - a deluxe art set "with twenty-four tubes of color and three brushes and a pad of heavy art paper."
On Christmas morning, Jess is glad to see May Belle playing with her Barbie, but his father is less than happy with the electric car racing set that he gave Jess. It's a low-end model and doesn't work well, though Jess knows that his father probably spent more than he could afford to on it.
"Cheap junk," Mr. Aarons says. "Don't get nothing for your money these days." He comes perilously close to kicking the toy. Jess is relieved when his mother sends him out to milk the family's cow, Miss Bessie. As soon as he leaves the house, Leslie, who has been waiting for him, runs to him, followed by Prince Terrien, and "It felt like Christmas again."
In the spring, when Leslie asks if she can go to church with Jess and his family for Easter services, (she's never been to a church before) his mother grudgingly gives her permission. Leslie shows up for church nicely dressed and is well mannered.
On the way home, Leslie wonders why Jess, who is a Christian, hates church so much while she, a nonbeliever, thinks that the story of Jesus is beautiful. May Belle warns her that she has to believe in the Bible, or else God will send her to Hell when she dies. Leslie disagrees.
The closer Jess grows to Leslie, the less he thinks about Miss Edmunds, the music teacher he has a crush on. But one morning, Jess is stunned when she unexpectedly invites him out to an art gallery in Washington.
Thrilled to be able to spend time with Miss Edmunds outside of music class, he goes off with her, asking his sleeping mother for permission. He forgets to call Leslie and tell her that he won't be meeting her in Terabithia that day.
Jess loves the art gallery, but immediately chastises himself for not inviting Leslie along. It's just not the same without her. He promises himself that he will invite her next time. Sadly, there won't be a next time. When Jess returns home, he finds his family worried, his mother in tears.
His older sister Brenda breaks the news: Leslie is dead. His father explains that she had been swinging on the rope to Terabithia when it broke. She fell, struck her head, and drowned in the creek. The family thought that Jess had been killed, too.
Disbelieving them at first, the terrible realization hits Jess like a punch in the stomach and he takes off, as if by running, he could keep Leslie alive. His father brings him home. Jess experiences all the stages of the bereaved: denial, anger, fear, guilt, and sorrow.
He and his parents go to a gathering at the Burkes' house to pay respects. The experience is unreal to him. Afterward, Jess struggles hard to deal with his grief. The only way he can cope with his loss is to use all the inner strength that Leslie had given him.
He decides to repay her for her kindness by passing it along. He builds a bridge to Terabithia and brings his neglected little sister May Belle into the magical kingdom, making her the new queen.
Katherine Paterson's powerful, emotional story won the Newbery Award the year it was published. Over 40 years later, it continues to touch the hearts and minds of new generations of readers.
Surprisingly, Bridge To Terabithia holds the distinction of being the most banned and challenged children's book of all time, as it often appears on teachers' assigned reading lists for classroom study.
The novel still raises the ire of disgruntled parents and conservative groups who complain about its bleakness, stark realism, themes of death and grief, dialectic use of mildly profane language, alleged ridiculing of authority figures and negative depictions of Christians and Christianity.
These criticisms are surprising, considering that the author is the wife of a minister. Religious themes are handled in an honest, realistic way. Due to the religious dogma he was raised to believe in, Jess's faith is no comfort to him at all in his greatest time of need.
On the contrary, he's terrified that God will send Leslie Burke to Hell for being a nonbeliever. His father assures him otherwise, telling him that "God don't send no little girls to Hell." But Jess still worries about Leslie's soul.
Bridge To Terabithia has been adapted into other media over the years. The first adaptation was an audio dramatization released by Newbery Award Records in 1979. Sold only to schools as a study aid, this dramatization is excellent, with great voice acting, music, and sound effects.
I got my copy of the record on eBay. The 50-minute recording would be edited down to almost half its length and used as the soundtrack for a 1981 Bridge To Terabithia filmstrip set, which I also have.
There were two unabridged audiobook releases of Bridge To Terabithia. The first, released by Recorded Books in 1996, is read by actor Tom Stechschulte, who gives one of the best audiobook performances I've ever heard, his rich baritone voice resonating the power of the story.
The second audiobook, released in 2004 by Harper Children's Audio, features a flat and uninspired reading by actor Robert Sean Leonard. The 2007 movie tie-in re-release of this audiobook features a bonus interview with Katherine and David Paterson, which is the only reason to buy it.
In 1996, Katherine Paterson co-wrote a musical stage play adaptation of Bridge To Terabithia which her son David would produce and stage at elementary schools. The play would also be performed around the world in various languages.
The musical soundtrack appears on the cassette-only release, Bridge To Terabithia and Other Musicals, which includes the musical soundtracks for two other plays based on novels by Katherine Paterson: The Tale of the Mandarin Ducks and The Great Gilly Hopkins.
I ordered my copy of the cassette from the only store that sold it - a children's bookstore in New York City called Books of Wonder. I also have a copy of the play script, which is sold by its publisher - Samuel French, Inc., America's largest publisher of plays.
Bridge To Terabithia was filmed twice. It was first adapted in 1985 as an episode of the PBS TV series, Wonderworks - a zero-budget, horribly written, poorly acted episode of a series that usually produced quality adaptations of children's literature.
David Paterson, who grew up to become a playwright, described it as being "the crazy cousin that nobody talks about... no one on our side was either involved with it or happy with the final product."
Fans of the book, myself included, believed that it would never be adapted as a quality film because of its controversial nature. However, in 2007, Disney's Walden Media division produced a feature film version of Bridge To Terabithia.
With David Paterson serving as producer and co-writer, the movie turned out to be a faithful (albeit modernized) adaptation that beautifully captured all the emotion of the story. It was lovingly directed by animator Gabor Csupo in his first live-action film.
The movie featured stunning performances by young leads Josh Hutcherson and AnnaSophia Robb as Jess Aarons and Leslie Burke. They're backed by a stellar supporting cast, including Robert Patrick as Mr. Aarons and Zooey Deschanel as Miss Edmunds.
Although the "Disneyfied" screenplay tones down the story (the book is much darker) and omits or waters down the most controversial elements of the novel, (Disney originally wanted an alternate ending where Leslie Burke doesn't die) the movie still ignited a firestorm of controversy due to deceitful marketing practices over which the filmmakers had no control.
Hoping to attract a large audience, Disney falsely advertised the film as a fantasy similar to The Chronicles Of Narnia. Parents and children unfamiliar with the book went to the movie expecting to see what was advertised.
Instead, they saw a deep and sad story that really had little to do with fantasy. The marketing also drove away fans of the book (like me) who believed that the story they loved so much had been butchered yet again.
The Bridge To Terabithia movie is currently available on DVD, Blu-Ray, and streaming services. I wholeheartedly recommend that you see it - after you read the book, which is a masterpiece of contemporary children's literature.
In 2017, a 40th Anniversary Special Edition of Bridge To Terabithia was released, featuring a foreward by novelist Kate DiCamillo, an author's note on the book's 40th anniversary, and the complete text of Katherine Paterson's Newbery Award acceptance speech.
Quote Of The Day
"When people ask me what qualifies me to be a writer for children, I say I was once a child. But I was not only a child, I was better still, a weird little kid." - Katherine Paterson
Vanguard Video
Today's video features Katherine Paterson discussing the writing of Bridge To Terabithia on Author Visits. Enjoy!
No comments:
Post a Comment