Summer of Children’s Classic – Peter Pan –Hook’s Daughter by Heidi Schulz

As part of the last week of our Summer of Children’s Classics, we are back in Neverland with a recently published Peter Pan sequel, ‘Hook’s Daughter’ by Heidi Schulz.

Hook’s Daughter is a delight, a funny swashbuckling yarn, told by a cantankerous narrator who tells the tale of great Captain Hook’s daughter, Jocelyn. As daughter and heir of the most feared pirate ever to sail the Seven Seas, Jocelyn isn’t shaping up to be the daughter her grandfather wishes her to be. After numerous governesses and failed attempts at teaching Jocelyn to be lady destined for a good match and future prospects, The girl is shipped off to ‘Miss Eliza Crumb-Biddlecomb’s finishing School for Young Ladies. ‘

But Jocelyn is determined to follow her own path, to follow in her father’s footsteps and become a pirate. Despite Jocelyn’s aptitude for breaking governesses, she finds that school is much more difficult than she anticipated, her scruffy appearance, lack of manners and defiant attitude landing her trouble from the onset. It is only her newfound secret friend, Roger the cook’s servant, who gives her any joy as the pair escape to the store rooms, and read adventures stories and plan their own expedition. Yet her joy is short-lived, when her friendship is exposed, Roger is sent away and Jocelyn makes a wish upon her star for an adventure.

One should never wish upon a star unless they are prepared for the wish to be granted. The moment the wish is made, an oversized black bird by the name of ‘Edgar Allen’, appears and delivers to the girl a letter, one that is essentially the last will and testament of the late great Captain Hook.

“Dear female offspring,

Since you are now reading this epistle, the thing I fear has most assuredly happened. I am dead… 

…the crocodile has sent me to my doom… 

…You are my only heir. As such you must avenge my death. I lay this charge upon you; Come to Neverland. Hunt the beast and destroy it in my name… 

…PS. you must consider this quest your inheritance, along with a few personal effects and a small bag of coins left with my bo’sun, Mr Smee. I may not be able to take my riches into the afterlife, but that is no reason to give them away.”

Without hesitation Jocelyn returns with Edgar to Neverland, meets Mr Smee and purchases herself a small vessel that she names, ‘Hooks Revenge’. All seems to be progressing to her plan until she hires a crew, sadly not the best Neverland has to offer, or second or third best, try sixteenth! The young crew are all afflicted with one aliment or another. One-Armed Jack only has one arm, despite actually having a full quota of limbs, Jim McCraig with a Wooden leg which is actually skin and bone. Or the lookout Blind Bart who has patches over both his functioning eyes.

“Begging your pardon, miss, but your men have some…how shall we put this Jonny? Some unusual characteristics. You see, they’ve not had much experience. Not like your regular crews. None of them have been in a real battle, but that doesn’t stop them wishing they had, so they, ah, pretend.”

To make matters worse, her crew seem to have no discipline, preferring to play and for some obscure reason they refer to her as ‘Mother!’

Catching the enormous red-eyed ticking reptile, is tougher than Jocelyn imagined, made increasingly more difficult, by Neverland and its strange inhabitants, not least a very silly flying boy, and his volatile flying fairy.

“’Aren’t you here to be a mother to me and the lost boys? Mothers tell stories, and they do the washing and the mending and the scolding. Although if you want to forget the scolding, I won’t mind. But mothers must tell stories…if you don’t tell me a story right now, I shan’t take my medicine and you will be sorry!’

Incensed by the silly flying boy, Jocelyn agrees to wage war with him and lost boys once she has killed the crocodile. After an attack from another vessel with a much more seasoned crew, Jocelyn finds herself on her own, and survives the dangers of Neverland by softening the heart of a mermaid, outwitting cannibals and saving a fairy prince who becomes her loyal friend. Yet despite her victories, the crocodile taunts her it’s ticking fraying her nerves, feeding on fear and doubt. Her doubts are magnified when she bumps into the lost boys and comes face to face with Roger who has no recollection of his life before Neverland and no memories of their friendship. The loss of her friends makes it all the more difficult when the time comes and it is Jocelyn or the crocodile, as she must be believe in herself and quell her fears in order to slay the beast.

Hook’s Daughter is a jolly, funny riveting read, she has taken Neverland and imitated and yet made it her own at the same time. One of the delights of Neverland is its character, the fact the world has a personality of its own and will wield its lands to suit its own agenda, Heidi Schulz has made every advantage of this in her book, having the land remould and reshape itself to create challenges and hurdles for Jocelyn to overcome. Another triumph is the inhabitants of Neverland, with all the expected characters we know; the ice-blooded Mermaids, the lost-boys, Peter, Tink, and Smee, who all seem exactly how they were in the original text. But Schulz, has also developed characters like the banished lost-boys, now young men turned pirates, or the crocodile who had mutated into a fierce beast poisoned by its last meal. Then Schulz has created her own characters, drawing on Neverland’s ever changing state dreamed up slumbering children, she has let her imagination run free creating colourful and delectable characters like The Karnapinae, the feathered-nosed cannibals with an obsession with England with ambition to fly there and dine on the population, or her expanded fairy realm, which also draws on fairy-lore.

The book is a great story, with adventure which emulates the voice of the original, with a perhaps more cranky narrator, who is himself very amusing, but she has also laid waste to the now antiquated view of the role of women and mother, as she is most adamantly not a fine lady, or destined to wash and mend clothes. Hook’s Daughter takes the best of Barrie’s Neverland and has used it to create a charming tale of self-discovery and swashbuckling adventure.

Summer of Children’s Classics – Peter Pan – J.M.Barrie

Throughout the month we have been looking at children’s classics, delving into their often strange and curious path to publication, the cultural impact that they have created, and trying to work out exactly what it is that makes them classic. Today we journey to place between consciousness and sleep, as we put Neverland and it’s most famous inhabitant, Peter Pan, under the microscope.

J.M.Barrie’s novel telling the adventures of one very cocky and mischievous leaf clad boy, Peter Pan, is another undisputed classic. Like many classic’s, Peter Pan had meandering course to publication and it may surprise you to learn that Peter‘s debut was actually in a novel Barrie penned for adults, ‘The Little White Bird’ published in 1902. It is more widely known that the story which is adored by millions of people today was originally a play; Barrie used his creation of the boy who lived in Kensington garden as the main character of the 1904 production; Peter Pan or The Boy Wouldn’t Grow Up. The play was a success, and soon Barrie’s publishers re-printed the chapter of ‘The Little White Bird’ which featured Peter as its own book ‘Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens’ accompanied by the delightful illustration my Arthur Rackham. With gaining popularity Barrie adapted the play to novel form and ‘Peter Pan and Wendy’ was published in 1911.

The genius of Peter Pan is that it written solely for the entertainment of children. The magical dream-realm, with, mermaids, ticking crocodiles, Indians tribes, where you can fly and play all day but return to the waiting arms of devoting parents appeals to children’s imaginations. It is freedom personified, and even comes with a safety net, if anything goes wrong, and you find yourself at the end of a plank, then Peter is always there to save you. This is a world where children will always been drawn to as, it is free and safe, and thereby the story is as relevant today as it were a century ago.

Since then, Peter, the Darling siblings, The Lost Boys and Captain Hook, have become ingrained in modern culture. Everyone knows the story, even if they haven’t actually read the book. It has been adapted into films and animations, by the likes of Disney and Warner Brothers, and the hugely successful all-star sequel ‘Hook’ with Steven Spielberg at the helm.

As a child I LOVED the stories of Neverland, I was introduced to them firstly by the Disney animation, and then panto and I even won the role of Wendy in a school play. I read the book (despite the difficult language and the heavy narration), and found myself amazed by both the story and the exquisite illustrations (although I did feel the need to enhance the pictures by self-colouring them, after all Neverland shouldn’t be monochrome!) Both my children, adore the book, but one thing I did find whilst reading it them, is that through adult’s eyes it reads very different.

I was shocked at how much darker Neverland from an adult’s perspective. Nowhere does it say that Neverland is a place where children don’t grow up, but merely a place where Peter doesn’t age, in fact Peter’s rule that growing up is forbidden has rather sinister connotations especially in regards to the implied enforcement.

“The boys on the island vary, of course, in numbers, according as they get killed and so on; and when they seem to be growing up, which against the rules, Peter thins them out.”

As a grown up Peter becomes less appealing, his self-assured personality, and his butterfly nature makes him less of a reliable captain, and hero, making the whole Neverland seem like a much darker and dangerous place. Whether these dark undertones are picked up my children, I don’t know, and I do wonder if it really matters. After all fairy-tales aren’t exactly fluffy and light and children tend to let their imaginations to venture as dark as they want to go.

These undertones, of course are picked up on my adults and have on many occasions been put to great use, for instance the Peter Pan and indeed the Neverland with the Disney ABC television’s ‘Once Upon a Time’ are exquisitely dark and terrifying. Or the 1987 vampire movie ‘The Lost Boys’ where the bloodthirsty runaways are looking for a mother.

So Peter Pan is a truly integrated into modern culture its appeal being multi-layered; the surface a place of freedom and play for children that sparks their imagination and the bottom, being a darker world that stirs the shadowy parts of adults imaginations.

Staying in The Neverland, our next post is a review of the recently published Heidi Schulz penned sequel to Peter Pan, Hook’s Daughter!