The Enchanted Castle and Five Children and It

“There is,” said Gerald earnestly. “I assure you there is—hope, I mean. And life’s as right as rain really. And there’s nothing to despair about. He’s not mad, and it’s not a dream. It’s magic. It really and truly is.”

“The magic exists not,” Mademoiselle moaned; “it is that he is mad. It is the joy to re-see me after so many days. Oh, la-la-la-la-la!”

“Did he talk to the gods?” Gerald asked gently.

“It is there the most mad of all his ideas. He say that Mercure give him rendezvous at some temple tomorrow when the moon raise herself.”

“Right,” cried Gerald, “righto! Dear nice, kind, pretty Mademoiselle Rapunzel, don’t be a silly little duffer”—he lost himself for a moment among the consoling endearments he was accustomed to offer to Kathleen in moments of grief and emotion, but hastily added: “I mean, do not be a lady who weeps causelessly. Tomorrow he will go to that temple. I will go. Thou shalt go—he will go. We will go—you will go—let ’em all go! And, you see, it’s going to be absolutely all right. He’ll see he isn’t mad, and you’ll understand all about everything. Take my handkerchief, it’s quite a clean one as it happens; I haven’t even unfolded it. Oh! do stop crying, there’s a dear, darling, long-lost lover.”

This flood of eloquence was not without effect. She took his handkerchief, sobbed, half smiled, dabbed at her eyes, and said: “Oh, naughty^! Is it some trick you play him, like the ghost?”

“I can’t explain,” said Gerald, “but I give you my word of honour—you know what an Englishman’s word of honour is, don’t you? even if you are French—that everything is going to be exactly what you wish. I’ve never told you a lie. Believe me!”

“It is curious,” said she, drying her eyes, “but I do.” And once again, so suddenly that he could not have resisted, she kissed him. I think, however, that in this her hour of sorrow he would have thought it mean to resist.

“It pleases her and it doesn’t hurt me—much,” would have been his thought.

And now it is near moonrise. The French governess, half-doubting, half-hoping, but wholly longing to be near LordYalding even if he be as mad as a March hare, and the four children—they have collected Mabel by an urgent letter-card posted the day before—are going over the dewy grass. The moon has not yet risen, but her light is in the sky mixed with the pink and purple of the sunset. The west is heavy with ink-clouds and rich colour, but the east, where the moon rises, is clear as a rock-pool.

They go across the lawn and through the beech-wood and come at last, through a tangle of underwood and bramble, to a little level tableland that rises out of the flat hill-top-one tableland out of another. Here is the ring of vast rugged stones, one pierced with a curious round hole, worn smooth at its edges. In the middle of the circle is a great flat stone, alone, desolate, full of meaning—a stone that is covered thick with the memory of old faiths and creeds long since forgotten. Something dark moves in the circle. The French girl breaks from the children, goes to it, clings to its arm. It is Lord Yalding, and he is telling her to go.

“Never of the life!” she cries. “If you are mad I am mad too, for I believe the tale these children tell. And I am here to be with thee and see with thee—whatever the rising moon shall show us.”

The children, holding hands by the flat stone, more moved by the magic in the girl’s voice than by any magic of enchanted rings, listen, trying not to listen.

“Are you not afraid?” Lord Yalding is saying.

“Afraid? With you?” she laughs. He put his arm round her. The children hear her sigh.

“Are you afraid,” he says, “my darling?”

Gerald goes across the wide turf ring expressly to say:

“You can’t be afraid if you are wearing the ring. And I’m sorry, but we can hear every word you say.”

She laughs again. “It makes nothing,” she says “you know already if we love each other.”

Then he puts the ring on her finger, and they stand together. The white of his flannel coat sleeve marks no line on the white of her dress; they stand as though cut out of one block of marble.

Then a faint greyness touches the top of that round hole, creeps up the side. Then the hole is a disc of light—a moonbeam strikes straight through it across the grey green of the circle that the stones mark, and as the moon rises the moonbeam slants downward. The children have drawn back till they stand close to the lovers. The moonbeam slants more and more; now it touches the far end of the stone, now it draws nearer and nearer to the middle of it, now at last it touches the very heart and centre of that central stone. And then it is as though a spring were touched, a fountain of light released. Everything changes. Or, rather, everything is revealed. There are no more secrets. The plan of the world seems plain, like an easy sum that one writes in big figures on a child’s slate. One wonders how one can ever have wondered about anything. Space is not; every place that one has seen or dreamed of is here. Time is not; into this instant is crowded all that one has ever done or dreamed of doing. It is a moment and it is eternity It is the centre of the universe and it is the universe itself. The eternal light rests on and illuminates the eternal heart of things.

None of the six human beings who saw that moon-rising were ever able to think about it as having anything to do with time. Only for one instant could that moonray have rested full on the centre of that stone. And yet there was time for many happenings.

From that height one could see far out over the quiet park and sleeping gardens, and through the grey green of them shapes moved, approaching.

The great beasts came first, strange forms that were when the world was new—gigantic lizards with wings—dragons they lived as in men’s memories—mammoths, strange vast birds, they crawled up the hill and ranged themselves outside the circle. Then, not from the garden but from very far away, came the stone gods of Egypt and As-syria—bull—bodied, bird-winged, hawk-headed, cat-headed, all in stone, and all alive and alert; strange, grotesque figures from the towers of cathedrals—figures of angels with folded wings, figures of beasts with wings wide spread; sphinxes; uncouth idols from Southern palm-fringed islands; and, last of all, the beautiful marble shapes of the gods and goddesses who had held their festival on the lake-island, and bidden Lord Yalding and the children to this meeting.

Not a word was spoken. Each stone shape came gladly and quietly into the circle of light and understanding, as children, tired with a long ramble, creep quietly through the open door into the firelit welcome of home.

The children had thought to ask many questions. And it had been promised that the questions should be answered. Yet now no one spoke a word, because all had come into the circle of the real magic where all things are understood without speech.

Afterwards none of them could ever remember at all what had happened. But they never forgot that they had been somewhere where everything was easy and beautiful. And people who can remember even that much are never quite the same again. And when they came to talk of it next day they found that to each some little part of that night’s great enlightenment was left.

All the stone creatures drew closer round the stone—the light where the moonbeam struck it seemed to break away in spray such as water makes when it falls from a height. All the crowd was bathed in whiteness. A deep hush lay over the vast assembly.

Then a wave of intention swept over the mighty crowd. All the faces, bird, beast, Greek statue, Babylonian monster, human child, and human lover, turned upward, the radiant light illumined them and one word broke from all.

“The light!” they cried, and the sound of their voice was like the sound of a great wave; “the light! the light—”

And then the light was not any more, and, soft as floating thistle-down, sleep was laid on the eyes of all but the immortals.

The grass was chill and dewy and the clouds had veiled the moon. The lovers and the children were standing together, all clinging close, not for fear, but for love.

“I want,” said the French girl softly, “to go to the cave on the island.”

Very quietly through the gentle brooding night they went down to the boat-house, loosed the clanking chain, and dipped oars among the drowned stars and lilies. They came to the island, and found the steps.

“I brought candles,” said Gerald, “in case.”

So, lighted by Gerald’s candles, they went down into the Hall of Psyche and there glowed the light spread from her statue, and all was as the children had seen it before.

It is the Hall of Granted Wishes.

“The ring,” said Lord Yalding.

“The ring,” said his lover, “is the magic ring given long ago to a mortal, and it is what you say it is. It was given to your ancestor by a lady of my house that he might build her a garden and a house like her own palace and garden in her own land. So that this place is built partly by his love and partly by that magic. She never lived to see it; that was the price of the magic.”

It must have been English that she spoke, for otherwise how could the children have understood her? Yet the words were not like Mademoiselle’s way of speaking.

“Except from children,” her voice went on, “the ring exacts a payment. You paid for me, when I came by your wish, by this terror of madness that you have since known. Only one wish is free.”

“And that wish is—”

“The last,” she said. “Shall I wish?”

“Yes—wish,” they said, all of them.

“I wish, then,” said Lord Yalding’s lover, “that all the magic this ring has wrought may be undone, and that the ring itself may be no more and no less than a charm to bind thee and me together for evermore.”

She ceased. And as she ceased the enchanted light died away, the windows of granted wishes went out, like magic-lantern pictures. Gerald’s candle faintly lighted a rudely arched cave, and where Psyche’s statue had been was a stone with something carved on it.

Gerald held the light low.

“It is her grave,” the girl said.

Next day no one could remember anything at all exactly. But a good many things were changed. There was no ring but the plain gold ring that Mademoiselle found clasped in her hand when she woke in her own bed in the morning. More than half the jewels in the panelled room were gone, and those that remained had no panelling to cover them; they just lay—bare on the velvet-covered shelves. There was no passage at the back of the Temple of Flora. Quite a lot of the secret passages and hidden rooms had disappeared. And there were not nearly so many statues in the garden as everyone had supposed. And large pieces of the castle were missing and had to be replaced at great expense. From which we may conclude that Lord Yalding’s ancestor had used the ring a good deal to help him in his building.

However, the jewels that were left were quite enough to pay for everything.

The suddenness with which all the ring-magic was undone was such a shock to everyone concerned that they now almost doubt that any magic ever happened.

But it is certain that Lord Yalding married the French governess and that a plain gold ring was used in the ceremony, and this, if you come to think of it, could be no other than the magic ring, turned, by that last wish, into a charm to keep him and his wife together for ever.

Also, if all this story is nonsense and a make-up—if Gerald and Jimmy and Kathleen and Mabel have merely imposed on my trusting nature by a pack of unlikely inventions, how do you account for the paragraph which appeared in the evening papers the day after the magic of the moon-rising?“MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE OF A

WELL-KNOWN CITY MAN,”

it said, and then went on to say how a gentleman, well known and much respected in financial circles, had vanished, leaving no trace.

“Mr. U. W Ugli,” the papers continued, “had remained late, working at his office as was his occasional habit. The office door was found locked, and on its being broken open the clothes of the unfortunate gentleman were found in a heap on the floor, together with an umbrella, a walking stick, a golf club, and, curiously enough, a feather brush, such as housemaids use for dusting. Of his body, however, there was no trace. The police are stated to have a clue.”

If they have, they have kept it to themselves. But I do not think they can have a clue, because, of course, that respected gentleman was the Ugly-Wugly who became real when, in search of a really good hotel, he got into the Hall of Granted Wishes. And if none of this story ever happened, how is it that those four children are such friends with Lord and Lady Yalding, and stay at The Towers almost every holidays?

It is all very well for all of them to pretend that the whole of this story is my own invention: facts are facts, and you can’t explain them away.

ENDNOTES

Five Children and It

1 (p. 3) To John Bland: The “five children” of the novel are loosely based on Nesbit’s own. John Bland (“The Lamb”) was Nesbit’s fifth, born when the others were already in their teens. See the introduction (p. xxii) for an account of the circumstances surrounding his birth.

2 (p. 20) if you had three wishes given you, and have despised the old man and his wife in the black-pudding story: In this version of the fairy tale of “the three wishes,” a man who dislikes his wife’s cooking wishes for a helping of black pudding, to which she reacts by wishing the pudding on his nose. This requires the man to use the third and final wish to undo the effects of the second. See the introduction for a discussion of the significance of this fairy tale, which exists in many versions around the world.

3 (p. 84) “What was it Sir Philip Sidney said when the soldier wouldn’t stand him a drink?”: Like those of Shakespeare, the sonnets of soldier and statesman Philip Sidney (1554-1586) are considered among the finest of the Elizabethan age. In this passage, Cyril inverts a line attributed to Sidney: Wounded and dying on the battlefield, Sidney supposedly handed his water bottle to another wounded soldier with the words “Thy need is greater than mine.”

4 (p. 107) he began boldly enough, with a sentence straight out of Ralph de Courcy; or, The Boy Crusader: Ralph de Courcy is a character in A March on London: Being a Story of Wat Tyler’s Insurrection (1897), by the prolific G.A. (GeorgeAlfred) Henty (1832-1902). Known as “the boys’ own historian,” he wrote more than one hundred historical novels featuring young men who learn manly virtues in the heat of significant historical conflicts. The Boy Crusader may be a reference to his Winning His Spurs: A Tale of the Crusades (1882), which was republished the following year as The Boy Knight, Who Won His Spurs Fighting with King Richard of England: A Tale of the Crusaders.

5 (p. 142) One gentleman ... offered Robert, in an obliging whisper, ten pounds a week to appear at the Crystal Palace: A huge iron and glass building, the Crystal Palace, designed by Sir Joseph Paxton (1801-1865), originally housed the Great Exhibition of 1851. It was subsequently moved to Sydenham Hill, overlooking London, and expanded; over the years its spectacular exhibits drew many thousands of visitors, including Nesbit and her family. It was destroyed by fire in 1936.

6 (p. 144) “Robert and I are dressed the same. We’ll manage somehow, like Sydney Carton did”: At the end of Charles Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities (1859), Sydney Carton contrives an elaborate self-sacrificial plan to rescue his condemned look-alike, Charles Darnay, from a French prison by switching places with him.

7 (p. 182) “I wish Martha to forget about the diamond ring, and mother to forget about the keeper cleaning the windows.” “It’s like ‘Brass Bottle’,” said Jane: Nesbit is acknowledging the influence of The Brass Bottle (1900), a fantasy novel by Thomas Anstey Guthrie (1856-1934), who wrote under the pseudonym F. Anstey. In this novel, a modern architect buys an antique brass bottle and discovers that it contains a genie. The latter’s beneficence is so excessive that it backfires at every turn, and the exasperated architect ends up wishing it to “kindly obliterate all recollection of yourself and the brass bottle from the minds of every human being who has had anything to do with you or it” (see The Brass Bottle, London: Penguin, 1946, p. 218).

The Enchanted Castle

1 (p. 193) assuming a gentle, pleading expression, resembling that of the late little Lord Fauntleroy—who must, by the way, be quite old now, and an awful prig: A novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett (1849-1924), Little Lord Fauntleroy (1886) was immensely popular in its time. The book’s title character later came to epitomize (somewhat unfairly) a certain type of overdressed and insufferably polite young man.

2 (p. 205) Beyond the rose garden was a yew hedge with an arch cut in it, and it was the beginning of a maze like the one in Hampton Court: The renowned hedge maze at Hampton Court, a former royal palace in an outer borough of London, was planted for William of Orange between 1689 and 1695.

3 (p. 225) “I was playing at Fair Rosamond first, and then I heard you talking in the maze”: Rosamond, or Rosamund, Clifford (c.1140-c.1176) was a mistress of Henry II (1133-1189). According to one legend, she was hidden in the labyrinthine bower of a secret garden, but was tracked down and killed by Henry’s jealous wife, Eleanor of Aquitane (c.1 122-1204). In one version of the story, it is the equivalent of Ariadne’s thread that enables the Queen and her henchman to penetrate the maze.

4 (p. 240) “Like La Belle Dame Sans Merci, and he does not want to be found in future ages alone and palely loitering in the middle of sedge and things”: John Keats’s 1819 ballad describes an encounter between a man and an enchanted beauty who has left him, like others before him, in a forlorn state. Gerald’s reference to being found alone in the sedge recalls the last lines of the first and final stanzas: “Alone and palely loitering? / The sedge has wither’d from the lake, / And no birds sing.”

5 (p. 265) “The melancholy Mabel will await the tryst without success, as far as this one is concerned. ‘Fish, fish, other fish—other fish I fry!’ ” he warbled to the tune of “Cherry Ripe”: Gerald is parodying a love poem by Robert Herrick (1591-1674); its first line is “Cherry-ripe, ripe, ripe, I cry.”The rest of Gerald’s song echoes the finale: “Where my Julia’s lips do smile; / There’s the land, or cherry-isle, / Whose plantations fully show / All the year where cherries grow.”

6 (pp. 313, 315) They met no one, except one man, who murmured, “Guy Fawkes, swelp me!” and crossed the road hurriedly: Guy Fawkes (1570-1606) was the best-known member of a group of Catholic conspirators who attempted to blow up England’s Houses of Parliament and kill the king in 1605. The plot was uncovered, and Fawkes and the others were tried and executed. Guy Fawkes Day is celebrated annually on November 5 with fireworks and the burning of Fawkes in effigy.

7 (p. 319) We must excuse her. She had been very brave, and I have no doubt that all heroines, from Joan of Arc to Grace Darling, have had their sobbing moments: Grace Darling (1815-1842) was the daughter of a lighthouse keeper in Northumberland, England, who became a national heroine after September 1838, when she and her father rescued survivors of a ship, the Forfarshire, that had run aground on a nearby island.

8 (p. 330) “Anyway,” said Gerald, “we’ll try to get him back, and shut the door. That’s the most we can hope for. And then apples, and Robinson Crusoe or the Swiss Family, or any book you like that’s got no magic in it”: The popular adventure novel Robinson Crusoe (1719), by Daniel Defoe (1660-1731), inspired similar castaway narratives, perhaps the most famous of which is The Swiss Family Robinson (1814), by Johann David Wyss (1743-1818). As Gerald indicates, these tales of shipwrecked individuals and families, known for their realistic adventures, are devoid of magic and enchantment.

9 (p. 348) she looked like a little girl reflected in one of those long bent mirrors at Rosherville Gardens that make stout people look so happily slender, and slender people so sadly scraggy: Rosherville Gardens, a riverside resort in Northfleet, England, opened in the early 1840s. For a time a popular destination for Londoners, who reached it by steamboat, the resort featured a bear pit, zoo, aviary, botanical gardens, maze, open-air theaters, and tea rooms.

10 (p. 369) “Come, we must get the feast ready. Eros—Psyche—Hebe—Ganymede—all you young people can arrange the fruit”: In classical mythology, Psyche (which means “soul” in Greek) is the princess who married Cupid, the god of love. As a result of her failure of trust, she is compelled to leave her husband’s castle, but after enduring many trials and a long separation, she is reunited with the god and made immortal. The myth of Psyche and Cupid can be seen as an allegory of the soul transfigured by love. In chapter 6, the children act out a fairy-tale version of this myth in the story of Beauty and the Beast. See the introduction for an account of the increasingly significant, if never explicitly stated, role of the myth and the fairy tale in the second half of The Enchanted Castle.

11 (p. 379) perhaps Mr. Millar will draw the different kinds of arches for you: H. R. Millar (1869-1942) worked as an illustrator for The Strand Magazine as well as other publications. His collaboration with Nesbit began in 1899 with the illustrations for The Book of Dragons, which originally appeared in The Strand, and they continued to work together until her relationship with the magazine ended in 1913.

INSPIRED BY THE ENCHANTED CASTLE AND FIVE CHILDREN AND IT

British author J. K. Rowling frequently identifies Edith Nesbit as a major inspiration for her immensely popular Harry Potter novels. Therefore, it may be no coincidence that in the wave of excitement surrounding the Harry Potter phenomenon, a major film adaptation of Nesbit’s Five Children and It has also appeared. Surprisingly, John Stephenson’s Five Children and It (2004) is only the third Nesbit novel to appear on the large screen, following The Railway Children (1970) and The Phoenix and the Magic Carpet (1995). The film stars Kenneth Branagh as Uncle Albert, Zoe Wannamaker as Martha the housekeeper (Wannamaker also appeared in the second Harry Potter film) , Eddie Izzard as the voice of the Psammead, Freddie Highmore as Robert, the narrator, and four other child actors. Produced in conjunction with Jim Henson’s Creature Shop, the film uses a combination of computer-generated special effects, animatronics, and live action to bring Nesbit’s story to life.

Works by Nesbit have appeared more often on television, at least in the United Kingdom. In addition to TV movies and serial adaptations of The Story of the Treasure Seekers (released as Treasure Seekers in 1996), The Phoenix and the Carpet (1976 and 1997), and The Railway Children (1951, 1957, and 2000), a six-episode miniseries of The Enchanted Castle aired on British television in 1979, and a similar serialization of Five Children and It (retitled The Sand Fairy for U.S. distribution) was broadcast in 1991. Nesbit herself was the subject of a television play that was shown on BBC television in 1972 as part of the series The Edwardians.

For a discussion of authors inspired by Nesbit, see part VI of the introduction to this volume.

COMMENTS & QUESTIONS

In this section, we aim to provide the reader with an array of perspectives on the text, as well as questions that challenge those perspectives. The commentary has been culled from sources as diverse as reviews contemporaneous with the work, letters written by the author, literary criticism of later generations, and appreciations written throughout the work’s history. Following the commentary, a series of questions seeks to filter Edith Nesbit’s The Enchanted Castle and Five Children and It through a variety of points of view and bring about a richer understanding of these enduring works.

Comments

THE NATION

E. Nesbit and W. W. Jacobs are the two contributors who have given a certain cheap magazine some circulation among a constituency at whom, to judge by the rest of its matter, it was not aimed. E. Nesbit is, one may almost say, the only person now telling fairy stories in public for love of the game. “The Enchanted Castle” is a very good example of her craft. Its humor consists in the continual jumbling of the realities of English child life, and the unrealities (or deeper realities) of the land of fancy. The wits of these young Britons are, when they choose, mazed with fairy-lore, and they have the dialect of romance at their tongue’s end. Probably no such deep philosophy could be read into their adventures as ingenuity has connected with the exploits of their great progenitor Alice; but the absurdity of the things they do is made delightful by the whimsical air of the writer. In short, the book illustrates once more the English faculty of amusing children without boring one’s self.

-August 13, 1908

NEW YORK TIMES

There is great charm in E. Nesbit’s book, “The Enchanted Castle.” In its general character it is decidedly above the average run of so-called juvenile literature, and should prove vastly entertaining to the imaginative children to whom it is primarily addressed, as well as to grown-up folk who have a liking for books that are quaint, fanciful, and delicately humorous.

—July 11, 1908

THE NATION

If Emil [in Erich Kastner’s Emil and the Detective] is a real person, the “five children” constitute an equally real family. The public of Mrs. Nesbit, so large and devoted, will rejoice in this American edition of a book which has been making friends everywhere for twenty years. The ingenuity of the author’s imagination, her humor, and her charming outlook invest the adventures of her young characters with unceasing interest.

—November 19, 1930

C. S. LEWIS

Much better than either [Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sir Nigel or Mark Twain’s A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court] was E. Nesbit’s trilogy, Five Children and It, The Phoenix and the Wishing [sic] Carpet, and The Amulet. The last did most for me. It first opened my eyes to antiquity, the ‘dark backward and abysm of time.’ I can still reread it with delight.

—from Surprised by Joy (1955)

GORE VIDAL

After Lewis Carroll, E. Nesbit is the best of the English fabulists who wrote about children (neither wrote for children) and like Carroll she was able to create a world of magic and inverted logic that was entirely her own.

—New York Review of Books (December 3, 1964)

J. B. PRIESTLEY

The Edwardian variety of literary interests and abilities can be well illustrated by some mention of the finely-written whimsical tales it has left us, the kind of work later writers have never been able to improve upon or supplant.... And I am ready to include in this class Edith Nesbit’s entrancing stories about children, which I read and enjoyed as a child and then, enjoying them all over again, praised in print when I was fully adult—but still fascinated by magic.

—from The Edwardians (1970)

ALISON LURIE

Though there are foreshadowings of her characteristic manner in Charles Dickens’s Holiday Romance and Kenneth Grahame’s The Golden Age, Nesbit was the first to write at length for children as intellectual equals and in their own language. Her books were startlingly innovative in other ways: they took place in contemporary England, and recommended socialist solutions to its problems; they presented a modern view of childhood; and they used magic both as a comic device and as a serious metaphor for the power of the imagination. Every writer of children’s fantasy since Nesbit’s time is indebted to her—and so are some authors of adult fiction.

—New York Review of Books (October 25, 1984)

COLIN MANLOVE

In The Enchanted Castle we are more concerned with the inner world of the spirit, than with the outer world of objects and doings.... What is solid and real in the earlier books is less certain here. A statue may come alive, a dummy may turn into a half-person, a girl into a princess: nothing is what it seems. We are partly in a world of the imagination, partly in one of magic, and who is to say which it is? Where in the earlier books the imagination became real, here the real becomes the imagination. And where the earlier books took place mainly in the day, these later ones often have nighttime settings. It is as though Nesbit had passed from a materialist to an idealist attitude towards magic.

—from From Alice to Harry Potter: Children’s Fantasy in England (2003)

NATASHA WALTER

In the tales of Lewis or Rowling or Pullman the children find themselves part of a grand quest, a huge cosmic battle in which they will play a destined role. In Nesbit’s work everything is much more anarchic, and the children are always unsure whether they are going to be thrown into the darkest dungeon in Egypt or be sent to bed without supper. For her, magic worlds are as chaotic as real life; there are no Voldemorts or Dumbledores, no forces of pure evil or pure good, in her fantasies. So the children have to muddle through just as they would in everyday life.

—The Guardian (October 9, 2004)

Questions 1. Alison Lurie praises Nesbit for writing “at length for children as intellectual equals and in their own language.” But Gore Vidal claims that for all her virtues she wasn’t really writing “for children.” Discuss the voice of the narrator in these novels and the relationship between the narrator and the audience (or audiences) she seems to be addressing.2. How does Nesbit appropriate traditional folktales, ancient legends, and classical myths in these novels?3. What are the relative strengths and weaknesses of the looser episodic organization of the early fantasy Five Children and It, as compared to the more unified plot of The Enchanted Castle, a later work? Which approach do you prefer?4. Nesbit was known for focusing on a group of children rather than the single protagonist who had prevailed in earlier children’s fiction. Discuss the similarities and differences of character in the juvenile ensemble in these novels and the ways they interact with each other and respond to the challenges that come their way.5. Natasha Walter claims that, compared to the imaginary worlds of C. S. Lewis and other more recent fantasists, Nesbit’s works are “much more anarchic” and her “magic worlds are as chaotic as real life.” On the other hand, Colin Manlove argues that in her later fantasies Nesbit shifts “from a materialist to an idealist attitude towards magic” and “in The Enchanted Castle we are more concerned with the inner world of the spirit, than with the outer world of objects and doings.” Compare the kind of magic that appears in Five Children and It with the sort that comes to the fore in the second half of The Enchanted Castle.

FOR FURTHER READING

Other Children’s Books by Edith Nesbit

The Story of the Treasure Seekers: Being the Adventures of the Bastable Children in Search of a Fortune. 1899. London: Puffin Books, 1994. Nesbit’s first full-length children’s novel.

The Book of Dragons. 1900. New York: Seastar Books, 2001. Still popular, a collection of eight dragon stories.

The Wouldbegoods: Being the Further Adventures of the Treasure Seekers. 1901. London: Puffin Books, 1996. The second volume in the Bastable series.

The Phoenix and the Carpet. 1904. London: Puffin Books, 1994. A sequel to Five Children and It.

The New Treasure Seekers. 1904. London: Puffin Books, 1996. The third volume in the Bastable series.

The Story of the Amulet. 1906. London: Puffin Books, 1996. The third and final volume of the “Five Children” series.

The Railway Children. 1906. London: Puffin Books, 1994. After The Story of the Treasure Seekers, her most popular family adventure novel.

The House of Arden. 1908. New York: Books of Wonder, 1997. The Arden children travel into the past in search of lost family treasure.

Harding’s Luck. 1909. New York: Books of Wonder, 1999. A sequel to The House of Arden.

The Magic City. 1910. New York: Seastar Books, 2000. The adventures of two children inside their own toy city.

The Wonderful Garden. 1911. New York: Coward-McCann, 1959. Three children find and plant the seeds of Heart’s Desire.

The Magic World. 1912. London: Puffin Books, 1994. A collection of twelve stories.

Wet Magic. 1913. New York: Seastar Books, 2001. Four children help the Merfolk in their struggle against the Underfolk.

Long Ago When I Was Young. 1966. New York: Dial Books for Young Readers, 1991. A series of childhood reminiscences originally published as “My School-Days” in The Girl’s Own Paper, October 1896-September 1897.

Biography

Briggs, Julia. A Woman of Passion: The Life of E. Nesbit, 1858-1924. 1987. New York: New Amsterdam Books, 2000. A thorough update of Moore’s biography with edifying commentary on Nesbit’s works.

Moore, Doris Langley. E. Nesbit: A Biography. 1933. Revised edition. London: Ernest Benn, 1967. Based on extensive interviews with and letters from Nesbit’s family and other acquaintances.

Criticism and Contexts

Bell, Anthea. E. Nesbit. 1960. New York: H. Z. Walck, 1964. A succinct overview of her life and works.

Carpenter, Humphrey. Secret Gardens: A Study of the Golden Age of Children’s Literature. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1985. An account of the Anglo-American tradition from the mid-nineteenth to the early twentieth century. The sharply critical chapter on Nesbit questions both her originality and the value of her influence.

Crouch, Marcus. Treasure Seekers and Borrowers: Children’s Books in Britain, 1900-1960. London: Library Association, 1962. An informative survey that identifies Nesbit as a central figure in the modern British tradition and credits her with reshaping the family story, the fantasy novel, and the historical romance.

———The Nesbit Tradition: The Children’s Novel in England, 1945-1970. London: Ernest Benn, 1972. An overview that emphasizes Nesbit’s enduring influence on English children’s fiction.

Knoepflmacher, U. C. “Of Babylands and Babylons: E. Nesbit and the Reclamation of the Fairy Tale.” Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature 6:2 (Fall 1987), pp. 299-325. A probing essay that uses Nesbit’s autobiographical writings (primarily Long Ago When I Was Young) to explore some of the psychological conflicts in her major fiction. Lochhead, Marion. Renaissance of Wonder: The Fantasy Worlds of C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, George MacDonald, E. Nesbit and Others. San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1977. A historical survey with a chapter devoted to Nesbit.

Manlove, Colin N. From Alice to Harry Potter: Children’s Fantasy in England. Christchurch, New Zealand: Cybereditions, 2003. An illuminating tour of the fantasy tradition from the mid-nineteenth century to the present.

Nelson, Claudia. Boys Will Be Girls: The Feminine Ethic and British Children’s Fiction, 1857-1917. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1991. An analysis of the sanctification of childhood and related changes in gender ideals in the fiction of the era.

Nicholson, Mervyn. “What C. S. Lewis Took from E. Nesbit.” Children’s Literature Association Quarterly 16 (1991), pp. 16-22. An essay that examines the influence of Nesbit’s fantasies on the plot, character, and narrative voice of Lewis’s The Chronicles of Narnia, with an analysis of the sections most heavily indebted to her works.

Nikolajeva, Maria. Children’s Literature Comes of Age: Toward a New Aesthetic. New York: Garland, 1996. A sophisticated and wide-ranging study that identifies Nesbit as “the key figure of modern fantasy” (p. 159) and highlights her appropriation of other literature from traditional folktales to the novels of H. G. Wells.

Prickett, Stephen. Victorian Fantasy. Hassocks, Sussex: Harvester, 1979. A standard work on the period that concludes with a chapter on Kipling and Nesbit.

Streatfeild, Noel. Magic and the Magician: E. Nesbit and Her Children’s Books. New York: Abelard Schumann, 1958. A book-length appreciation by a well-known author of children’s literature.

a

Rented one-horse carriage.

b

British magicians John Nevil Maskelyne (1839-1917) and George A. Cooke (1825-1904) ran a famous theater, the Egyptian Hall, in London. After Cooke’s death, David Devant (1868-1941) became Maskelyne’s partner (see The Enchanted Castle, p. 221).

c

Limekiln: kiln in which limestone is heated in order to extract lime; oasthouse: building containing an oast, a kiln for drying hops.

d

Type of northern swallow that lives in tunnels in day or sand banks.

e

Type of eucalyptus tree native to Australia.

f

The Australian emu bird provided the logo for “Emu Brand” knitting wool.

g

Spanish gold coin; no longer in use.

h

Nesbit derived this term for “Sand-fairy” from the Greek psammos (sand) and the names naiad (water nymph) and dryad (wood nymph) of Greek mythology.

i

Elephant-size sloths that became extinct at the end of the last Ice Age, about 11, 000 years ago.

j

Sleeveless, apron-like garment worn over other clothing.

k

Prank in which bedsheets are doubled up, like an apple turnover, so that a person cannot stretch out her legs under them.

l

Breakfast (slang).

m

Small town in Kent, east of London.

n

Canopy.

o

June 24, the day on which the summer solstice, the longest day of the year, is traditionally celebrated.

p

Gold coins once used in England.

q

Loose-fitting jackets, sometimes part of a suit with knee breeches.

r

Tree; member of the birch family.

s

English gold coins worth 21 shillings; not minted since 1813.

t

Imitation coins used as stakes in card games.

u

Quickly.

v

Carriage with horses, harness, and driver.

w

Twopence; sum equal to two British pennies.

x

I’ll guarantee (slang).

y

Worthless or contemptible person.

z

Lord love me (dialect).

aa

Soot.

ab

Chimney (dialect).

ac

Barrier used in nurseries to restrict children’s movements.

ad

Worthless (slang).

ae

To proceed in lines of four.

af

Reference to “Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears,” a line from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar (act 3, scene 2).

ag

Term of endearment.

ah

Sand flea.

ai

Large English chicken.

aj

Leave; clear out (slang).

ak

Term of endearment for a child.

al

Tributary of the River Thames that divides the county of Kent.

am

Books in which documents are printed for pupils to imitate.

an

Offspring of Sennacherib, king (705-681 B.C.) of the Assyrian Empire, who rebuilt its largest city, Nineveh. He was slain by one, or possibly two, of his sons.

ao

Literally, other times, other customs (French); that is, times change, customs change.

ap

Molasses.

aq

Room for storing food.John Churchill (1650-1722), celebrated for his victory over France in the Battle of Blenheim (1704).

ar

Much talk with insignificant results.

as

Term for the younger of two people with the same surname.

at

Major campaign (1808-1814) on the Iberian Peninsula during the Napoleonic Wars.

au

King of England from 1625 until 1649; he was executed after the defeat of his forces in the English Civil Wars.

av

The second ( 1147-1149) in the series of campaigns to wrest the Holy Land from Muslim control.

aw

Helmets from the era of Oliver Cromwell (1599-1658), who led the Puritan rebellion against Charles I and ruled as lord protector from 1653 until his death.

ax

Harm.

ay

Shrub with laxative properties.

az

Often spelled gramercy; an expression of gratitude (archaic).

ba

Also (archaic).

bb

Grate or grille, made of wood or iron and suspended by chains; designed to be lowered for quick fortification against assault.

bc

Merry-go-round.

bd

Loop or coil.Resinous substance used to strengthen the thread that is used to sew shoes or to bind whips, ropes, and other goods.

be

Baked or boiled pudding made of a sheet of pastry covered with jam and rolled up.

bf

Castle in East Sussex built by an English knight in 1385.

bg

Further ahead.

bh

Peace (Latin).

bi

Cut it out (slang).

bj

Popular weekly magazine launched by Edwin J. Brett in 1866.

bk

Official residence of London’s lord mayor.

bl

Broad, stiff white collar worn over a jacket’s lapels.

bm

Cloth covering for a long, narrow pillow.

bn

Pit of a plum.

bo

Sideshow at a fair; contestants throw a ball to try to knock a coconut off its stand.

bp

So help me! (dialect).

bq

Reference to the slang expression “balmy in the crumpet” (wrong in the head or crazy).

br

Upon my word of honor! (slang).

bs

Bed (slang).

bt

Two pounds (slang).

bu

An oath—short for “God’s truth” (slang).

bv

Small change (slang).

bw

Exclamation of surprise (slang).

bx

Riotous dance.

by

Inexpensive watch made by the Waterbury Watch Company in Connecticut.

bz

Socks made with decorative openings.

ca

Famous novel, published in 1826, by James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851).

cb

County in northern England, on the border with Scotland.

cc

County in the northeast of England, on the North Sea.

cd

Weekly magazine established in 1828.

ce

English coin worth 2 shillings; first minted in 1849.

cf

Popular name for the Hospital of St. Mary of Bethlehem, England’s oldest psychiatric hospital.

cg

Machine for drying clothes.

ch

Floor covering made from the fiber of coconut husks.

ci

County on the southern coast of England.

cj

Hard work (slang).

ck

Well? (French).

cl

Dear (French).

cm

Partly or wholly underground structure used to store ice.

cn

Not so bad (slang).

co

Shiny.

cp

Tower of London, where the Crown Jewels are housed.

cq

Decorative gold necklace, traditionally restricted to certain government officials, composed of a string of small emblems shaped like the letter S.

cr

In the French fairy tale Le Petit Poucet (“Little Tom Thumb”), by Charles Perrault (1628-1703), the young hero deceives an ogre and steals a pair of magic boots that allow the wearer to cover 7 leagues (about 3 miles) in one stride.

cs

Famous stage magicians (see footnote on p. 10 to Five Children and It).

ct

Tawdry (archaic).

cu

Elizabeth I (1533-1603), the venerated British monarch who was also known for her stately self-display.

cv

Fool (slang) .

cw

Exclamation of surprise (slang).

cx

Breakfast (slang).

cy

Innkeeper or stableman at an inn.

cz

Type of colored lithograph finished to resemble an oil painting.

da

Covered in black polish derived from graphite.

db

Occupation.

dc

Little fellow (slang).

dd

All serene (slang)—that is, “so everyone’s happy.”

de

From “safe as houses,” a saying that refers to the stability of the real estate market.

df

Here you are (French) .

dg

Sleight of hand; a conjuring trick.

dh

Built for the Great Exhibition of 1851; see endnote 5 to Five Children and It.

di

Unbleached linen fabric originally from Holland.

dj

Coarse woolen cloth.

dk

Soiled (slang).

dl

Chimney (dialect) .

dm

Stolen goods.

dn

Money; a pound (slang).

do

That is, in the arms of Morpheus; in other words, asleep.

dp

Coins (slang).

dq

Rain barrel.

dr

Such a swell (slang).

ds

Roman goddess of the hunt and the moon. t Byname for Apollo, the Greek sun god associated with song and wisdom. ^‡ Greek god of wine and patron of agriculture and the theater.

dt

Roman god of commerce and the messenger of the gods.

du

Greek equivalent of Mercury.

dv

Half a moment (dialect).

dw

Monsieur Lecoq, the detective created by Émile Gaboriau (c.1832-1873); the character preceded by several decades his more famous counterpart, Sherlock Holmes, the creation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle ( 18 5 9-19 3 0) .

dx

Slave who performs a low bow accompanied by the placement of his right palm on his forehead. In The Arabian Nights, Mesrour is a henchman of the Khalif Haroun er Reshid.

dy

Mable means “entail”; the property has an assigned line of inheritance and can be sold or bequeathed only to a specified class of heirs.

dz

Heavens! (French).

ea

So! (French).

eb

Concentrated liquid extract of beef, marketed by German chemist Justus von Liebig (1803-1873) as an inexpensive source of meat nutrients.

ec

Bonnet with a projecting brim.

ed

Wooden frame on which towels are hung.

ee

Long stuffed pillows.

ef

Recipient of the highest award for gallantry granted to a member of the British and Commonwealth armed forces.

eg

Stock exchange term for South African mine shares.

eh

Sixpence (slang).

ei

Big pile of money (slang).

ej

Money (slang).

ek

Festive gathering (slang).

el

5 shillings (slang).

em

Twopence; that is, I couldn’t care less.

en

Street in London.

eo

Female oracles: The Pithia (named after the Python slain by Apollo) is the Oracle at Delphi; the Sibyl lived in caves, the most respected in Cumae near Naples.

ep

Mystery novel (1901), by E. F. Benson (1867-1940), set among the English aristocracy.

eq

Gooseberries (dialect).

er

Out of their senses (slang).

es

Roman god of gates and doors, beginnings and endings, and major transitions in individual and social life; the month of January is named for him.

et

Major plaza in central London commemorating the 1805 British naval victory over the French at the Battle of Trafalgar.

eu

Celestial Aphrodite; a particular vision of Aphrodite as the Greek goddess of spiritual as opposed to merely sensual love.

ev

Eros: Greek god of love; Psyche: princess in Roman mythology who marries Cupid (Eros); Hebe: Greek goddess of youth; Ganymede: in Greek myth, the Trojan prince who is carried off to become cupbearer of the gods. See also endnote 10.

ew

Greek goddess of marriage; wife and sister of Zeus.

ex

Ruler of the gods, and god of the sky and weather.

ey

Greece.

ez

Greek goddess of agriculture.

fa

Staff entwined with two snakes; traditionally associated with Hermes (Mercury).

fb

From vivandiere, a woman who accompanies troops to sell them supplies (French).

fc

Prince Albert (1819-1861), husband of Queen Victoria.

fd

Famed British gardener and hothouse designer who was the architect of the Crystal Palace (see endnote 5 to Five Children and It).

fe

Phrase that replaces other words when one derisively repeats a statement.

ff

Mercy! (French).