Edith Nesbit has been a
landmark ever since I read Five children and it exactly forty
years ago. I didn't read it as a child, because it wasn't available;
I read it as a scholar of children's literature, and of fantasy in
particular. I bow to Lewis Carroll and George Macdonald, but all
children's fantasy goes back to Nesbit. Her magic code (my coinage,
which eventually became the title of my PhD thesis) is as central for
fantasy as Asimov's three laws of robotics for science fiction.
I wrote my second academic
article, in Russian, on Nesbit in 1979, and it was later revised and
published in English in the inaugural issue of Marvels & Tales
in 1987. Nesbit's fantasy novels were key texts in my PhD. I taught
Five children and it in every course I could squeeze it into.
I don't worship authors,
and I have never been particularly interested in Nesbit as a person,
but last year I happened to visit her grave.
I am sceptical of sequels
and prequels, especially written by someone else. (I have written an
infuriated essay on so-called sequels to Winnie-the-Pooh, The Wind
in the Willows and Anne of Green Gables). But if done
well, they can be wonderful. Jacqueline Wilson's Four children and it was a joy to read.
Some days ago I stumbled
upon Kate Saunder's Five children on the Western front. I must
admit that I had not read anything by this author, but I was
intrigued by the title (and it acknowledged “inspired by...”).
It was, obviously, very
different from Wilson's witty and hilarious book, a playful travesty
rather than a proper sequel. I could not help comparing Five
children on the Western front with A.S. Byatt's The Children's
Book, which is one long, idyllic prologue to the Great War where
all title characters die. The mother is of course modelled on Nesbit.
Five children on the Western front
starts with a glimpse of the idyll, portrayed in Nesbit's trilogy,
and moves on quickly to the War, with a prolepsis suggesting that two
boys of the adventurous five, whom Nesbit calls exceptionally lucky
children, will not make it. The reader's privileged knowledge over
the character is a tremendously attractive feature for me, as a
professional as well as pleasure reader. It makes my guts turn. There
they are, the five children – actually six, with an additional
sister, cleverly called Edie, short for Edith. There they are, once
again exceptionally lucky to meet their old friend the Psammead, on a
warm and sunny autumn day of 1914. Cyril is an officer, about to be
dispatched to France. Everybody knows that the war will be short,
maybe a couple of weeks. If the Psammead knows otherwise he keeps it
for himself.
It is a powerful book. It
is perfectly stylised: just enough “beastly” and “A1 brick”
to feel Nesbit-y without overdoing it. The characters are developed
in a remarkably believable and tactful way, from their
never-wishing-to-grow-up pastoral to inevitably-growing-up in the
shadow of war. I would say, Nesbit couldn't have done it better
herself. She most probably couldn't have. The Great War had this
effect on writers: they hid in the Hundred Acre Wood with Just
William and Swallows and Amazons. But from a hundred years'
perspective, it feels profound: all early twentieth-century
children's literature children would die in the Great War. I don't
believe literary characters have a life outside the text, but this
book makes me change my mind.
I have now lived in the UK
almost seven years, and even before the centenary last year I had
been deeply moved by the Great War indelible trauma. The collective
memory doesn't shout: “Hooray, we won the war”, as many other
nations do. Instead, it soberly and respectfully mourns its children.
