Below you will find pages that utilize the taxonomy term “Susan Cooper”
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Review: King of Shadows
I love it when reading a book, I learn a new word. Thank you [a:Susan Cooper|7308|Susan Cooper|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1379606336p2/7308.jpg] for introducing me to “thribbling” which is another word for improvising - used in this context for actors performing [b:A Midsummer Night’s Dream|1622|A Midsummer Night’s Dream|William Shakespeare|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1327874534l/1622.SY75.jpg|894834], who can’t remember their exact lines.
Cooper immerses the reader in Elizabethan London - you can hear the noise, feel the cobblestones and smell the stink of unwashed bodies, rotting garbage and effluent in the streets. You share young Nat Field’s confusion, when he wakes to find himself in a strange bed, and discovers that he has travelled back in time to 1599, where he is an actor in the newly erected Globe Theatre, working beside William Shakespeare.
How Nat copes with this situation, and why he finds himself transported in time, makes for a thrilling read. Details of theatre life and the workings of the Globe Theatre in particular, are fascinating. This is an excellent introduction to Shakespeare, making him a living, breathing man who takes Nat under his wing. It would be a lot of fun to watch a performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream after reading this book - it would make the reader feel like they have secret, insider knowledge about the background of this Shakespeare comedy.
Highly recommended for readers aged 10 years and older.
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As an adult reading this book, I found Will’s acceptance of his destiny especially moving as it means also accepting the end of his childhood innocence and freedom.
In the long tradition of wise teachers (think Merlin, Dumbledore, Gandalf) Will is mentored by Merriman Lyon, who helps him come to terms with his new powers, “It is a burden. Make no mistake about that. Any great gift of power or talent is a burden, and this more than any, and you will often long to be free of it. But there is nothing to be done.”
The story is set at Christmas time, and the contrast between the comforting domesticity of Christmas traditions and the ever increasing power of the Dark makes the looming threat to Will’s world all the more menacing. It’s easy to forget that Will is only a child, longing to return to the safety of his family.
Not only does Cooper reference British lore and myth, she’s also not afraid to poke fun at the English ability to ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’. When Will notices that the village folk seem to be positively ‘bubbling’ when things are absolutely awful, Merriman says “They are English” and Will’s father rejoins “Quite right. Splendid in adversity, tedious when safe.”
I am so glad I have revisited this classic novel and I strongly recommend reading it as an adult because, as Robert Macfarlane says in his introduction for the 2019 Puffin reprint, ‘these are not books for children - they are books for people’.
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Review: The Dark is Rising (The Dark is Rising, #2)
‘This night will be bad…and tomorrow will be beyond imagining.’
After listening to a Backlisted podcast discussing The Dark is Rising I felt impelled to revisit this children’s classic. I was 13 when it was published, so the perfect age to appreciate its power. This is not a jolly-hockey-style children’s fantasy. Cooper mines the rich vein of Britain’s myths and legends, and the book is imbued with a dark menace.
On the eve of his eleventh birthday, Will Stanton’s world is turned upside down when he discovers that he is, in fact, the Sign-Seeker, last of the immortal Old Ones, destined to battle the powers of evil that trouble the land. There is an inevitability to this burden, and Will accepts it with stoicism:
‘He accepted everything that came into his mind, without thought or question, as if he were moving through a dream. But a deeper part of him knew that he was not dreaming. He was crystal-clear awake, in a Midwinter Day that had been waiting for him to wake into it since the day he had been born, and, he somehow knew, for centuries before that.’
As an adult reading this book, I found Will’s acceptance of his destiny especially moving as it means also accepting the end of his childhood innocence and freedom.
In the long tradition of wise teachers (think Merlin, Dumbledore, Gandalf) Will is mentored by Merriman Lyon, who helps him come to terms with his new powers, “It is a burden. Make no mistake about that. Any great gift of power or talent is a burden, and this more than any, and you will often long to be free of it. But there is nothing to be done.”
The story is set at Christmas time, and the contrast between the comforting domesticity of Christmas traditions and the ever increasing power of the Dark makes the looming threat to Will’s world all the more menacing. It’s easy to forget that Will is only a child, longing to return to the safety of his family.
‘On Christmas night, Will always slept with [his brother] James. There was something about Christmas Eve, they both felt, that demanded company; one needed somebody to whisper to, during the warm beautiful dream-taut moments between hanging the empty stocking at the end of the bed, and dropping into the cosy oblivion that would flower into the marvel of Christmas morning.’
Not only does Cooper reference British lore and myth, she’s also not afraid to poke fun at the English ability to ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’. When Will notices that the village folk seem to be positively ‘bubbling’ when things are absolutely awful, Merriman says “They are English” and Will’s father rejoins “Quite right. Splendid in adversity, tedious when safe.”
I am so glad I have revisited this classic novel and I strongly recommend reading it as an adult because, as Robert Macfarlane says in his introduction for the 2019 Puffin reprint, ‘these are not books for children - they are books for people’.