In Chapter 7 of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Magician’s Nephew, Jadis, the Queen of Queens and the Terror of Charn, stood “swaying, but with superb balance,” atop a hansom pulled by a galloping horse named Strawberry. There is plenty about this scene I found interesting, not the least of which is Jadis’s ability, at seven feet tall, to maintain her balance on a quickly moving box on wheels. The shorter the person, the lower the center of gravity. The lower the center of gravity, the easier it is to keep balance. It’s why professional gymnasts, jockeys, and bull riders are often smaller in stature.
I paused in my reading and looked over at Mikey on my left and Nicholas on the floor, half listening and playing with cars, and decided to keep it simple.
“Do you know what a hansom is?”
“No.”
“It’s like a carriage.”
“Okay.”
“Jadis was standing on a carriage going really fast.”
“Got it.”
A few paragraphs later, we were introduced to Strawberry’s owner, a cabby described as a “red-faced man in a bowler hat” intent on warning Jadis of the horse’s military lineage. (Fool. As if Jadis cares.)
“Do you know what a bowler hat is?”
“No.”
“It’s a hat with a round top.”
“Okay.”
I read on, shaking my head at the cabby, and then stopped. “We’ll research hansoms and bowler hats when we’re done with this chapter.”
Google images is the most important tool to the avid reader aside from the dictionary. Wikipedia is something altogether other. That site brings me great, great joy at least twice a week. One day I will share with the boys how, when I was their age, I spent minutes thumbing through encyclopedias and dictionaries looking for information they can access in seconds. I’m sure it will be as difficult to understand as minions (“like someone’s slave”), twopences (“what they used to call pennies”), and sal volatile (“a drink for nervous grown ups”).
We sat down after chapter 7 and did our research. It took seconds, naturally. An image search for hansoms produced pages of pictures, some that included cabbies wearing bowler hats. Convenient! Mikey went to his room satisfied and I read Nicholas three picture books. He doesn’t get much out of The Magician’s Nephew. Tickle Monster, on the other hand, is a tour de force.
I read to escape and I read to learn. When I can do both, I’m in heaven. A friend once admitted she skips anything she doesn’t understand. I can’t even imagine. Last year, when I read the Mark of the Lion series, I was swept down a rabbit hole of A.D. 100 Roman fashion. If I don’t know something, or if something doesn’t make sense, I can’t let it go.
Sometimes I wonder whom I am benefiting when I read books like The Chronicles of Narnia to the boys. Do I do it for them, or do I do it for me? Thoughts like this plague me, especially when I sit down at the computer after the boys are in bed and research the history of bowler hats.
Maybe it’s all for me.
Twenty minutes later I walked into Mikey’s room and found him reading a Paleo Joe book. I sat next to him in bed.
“Mikey, guess what?”
“What?”
“I did a little more reading on bowler hats.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah, and listen to this. They were made because back then, guys wore top hats. You know, top hats? They’re tall and flat…”
“I know those hats.”
“Okay, good. So the guys wore top hats, even when riding horses. But when they were riding horses where there were lots of trees, the low branches would knock the hats off their heads. So the boss of the guys riding horses when to a hat maker and asked him to invent a hat his employees could wear that wouldn’t get caught on branches. The round hat stays on better. The branches go right over top. ”
I said all this quickly and with exaggerated hand motions, excited about my latest piece of trivia. When I got to the part about branches, I swooshed my hand over my head in an arc, like a branch skimming the top of a round hat. At that moment, I could see Mikey following my train of thought, and seconds later an enormous grin split his face. He shook his head in complete understanding.
“Very cool, mom. I like that.”
Maybe it isn’t all for me.
//image source//
Beautiful Jules! I loved your William Morris series but I’m so glad to see posts like this back : )
Thank you, Marie!
Very Cool. I personally get stuck when anything mentions england in 1940s, rationing or the great depression. Recently I was trying to find things on the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) The one book the library had didn’t fit what I was looking for so I am going to have to try again. I love Wikipedia but sometimes that isn’t detailed enough for my enthusiasms. (I love spell check too or I would never got enthusiasms right)
Hah! I love spell check, too. I’m not a great speller.
I love that story!! It’s those details that bring stories to life! I’m always saying – we have to go look that up. When we read we sit in the living room with a giant old college websters and look up words – we write down internet searches and find them later. It is so awesome to be able to learn and convey to our kids how interesting learning can be. I need to read all the Narnia books again to my kids – although every year we read The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe (my personal fave – I’ve probably read it over 30 times (as a child, a teacher, and a parent). Right now we are reading Gone Away Lake by Elizabeth Enright. Fantastic read.
I really like the idea of a journal for future internet searches. Very smart! I’ll check out Gone Away Lake, too. I’ve never heard of it!
Oh my gosh, I envy you getting to read Gone-Away Lake and the sequel, Return to Gone-Away, for the first time! I started reading them at about the age of the young female protagonist (11). I think your boys will like them too because of her younger brother, Foster. They are fun, gentle books that are sweet without being cloying.
And if you’ve never seen the Moomin books by Tove Jansson, you are in for a treat. There is nothing else in the world like them.
This is just one of the reasons I love you so.
Books read and books on tape are still my best friends… pausing for clarity or definition, or to point out how it could fit into our lives.
I love you, too. :) I still remember when you left a comment years ago about how you started reading the Harry Potter series when your youngest was five years old.
GASP! I had no idea bowler hats were a useful invention . . . I always figured they were just another trend . . .
You know, I did not realize just how often I look things up until my hard drive crashed and I had no Google at my beckon call. It was painful. PAINFUL.
That said, I really should get an encyclopedia . . . so even if the power goes out, I can still learn an interesting tidbit or two . . .
I thought they were a trend, too!
This is one of the many reasons I love my smartphone and the built-in dictionary on my Kindle. I used to be a skip-overer – of words I didn’t know, mostly. Now, I just toggle the little cursor up to the word and up pops the definition! I didn’t realize just how much I use it until I was reading a hard copy book and was constantly wishing for the dictionary. I also have been using it a lot to find pronunciations of words. You know, those words you always read but never use because you’re not quite sure you’d say them correctly?
I find the smartphone to be so useful in similar ways, but mainly because it’s instant access to IMDB when I can’t let go of who so-and-so is in the TV show or movie on the television!
I have a Nook, but I don’t think it has a dictionary. I’ll have to check, because if it did? HEAVEN.
Really love this story of making it real for your kids. *You* are a great Mom! If only every parent would take the time to read and help open up their kids’ worlds.
Thank you, Alisa. :)
When I was younger (middle school and high school) I kept a little journal full of the words I came across while reading that I didn’t know. I’d then go and look them up later and add the definitions so I had my own little dictionary of sorts. I love that you go and look them up too.
Do you remember the movie Say Anything with John Cusack? The girl he is interested has a huge dictionary in her room, and every time she has to reference it, she high lights the word she looks up so she can keep track of every word she’s learned. I thought that was the most amazing thing ever.
Eveidently, what is good for the goose IS good for the gander.
You have me in tears once again. :o)
I read for the same reasons, except “to learn” is much higher on my list than “to escape.” And, my advice to you is to keep telling your boys about all the trivia you learn from your reading and your subsequent Wiki-research. You might think they’re not interested or not listening, but they are. You might feel ridiculous sometimes. They might laugh at you and TELL you you’re ridiculous sometimes. (Ask me how I know; my kids are 19 and 17!) But, even if your kids don’t remember the trivia, they WILL absorb this: moms can learn. Every. Day. You want your kids to know that!
Good point, Staci.
Wonderful story and so great that you are curious and take the time to research. The kid in you is still asking “why?” :) I read to my boys often but we don’t really “learn”. You’ve inspired me to take time to talk about what we’re reading. Love your blog, I look forward to it every morning!
Another beautiful example of why I love your blog.
I’m glad to hang on Mikey’s coat tails–whew, now I can cross “look off man’s round top hat” off my list of “cool things to know.” Seriously, that is an awesome piece of info that actually makes me smile to myself, as the new possessor of said knowledge.
Not every parent is blessed with at least one child who “gets” him/her. In my family, only one of us gets our dad. My daughter occasionally “gets” me. I rejoice in our differences (She = gypsy; Me = Elinor Dashwood), but it is a very cool when we have an actual soul meet.
I love when Mikey and Nichloas make an appearance, and duh of course Tickle Monster is a tour de force, EVERYONE knows that. Glad that I learrned something this a.m., now I don’t feel so guilty for reading a blog before breakfast;)
wonderful writing—and inspirational!
I have to admit that I tend to just absorb things rather than look them up – I hate having to stop while I’m reading! It has worked pretty well for me, but I don’t know how I know things – I guess repeated exposure to words in context lets you figure them out by osmosis. And sometimes I don’t know how to define a word – I just know how it *feels* and when it sounds wrong.
Glad you’re teaching the boys better habits!
That’s really cool about the bowler hat. I guess it was for me, too.
Of course for the boys! I can’t even count how many times my brother has read CoN to his kids. We will in a year or two for ours. Classics. Magician’s Nephew is my favorite; I love how it ties everything together.
I will admit not to skipping things I don’t understand, but any poetry/songs in a story, and overly long and boring fight/battle scenes.
Sorry if this is a repeat, I didn’t comment earlier, but the Game of Thrones is excellent. I don’t know how you couldn’t love them. The character development is amazing, and what makes the books. My husband introduced them to me. If /when you read them you HAVE to tell us what you think!!!!
I’m going to have to read Game of Thrones. Too many people of varied tastes in books have recommended it to me. I’m actually excited to start reading it.
Jules,
Not sure that Iv’e commented previously, but I just love your blog and wanted you to know. I think it’s awesome that you read to your boys.
Having just finished Cutting for Stone (excellent, by the way), there were many parts that involved surgery so I’m wondering how you would have handled a less than inimate knowledge of something like that? I truly am curious. I read it and understand some basics, but unless the reader is a surgeon one is left to their imagination.
Anyway, thanks for sharing your blog with your readers.
Marla in Columbus, OH
There was a story I read once (can’t recall now) with a lot of medical detail, so I went to layperson friendly websites like MayoClinic and WebMD–I don’t even know if that website is still in existence!–to get an idea of what was going on. It really did help, and it ended up being rather interesting.
Reading is a gift you give to your children that they will use for the rest of their lives. So is the idea that knowledge is valuable, even if knowing that particular thing seems to serve no purpose, and that a person is never too old to learn. I work with high school students in a large suburban school with a wide range of ethnicities and socio-economic backgrounds. I wish they could all have mothers like you.
Wow. Thank you, Burbhappy.
And this is how you perfectly combine grown up, mature story telling that is interesting and engaging for adults, with stories about parenting and children. This is how. This is why at the end of the day, you can’t abandon either. You are good at combining the two. I can read your post and walk away feeling just as smart as when I sat down to read. I always hate comments that seem to give a compliment while at the same time tear down others, but let’s be honest, some parenting bloggers out there have a hard time forming a full grammatically complete sentence. You have no problem with that my dear. No problem at all.
Hah! Thanks, Andrea…although I suspect you are still on a Hunter boot high. ;)
oh and p.s. Syd is really into all types of animals these days. I love Googling images of all the animals we’re interested in. Have you ever looked up a star nose mole? Do it. It will keep the boys glued to the screen for at least 20 minutes scrolling through all the crazy pictures of these wild looking animals
No! I’m off to do it right now!
“I read to escape and I read to learn. When I can do both, I�m in heaven.” You are the most eloquent writer! And how remarkable your boy is developing a sense of wonder about the world from his brilliant mama!
xo
Kate
Ah, yes. This is why I keep coming back to your blog. Perfectly stated. You’ve put into words exactly the way I feel about reading and the reader I want to be. I don’t want to skip over words or subjects I don’t understand; I want to dig and grasp and learn, even when the literal “school-ing” has passed.
Gorgeous post. Thank you.