Raindrops on Roses (Part Three) -- The Phantom Tollbooth

(Trailer? Wait…)

Okay, so I’m obviously not going to talk about a movie I haven’t seen, just the book it’s based on. And what it’s based on was supposed to be a children’s book about cities, or so the story goes. But Norton Juster got sidetracked, and instead wrote The Phantom Tollbooth, a children’s book about, well…

So we’re introduced to Milo, an unsatisfied young boy (if that’s even possible for a boy his age), who finds himself in possession of a model tollbooth. When he goes through it, he finds himself in the Kingdom of Wisdom. One thing leads to another and suddenly he’s on a quest to rescue Princesses Rhyme and Reason from the Castle in the Air.

The book’s twenty chapters are largely episodic. In each, Milo meets someone new, and after they talk for a bit, they either give Milo a gift, are outwitted by Milo, or both, with such wonderful characters as King Azaz the unabridged, or the Tallest Dwarf and the Smallest Giant, and I still use Chroma’s chapter as a reference to describe sunrises.

I called this “a children’s book for adults” last week because there’s no way the average twelve-year-old understands all of the wordplay hidden within the book. For example, just outside the Mountains of Ignorance, Milo and his friends meet the Everpresent Wordsnatcher, a bird who twists words around (“I didn’t mean--” “Of course you’re mean. Anyone who’d spend a night that didn’t belong to him is very mean.”) He’s not from Ignorance, though. He’s from a far away place called Context, and spends as much time as possible away from it.

I didn’t get that joke at age twelve. That’s why I think this book is worth reading (or rereading, as it were). There are a lot of details that are easily missed the first time around, and even on the fifth read-through, you’re still likely to find something new.

-F