The Box of Delights: Or When the Wolves Were Running (Kay Harker)

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The ending also reframes the prim middle-classness of it all. At first it seems outrageous that Kay Harker is entrusted with the Box of Delights for no other reason than he is a well spoken, privately educated boy and therefore obviously the protagonist. But once you discover that this is all his dream, it makes sense. The way that the great and secret powers of the world rush to his aid, that all animals and supernatural beings adore him, that all of history is his playground, becomes almost satire, almost a sneer at books that do not have the honesty to own themselves as wish-fulfilment. When Masefield was 23, he met his future wife, Constance Crommelin, who was 35. Educated in classics and English Literature, and a mathematics teacher, Constance was a perfect match for Masefield despite the difference in age. The couple had two children (Judith, born in 1904, and Lewis, in 1910). What a difference a few decades (and the full text) make! I’m so glad I’ve returned to this amazing story. I see it as a bridge between George MacDonald and C. S. Lewis, bringing in elements of almost every story before and after it. It is a continuous story, but it’s also a series of episodes that sometimes veer into the bizarre. For example, most of the town is “scrobbled” by a gang, and no one, including the police, seems to care very much, even about small children being whisked away for days at a time. Kay seems to have total freedom to do anything he likes, which sometimes involves adventures that could be extremely perilous. For me, though, all of this works together in a dreamy story that invites all kinds of symbolic interpretation but will never reveal whether any particular interpretation is intended. I wouldn’t want it to make any more logical sense than it does—though I see that this mysterious, mystical aspect of it was surely too much for my elementary-school understanding. I only wish I’d rediscovered it in time to read it to my kids. We would have had a grand time laughing and puzzling through it together. So the children are all outside, playing in the snow, making a lopsided snowman, when the adults call for them to come in. "You'll catch your death of cold, come inside!" The girls grumble, but go inside to put on dry clothes, and have a hot cocoa, and sit by the toasty fire. The boys say, "Too many rules around here, let's go exploring." and they run off to have adventures in the snow for hours and hours. Riding the train home for the Christmas holidays, prep school boy Kay Harker meets Punch and Judy man Cole Hawlings. Gnomically warning him that “the wolves are running”, Hawlings entrusts Kay with the eponymous Box of Delights. Kay must guard the Box from the gangster wizard Abner Brown and his gang (who are all disguised as vicars). Fortunately the Box allows him to “go small’ and “go swift” as well as travel in time, enabling Kay to enlist the help of figures from history and folklore, fairies, and a host of talking fauna.

Describing Masefield’s work as “magnificent”, he said: “It warrants a revival. The RSC putting on the play is a great thing … a wonderful Christmas story.” Stylistically it's dated - with Enid Blyton-y dialogue. The magic seems barely thought out and apart from a few good moments at the start is pretty mundane. The writing of the action ending is really bad and you barely get any sense of real geography or concrete quality to it. The deus ex machina has nothing to do with the main story or plot and the boy hero is basically a witness to events that do not require any action on his part. Also, The way the police and grown ups behave in response to the children going missing is totally unbelievable and though you might get away with it once - afterall grownups in kids books are always a little clueless - The fact everyone reacts this way as multiple characters are kidnapped in suspicious circumstances starts to stretch my credulity to the limit. Tis the night before Christmas and little Kay shall become as small and as fast as a bird! and he shall encounter wolves & wizards & witches & thieves! and he shall visit strange places and he shall enter the past and he shall protect his precious Box of Delights and he shall visit a friendly mouse! and he will deal with all of this with a certain nonchalance because it's not like he hasn't done this sort of thing before!The characters only spoke when it was necessary for them to move the disjointed plot along (although, one could argue that this was because of the ending), yet it seems Masefield had fun with word play, making the Police Captain and Maria go on longer than needed just for fun. This is a curious mixture of reality and fantasy: we have gangsters, magic, time travel. At times it was difficult to know just what was imagery and what was fantasy. It was interesting that, unlike in a lot of books, here we get children operating both on their own and with adults. I enjoyed the old-style British reality, such as the interactions with the police. I also liked the integration of religion into the essence of the book. Masefield, a former poet laureate, gave each chapter a rhyming couplet and interspersed the story with verse; his characters are “scrobbled” by kidnappers and danger is summoned by the haunting warning: “The wolves are running”. Piers Torday’s adaptation retains much of the idiosyncratic language, adds comedy to the menace, features plenty of carolling (including a wonderful set piece to open the second half) and gives Kay a more clearcut mission. It also uses an affecting modern-day framing device with Kay and his grandson, visiting for Christmas after his parents’ separation, underlining the novel’s view of the fragile preciousness of family. Torday also solves the problem of feeling deflated by the novel’s ending as he immediately establishes a dream world. Twas the Night Before Christmas: Edited by Santa Claus for the Benefit of Children of the 21st Century" (2012) being Pamela McColl "smoke-free" edit of Clement Clarke Moore's poem

Then there's Kay. People offer Kay money, mysterious and fabulous gifts, opportunities to time travel and experience magical events, and speak of him and to him as though he is the King of England. No reason is given for this. He does not appear to be nobility, particularly smart, or particularly good looking. He lives in a manor house, has an endless supply of funds, and his only guardian is "the beautiful Caroline Louisa." Where are his parents? Who is Caroline Louisa? At first I thought she was his sister, but she's more like a nanny, I guess. He's apparently so wonderful that all he needs in the way of guardianship is a beautiful young woman to cater to his every whim. John Masefield, poet laureate of the U.K. from 1930 till his death in 1967, is perhaps best known for his poem “Sea Fever” (“I must go down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky”). He was also, however, one of the finest and most influential writers of children’s books. I first read The Box of Delights in Kenya, when I was about ten. When I went to the States for college, I was horrified to find that no one had heard of it, and that the only available edition had been butchered by an abridger (who had somehow managed to trim out all the most marvelous and magical parts). Happily, New York Review Books recently came out with unabridged versions of both The Box of Delights and its precursor, The Midnight Folk. It now seems to be finding some sort of readership in the U.S. Young Kay still drove me crazy and I never knew when he was speaking to others or muttering to himself. This edition thankfully explains some of those issues by explaining that Masefield's original manuscript had never been corrected until now, which explains my original childhood bias. Long story short, the first publication of this book left several passages out, which the NYR edition fixes.When Kay comes home for the holidays, he meets a strange man who warns him, "The Wolves are running," and entrusts him with a magical Box to keep safe. The evil Abner Brown is after the box with his gang of kidnappers and cutthroats, and when people begin disappearing in Kay's town, Kay must use the Box to travel into the Past to save his friends. A design drawing of the scene where the character of Peter becomes a trout and dives and swims through a pool. Photograph: Tom Piper/RSC