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by Michele Fry, Scholar's Blog
Clockwork
Philip Pullman's Clockwork is a short but very compelling tale about a German town named Glockenheim where the
residents set great store by their clock-making tradition: each time an apprentice becomes master of his craft, he
commemorates the occasion by adding a new figure to the town's great clock. On the eve of one such celebration, a sinister
train of events is set in motion when the local novelist Fritz entertains the villagers with his most recent work: the tale
of Prince Florian, the son of the deceased local ruler, whose fate is linked to a brilliant clockmaker named Dr. Kalmenius.
However Fritz's narrative is interrupted by the arrival of a cloaked man who appears to have sprung straight from the pages
of his story: the aforementioned enigmatic Dr. Kalmenius of Schatzberg, who has come—or so it appears—to help the
young apprentice clockmaker Karl to achieve an unearned triumph at the next day's ceremonies. Meanwhile, poor Prince
Florian, whose time has nearly run out, stumbles into Glockenheim and finds the innkeeper's little daughter, Gretl, who is
the one person there who is capable of restoring true life to the mechanical prince.
Each character in this tale gets his or her just deserts with a fairy-tale ending that pays fitting and playful tribute to
the story's twin themes: "So they both lived happily ever after" and "that was how they all wound up." This book is both
about clockwork and about storytelling and offers an interesting point of view about the art of storytelling:
"For every once upon a time there must be a story to follow, because if a story doesn't, something else will, and it might
not be as harmless as a story." (p. 76)
I Was a Rat!
Philip Pullman's I Was A Rat! is a delightful take-off on the fairytale, Cinderella, interspersed with hilarious
articles from "The Daily Scourge" newspaper. Their satiric spin on the media will be appreciated by young and old: "As for
the rise in juvenile crime, it's easy. The kids are doing it, aren't they? Then there's no need to look any further.
BLAME THE KIDS!!!"
If you've ever wondered what happened to the creatures that were transformed into Cinderella's footmen and page, then this
story will amuse and entertain you. One little lad who was having too much fun sliding down banisters with the page boys
from the palace, missed Cinderella's coach back home. He finally wends his way through the town to the house of a childless
couple called Bob and Joan (a cobbler and washerwoman), where he answers their questions with the phrase "I was a rat!"
They name him Roger for the son they never had and he proceeds to stumble through a series of misadventures, whilst eating
pencils, tassels and miscellaneous other (usually inedible) items. There is a quality of innocence and ignorance to this
rat-boy, who trusts a little too easily. He gets into trouble at school, and with the Philosopher Royal and his cat
Bluebottle, he's put in a freak show, and then falls in with a gang of boy thieves. When he tries to go back to being a
rat, people fear the "Monster of the Sewers," as the Daily Scourge dubs him, and it seems that Roger might end up being
"Sterminated."
Before that fate can befall him, however, Cinderella, who used to be Mary Jane and is now the lovely Princess Aurelia, gets
to meet up again with Roger, the former rat, and they commiserate about their situations, which aren't quite as either one
of them anticipated. But as Mary Jane concludes "I don't think it's what you are that matters. I think it's what you do."
Books Reviewed:
Clockwork: Or All Wound Up. Scholastic Paperbacks; Reprint edition, 1998.
ISBN: 0-5901-2998-8.
I Was a Rat!, illustrated by Kevin Hawkes. Yearling; Reprint edition, 2002.
ISBN: 0-4404-1661-2.
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