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

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So little Maria gets kidnapped, and for days and days no one minds. No one is out looking for her. The police are informed, but they don't care either. "Oh, she'll turn up somewhere," they say. "Maria always lands on her feet. She'll probably join the gang, and teach them a thing or two." That phrase was the best part of this book for me. It stated immediate evil and drew me in, plus it kept me going when nothing else made sense. This John Masefield tale is a Christmas favourite for many and seems to have influenced the Narnia saga. I would also dare to say that it has some elements that may have influenced the Harry Potter stories as well such as the young hero, railway stations, snow-filled villages, hot drinks, and magic. The play’s director, Justin Audibert, said: “It’s a show that features trains, boats, planes, mythical creatures, a good and a very bad magician, and characters that magically turn into tiny versions of themselves, characters that transform into animals that fly through the air and swim in the sea. How exciting is that?

Dr Philip W Errington, a senior specialist at Peter Harrington Rare Books, leading antiquarian specialists, and an expert on Masefield, has been working with the RSC as a consultant on The Box of Delights, which will be performed at the RST between 31 October and 7 January. This classic of English children's literature, sadly overlooked by most on this side of the Atlantic, has just been reissued in a beautiful edition by the New York Review Children's Collection...Although The Box of Delights was first published in 1935, Masefield's intoxicating prose has lost none of its pull...in this wonderful tale of bravery and intrigue that deserves to become another staple of the holidays." --The San Francisco Chronicle Hely-Hutchinson: The BBC man who created the ultimate Christmas music". About the BBC. 13 December 2016. At the train station on his way home from school for the Christmas holiday, Kay Harker, the main character of The Box of Delights, encounters a mysterious Punch and Judy man named Cole Hawlings. The two hit if off so well that when Hawlings needs someone to hide and guard his box of delights he entrusts it to Kay. As Kay enjoys the powers given to him by the box - to move swiftly, to shrink, to travel through time - he also becomes aware of a strange series of disappearances around town. Not only have several local clergyman been "scrobbled" but some of Kay's houseguests, Kay's guardian Caroline Louisa, and Cole Hawlings himself have gone missing as well. Kay realizes all of these kidnappings must be attempts to gain access to the box of delights and in trying to protect it, he has a variety of thrilling adventures. It's mentioned many many times that several Rats really hate Kay. They say over and over that Kay "should have his head chopped off, because he is going to get a Dog for Christmas." And I kept waiting for that famous Dog to make an appearance. Why is so important that Kay is going to get a Dog for Christmas? How will this affect our plot? Why are the Rats so upset over this? And why is it always "Dog" with a capital D, and not just "dog"? What is so amazingly special about this Dog?

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But I just couldn't get into this book. Perhaps because I haven't read The Midnight Folk, thus coming in mid-story, as it were. But the plot seemed convoluted and disjointed, the characters seemed stilted, and the battle of good vs. evil (the staple of every really good children's books) seemed confused -- I never could sort out why the Wolves wanted to win or what they thought they might gain by winning. In 1930, due to the death of Robert Bridges, a new Poet Laureate was needed. King George V appointed Masefield, who remained in office until his death in 1967. Masefield took his appointment seriously and produced a large quantity of verse. Poems composed in his official capacity were sent to The Times. Masefield’s humility was shown by his inclusion of a stamped envelope with each submission so that his composition could be returned if it were found unacceptable for publication. Masefield has a way with a well-turned, memorable sentence: "And now, Master Harker, now that the Wolves are Running, perhaps you could do something to stop their Bite?" So far, so fairly traditional children's fantasy. But its Christmas setting in a snowbound corner of England (with particular resonances for this very festive season - all the grown-ups conspire to be snowed in elsewhere, leaving the children pretty much alone to enjoy their travails) and the dreamy, poetic language of author John Masefield come together to make it something of a seasonal classic that certainly bears repeat readings year after year.

Design will come from RSC Associate and Olivier award-winning Tom Piper, who most recently created the sets for the RSC’s productions of Hamnet in the Swan Theatre and The Tempest in the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Spring 2023. In 1895, Masefield returned to sea on a windjammer destined for New York City. However, the urge to become a writer and the hopelessness of life as a sailor overtook him, and in New York, he deserted ship. He lived as a vagrant for several months, before returning to New York City, where he was able to find work as an assistant to a bar keeper. 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.” Christmas Eve" ( Noch pered Rozhdestvom, 1832) by Nikolai Gogol (from Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka) For it is a cliché. We can probably let Lewis Carroll get away with it in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland as it’s a foundational example in children’s literature (and it becomes positively admirable in Through the Looking Glass when Carroll inverts it and Alice is told that she’s nothing but a thing in the Red King’s dream), but even there it’s an unsatisfactory rug-pull.I had high expectations for this book, and while I did enjoy it, I was a little disappointed. The plot has many gaping holes in it, the characters act in ways that don't really make sense, and I never did figure out WHY exactly the villains wanted to steal the Box of Delights. Eleven-year-old me would have been enchanted with all the period detail & would have giddily given it four stars. Old-old me says, eh, it's a three. a b Kingsley, Madeleine (17 November 1984), "A Box Full of Magic", Radio Times, pp.101–103 , retrieved 14 October 2017 The Box of Delights is a children's fantasy novel by John Masefield. It is a sequel to The Midnight Folk, and was first published in 1935. The central character is Kay Harker who, on returning from boarding school, finds himself mixed up in a battle to possess a magical box, which allows the owner to go small (shrink) and go swift (fly), experience magical wonders contained within the box and go into the past. 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).

He was the one that suffered because ultimately they never made the films. The one that really hurts is that Richard Burton was going to be in a filmed version of Masefield’s play Good Friday. If Richard Burton had been in a biblical play that was shown every Easter, you would still know about it, but that play has just been forgotten.” 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. This was a funny read, funny as in there is more kinds of magic in this book than any other I've read - Masefield seems to have done a sort of tossed salad of time travel, talking animals, a box that gives special powers to it's bearer(powers that are unplumbed, it might do a lot more than what is mentioned) - which makes for a colorful jumble of a book. At times it seemed totally haphazard, but not in an unpleasant way. I suspect that it gets better and more beloved after a rereading, both for it's quirks and because one knows what to expect and can appreciate the details.

Afterword

Mention is made of a "Boy" who apparently can tell the future. Who is this Boy? Where did he come from? Why is he working for, or in the clutches of, Abner? Is he there against his will? Is he a normal boy with magical abilities, or is he a magical fairy boy, or is he part of a mystical priesthood of fortune tellers? Who is this person? We don't KNOW! We will never know. Because this plot is crap and it doesn't explain anything. Although not hugely familiar with John Mansfield’s 1935 children’s book, The Box of Delights, and only having a vague memory of the 1984 TV series adaptation, we knew enough of the story as an adventure into a world of magicians and time travel to expect to be blown away by the mystery and illusion of Piers Torday’s adaptation (which had previously run at the atmospheric Wilton’s Music Hall in East London) at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford upon Avon. Can there be a more Christmassy book, this side of old Ebenezer's adventures with his trio of spirits, than The Box of Delights by John Masefield? Why does the evil Abner want the Box of Delights? He sure goes to a lot of trouble to get it, but why? We never find out. He steals a lot of jewels, kidnaps a lot of people, and all supposedly to get the Box of Delights. But then he seems content to run off to an island with his jewels, without the Box. Why was the Box so central to his plans if he already had the jewels and his island all prepared? This question is never answered satisfactorily.