The Secret Garden

1911, 1978 Dell Yearling edition
Frances Hodgson Burnett
"Decorations" by Tasha Tudor
The Secret Garden
Bought new for $1.50
Very tattered paperback
B+

I don't know how many times I've read this book since I was 10, but I still fall under its spell.  On the surface, it's about a couple bratty kids who learn to garden, but it's so much more than that.  Burnett is able to make everything seem magical, particularly the robin who guides Mary, not just to the garden but to her better self.  The story starts with Mary in India and for the most part stays with her, but then her cousin Colin, who has a further way to go physically and emotionally, takes over.  And the last chapter belongs to his father, her uncle, who realises he should stop neglecting his son, even if his wife did die in childbirth.

I didn't quite get that death when I was young.  The branch broke, she had a baby, and she died.  I didn't get that she fell to the ground when she was very pregnant.  Her death is tragic, but her husband and son make it even more so, by giving up on life.  She's supposed to have been young, beautiful, and kind, so her death is sad, while Mary's mother is young, beautiful, and self-centred, so we're not supposed to care about her death.

There are some other disquieting things about the book, like its attitude towards the "blacks" of India:  strange and superstitious, yet still our "brothers."  The part about Bess Fettleworth causing her drunken husband to beat her by calling him a drunken brute, that bothered me even as a child.

Still, the book's heart is in the right place.  It shows that everyone can be redeemed.  Of course, some of the most enjoyable parts are while Mary and Colin are still bratty, especially their big fight in the middle of the night.  In fact, Colin remains "a young Rajah," and no one really objects, reminding me of the introduction to Howards End, describing how "young Charles Wilcox insults and browbeats an elderly station porter, and Forster notices that the porter gazes after the young snot admiringly."  Colin will remain a young snot, but at least he'll be healthier and a bit more empathetic.

Colin is one of the mysteries of Misselthwaite Manor, and it's interesting that Burnett sometimes compares his sobs to the "wuthering" of the wind.  Like Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre, this is set in Yorkshire, but a much sunnier Yorkshire, literally and figuratively.  Mr. Craven keeps a frail son locked away, rather than a mad wife like Mrs. Rochester.  Dickon is like Pan, rather than the satanic Heathcliff.  Mary Lennox is passionately angry, like fellow orphan Jane Eyre at ten, but much less sympathetic, at least at first.

Tasha Tudor's illustrations at the beginning of each chapter are almost perfect.  They show how Mary, and to a lesser degree Colin, become healthier and happier.  They also capture the robin's charm.  The decoration for the chapter called "Dickon" doesn't quite live up to the text, partly because his rusty hair is covered up by a hat.  The illustration of Mary first taking Dickon to the garden is much better.

Since I was the same age as Mary when I first read the story, and much like her in personality (shy and sour, with a dead mother), I shipped her with Dickon, who was much nicer than any boy I knew in real life, and most of the boys in fiction.  I never considered the class difference, or the fact that by the time they grew up, he'd have possibly died in World War I.

Which brings me to the 1987 TV-movie.  I was excited about a new adaptation of one of my favorite children's stories, and I was still only 19.  As I recall, it was OK, but then came the ending, where Dickon was dead in the war, and Mary and Colin got together.  They weren't related in this version, but it still bugged me a lot.  In the book, Mary adored Dickon, and he seemed charmed by her.  Amusingly, Adult Colin was played by his namesake, Colin Firth, whom I'd never heard of at the time.