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Reviewed by Barry D. Gilfry © 2003
Wild Child Publishing.com © 2003
It was toward the end of my five-year stay in England, the year being 1971, when I saw it, an award-winning made-for-TV movie that affected me like no other, a black and white film set in the dismal east-coast marshes of Essex in the late 1930s. There were only two characters, really: a misshapen, scraggly, dark-haired man who had taken up residence in an abandoned lighthouse from whence the sea had retreated, and a smudgy-faced waif from the nearby Saxon oyster-fishing hamlet of Wickaeldroth. Perhaps it was my own feeling of sadness at leaving my home in the fens of East Anglia that resonated with the desolate and bleak landscape of that film and the lonely lives of the outcasts portrayed therein, but I never forgot that story.
Years later, in my fruitless search for that precious gem of cinematic excellence, I happened upon some biographical material on its author, Mr. Paul Gallico. Apparently, even though he had written the screenplay for the movie, he felt strongly that the story he wanted to convey was in the book. Thus, he stipulated in his will that the movie was never to be shown again.
This discovery left me no choice: I bought the book from Amazon.com ($10.50 plus shipping, hardcover). When it arrived five days later, I marveled at the compact packaging. Surely, I thought, such a big book must have been really crammed into this miniscule delivery box! I was wrong.
In a time when we daily encounter books by Anne Rice, Robert McCammon and Stephen King which can ramble on for a thousand pages or more, I was surprised to find that the book upon which that monumental movie had been based was no more than a short story, hard-bound in book form, a curiosity in today’s literary market. I held it in my hands as if it were the egg of some rare bird, knowing full well the precious treasure that lay within.
That evening, ensconced under fresh bed covers, I turned on my reading light and devoured the five thousand words which span a mere 58 pages. Was I disappointed? Not in the least. The reading of this marvelous story made the same impression upon me as the movie had done over thirty years before. Prepared now with a box of Kleenex in my lap alongside the book, I began reading again, this time savouring every word, the saying good things come in small packages in the back of my mind.
Descriptions in this story are concise, conversation and characterization succinct. As in all great short stories, this one gains its majesty from strength, not length, and is written with an economy that defies the removal of even one word.
We learn that Mr. Rhayader, a painter, has come to this desolate lighthouse to escape pity and the uncomfortable reactions that his physical deformities seem to engender. At 27 years of age, he buys the lighthouse and the land around it to be his haven from commerce with others, and creates a small artist’s studio and a sanctuary for wounded fowl.
One day, he detects a small form approaching on the sea wall. His visitor is a young girl from the nearby village, and as she draws near, he sees that she carries a bird which has been shot by the fowlers in a nearby marsh.
I said earlier that there are only two characters of any import in this story, but there is indeed a third if we count the wayward Canadian snow goose who has miraculously survived a terrible storm. Blown nearly three thousand miles off her migratory course, upon her weary approach to the marshes, she is greeted by a shot from a hunter’s gun.
Rhayader tells the apprehensive girl, Frith, that this bird comes all the way from Canada, so he calls the snow goose La Princesse Perdue, the lost princess. Frith begins to visit the recovering bird regularly, but once it has healed and flies off in response to its migratory instinct, her visits cease. It is then with even greater loneliness and sadness that Rhayader awaits the fall, which signals the return of the snow goose and his curious female visitor. Meanwhile, he recedes again into his sequestered life, only seeing the world twice a month when he deftly sails his boat to the village of Chelmbury for supplies.
Seasons pass and Frith grows to be a young woman, La Princesse Perdue returns every fall, and war continues to scar the face of Europe. One day, the government calls upon every able-bodied man on the east coast of England who owns a tug, a fishing boat or a power-launch, to sail to Dunkirk and save an army of British soldiers who are trapped on the beach, awaiting destruction at the hands of the advancing German army. When Frith comes to visit, she finds Rhayader in his boat, ready to sail across the channel to do what he can to help, a gleam in his eye at the challenge that awaits him. It is at this point that Frith becomes aware of the feelings that have grown in her heart for this man, and she offers to go with him.
To say much more about this magical story would be to give it away, and that would be unfair to you, the potential reader. Also, I don’t think a review should exceed the actual length of the book being reviewed! Suffice it to say that you will not be disappointed with this marvelous story, nor with the quality of this hardbound edition, which represents the sixtieth printing of this literary gem.
Recommended reading for children from five to one hundred and five. Enjoy!
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Reviewer’s Note: June 2, 2003, marked the 63rd anniversary of the evacuation at Dunkirk, wherein 338,000 stranded men were shuttled to safety by a flotilla of rag-tag vessels that would have been an embarrassment to McHale’s Navy.
To find out more about it, click on: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/753697.stm
To purchase The Snow Goose, click on:
this link for hardback
and this link for paperback.
You can read about the movie here. |
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