In infant school, aged six, I had a Thorfinn moment. My teacher had made me pencil monitor, but I had paid scant attention. So next day when work was being allocated my body was in the classroom, but my mind was in deep space, leading star fighters in combat with an alien battle cruiser, a huge ship heavily armed with powerful death rays..Then my reverie was interrupted by a little girl who very kindly reminded me that it was my job to give out the pencils. I wandered around a bit, not knowing where they were, then the girl took pity on me. "You don't want to be pencil monitor, do you?" she asked. I said that I didn't, so she rushed to Miss McLeish, and told her that I didn't want the job and asked could she have it. So the girl became pencil monitor and I returned to commanding Star Fleet.
"He's a dreamer!" Miss McLeish told my mother. Thus when I encountered the fictional character of Thorfinn Ragnarson, who dreams through his lessons and prefers the fictional world to the real one there was an instinctive sympathy. Early in the book Thorfinn is having a history lesson about Norse expeditions through Russia, and his teacher despairs that he is looking out of the window and taking nothing in.But his mind is alert and using the lesson to make an imaginary world in which he is a participant, constructing a story out of what the teacher is saying. But he gets into trouble nonetheless.
The book begins with the line, "Of all the lazy and most useless boys ever to attend Norday school, the laziest and most useless was Thorfinn Ragnarson" No one expects anything of his career, and his father doubts that he will have much success and worries what will become of him. Everyone thinks that he is useless, though the women say that he is a nice boy. Thorfinn progresses through life,enduring the miseries of prisoner of war status in World War Two,where in his confinement he turns to writing, where his imagination is allowed to blossom and he finally finds what he can do. The book is a cry from the heart for the education system to recognize the sensitive and imaginative child and refrain from imposing a pre-determined career pattern on him/her.
Thorfinn eventually returns to the now deserted island of Norday, wed now to the dreamy and beautiful young woman who seemed to be out of his reach, and he commits himself to the work of writing the ultimate poem. He has come full circle. Not only has he returned to Norday, but to the self sufficient lifestyle of his ancestors.
Comments
And you have done well academically!
Aged five or six I used to creep out of bed and look out at the night sky on warm, clear nights, in awe and dreaming of flying to the stars. In a garden opposite I used to see a girl who read at the window by torchlight. We were each using the night in different ways to feed different dreams. I have spoken to her but once, when her niece married my younger brother.
Each person has unique dreams and aspirations. I too spent many hours peering out of school windows. But I those hours I too was mentally active.
I like that story Frank.
I did a few months working in a school whose staff room was too smoke filled for me to tolerate, so at lunch sat in my room and listened to my music. Then two children asked me could they sit there in lunch, and they were followed by a few more. Eventually there was a little group of children too sensitive for the yard, who saw my room as a refuge.
This sounds like a book I would enjoy reading. I very much agree that sensitive boys, and those who don't fit the norm of what public education seeks out, are often left behind and under appreciated. I have three sons. None of them were very good at sports, and even though they played on teams occasionally, it didn't last long. It wasn't their "thing". They didn't get very good grades in school either, and I always wished there had been something for them to work towards that interested them. I also worked in the public school system (in the US) and felt sorry for the many boys I met who also felt a disconnect and simply didn't want to be there. My children are very spaced out in age with 20 years difference between the oldest and youngest, and my youngest son attended a high school that offered a video arts program and modern music classes that included his rock type music where he could play his guitar and compose music! So maybe that is a sign that, some schools at least, are branching out to offer more to the kids who are searching for a place where they can thrive.