Enter the Librarian, a review by Josh HanagarneThe Wind in the Willows by Kenneth GrahameDid you kno

Enter the Librarian, a review by Josh HanagarneThe Wind in the Willows by Kenneth GrahameDid you know that a toad can be sentenced to prison for twenty one years for stealing an automobile? If you have read Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows, the answer is definitely yes. But enough about toad-based jurisprudence.I’m writing this while trying not to watch people on the street outside, going about their days off in the sun and splendor. And I’m thinking of The Mole from Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows, and I’m thinking that The Mole gets it:“After all, the best part of a holiday is perhaps not so much to be resting yourself, as to see all the other fellows busy working.”But I’m the chump inside, and I feel The Mole laughing at me. Well, perhaps I’m not as miserable as I let on. I’ve been revisiting books that simply feel like summer, and The Wind in the Willows is the pinnacle. It is a ray of soporific sunshine in print if there has ever been one.The book contain the adventures of Ratty, Mole, Mr. Toad, Otter, the Badger, and a few other peripheral animals. It is impossible to make it sound as hypnotic and entrancing as it is, but there’s a line early on that sums it up best:By the side of the river he [The Mole] trotted as one trots, when very small, by the side of a man who holds one spell-bound by exciting stories.For me, The Wind in the Willows is that river. Turning the pages, I trot along beside it. It makes me want to take a nap. It reminds me of summer sleepovers. Of being annoyed with friends and going on picnics. Of feeling the sun on my back and knowing the days were so, so long. Of audacious experiments and big ideas proposed by aspiring daredevils and naive kids like myself.It reminds me of standing at the edge of a dark treeline in Nevada, hearing Rat talk to Mole about a similar forest:That? O, that’s just the Wild Wood…we don’t go there very much…beyond the Wild Wood lies the Wide World.As a child, summer was the Wide World collapsed into the next bike ride, or snack, or fishing trip, or backflip on my trampoline. Despite being so small, the world was bursting with possibilities that often feel lost to me now.As an adult, the sections dealing with angst, emotions, and panic resonate more sharply than I would wish. There is some seriously melancholic stuff in The Wind in the Willows, pure elegies like falling leaves.And it’s not all picnics and embraces. When you least expect it–because honestly, when would you expect it?–the God Pan also makes an appearance. It is one of the more lyrical, haunting passages I’ve read, and the whole scene would fit perfectly in a Pink Floyd video.This book is also where I learned the word “selvedge.” Say it out loud. It’s pretty. In fact, as irresistible as the writing is, its melodious brilliance is even more evident when read aloud. Try it.It’s impossible  to be nostalgic for a place to which you can still return. So, sadly, if you’re at all like me, you get nostalgic for childhood sometimes. But reading The Wind in the Willows at the onset of summer, trapped inside working like a sucker in a way that Mole would relish, is about as close as I can get. It’s such a sweet, sweet book. It makes me want to take a nap in the bottom of a rowboat. Join me, and together we will be lazy, sun-baked, well-read slugs. -- source link
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