Ponder Post: The Phantom Tollbooth

Yesterday I finished the book The Phantom Tollbooth, a classic for children that I somehow had never read while I was growing up. Wikipedia has a really great write-up about it. The main character Milo departs through a portal (hence the phantom tollbooth title) on an adventure to visit and unify two cities, Dictionopolis and Digitopolis, in the Kingdom of Wisdom.

Every month Gretchen Rubin, author of The Happiness Project, recommends three books to read,
one of which is children's literature. Her recommendation is what prompted me to read this.

Though a children's book, as an adult you can appreciate more all the amusing puns and literal interpretations of idioms. Here is an excerpt...

"Pardon me," said Milo to the first man who happened by; "can you tell me where I am?"
"To be sure," said Canby; "you're on the Island of Conclusions. Make yourself at home. You're apt to be here for some time."
"But how did we get here?" asked Milo, who was still a bit puzzled by being there at all.
"You jumped, of course," explained Canby. "That's the way most everyone gets here. It's really quite simple: every time you decide something without having a good reason, you jump to Conclusions whether you like it or not. It's such an easy trip to make that I've been here hundreds of times."

There is cute part where Milo talks to 0.58 of a boy, the youngest member of an average family of 2.58 children. Milo also tries to have a conversation with a bird who takes everything Milo says the wrong way. That is because the bird is from a far off land call Context and that is how he behaves when he is out of it. I have not given away even a small percentage of the little nuggets of humor and cleverness in this book. It is a fun read and I raced through it quickly; but it is the kind of book I will return to later to savor the nuances I missed the first time around.

After I finished the last page, closed the book, and started this post, the adult in me kicked in and I began thinking about this book on a deeper level. It struck me that although written in 1961, the book categorizes these cities the same way our world today in general is still organized.  SATs are divided into verbal and math sections. College degrees are awarded as B.A. and B.S.  Computer applications to manage and manipulate word and numbers are Word and Excel.

So what is there beyond words and number? Colors and sounds of course! We can give them names and we can characterize them mathematically – red  has a wavelength of 620-740 nm and middle C has a frequency of 261.6 Hz – but they are their own entities and you do not need the names and values to enjoy them. Colors and sounds are not forgotten in The Phantom Tollbooth. Milo conducts a symphony to paint the colors of each day and he travels through the Valley of Sound, meeting the characters Dr. Discord and Dynne. It did not escape my notice that today's technology needed to develop image processing applications and music software to digitally capture these aspects of our world.

This is the map lining the front and back book covers of The Phantom Tollbooth.

There are a few life style philosophies in the book as well.  Here is an excerpt on cities that struck a chord with me, entering as I am into the slower paced arena of retirement. It raised for me the question of being in the moment and of travel.

"Many years ago, on this very spot, there was a beautiful city of fine houses and inviting spaces, and no one who lived here was ever in a hurry. The streets were full of wonderful things to see and the people would often stop to look at them."
"Didn't they have any place to go?" asked Milo.
"To be sure," continued Alec; "but, as you know, the most important reason for going from one place to another is to see what's in between, and they took great pleasure in doing just that. Then one day someone discovered that if you walked as fast as possible and looked at nothing but your shoes you would arrive at your destination much more quickly. Soon everyone was doing it. They all rushed down the avenues and hurried along the boulevards seeing nothing of the wonders and beauties of the city as they went."
Milo remembered the many times he'd done the very same thing; and, as hard as he tried, there were even things on his own street that he couldn't remember.

The Phantom Tollbooth portrayed a fairly complete tongue in cheek model of the aspects of our world. It contained moral values and life guidance without being preachy. This book was contracted as a child's book. It seems to have far surpassed that simplistic role and did it over half a century ago. I liked it!