BY THE SHORES OF SANS-SOUCI: A few years ago, I re-read The Tattooed Potato and Other Clues, a kids’ book by Ellen Raskin (The Westing Game). TTP&OC; was even better than I’d remembered it–funny and poignant, a puzzlebook with a compassionate heart. This past week I revisited another Raskin book, Figgs & Phantoms, which I’d remembered as being the best thing I’d read by her.
It really isn’t. I know why I thought so: Figgs & Phantoms picks up on some of my besetting obsessions. It’s the story of sullen adolescent Mona, whose beloved uncle is dying; both Mona and her uncle are part of a family with its own religious cult, in which, when a Figg family member dies, he goes not to heaven but to a place called Capri.
I’d actually misremembered the title as All Figgs Go to Capri–and the image, the idea of Capri, is why I remembered the book so fondly. It’s an elusive place. Even the Figgs who believe in its existence disagree on how to reach it and what it’s like. This idea of the longed-for place that feels somehow achingly familiar, even though you know you’ve never been there, is entirely compelling to me; and, like the Figgs, I often associate it with the sea, the endless waves against the sand. “Capri” makes me think of the Dante Rossetti poem:
I have been here before
But when or how I cannot tell;
I know the grass beyond the door,
The sweet keen smell,
The sighing sound, the lights around the shore.
So the idea of Capri, and also Mona’s choking, distorting, self-centered grief, were very powerful to me. But Figgs & Phantoms is very uneven in tone–I didn’t think it handled the mix of picture-book humor (people with Funny Names and Quirky Habits) and poignance nearly as well as The Tattooed Potato did. The quirkiness felt studied and annoying.
There’s also a strong authorial hand pushing everyone toward happiness–“everybody should be happy, and you should let them be happy” seemed like a big theme. This struck me as too easy, especially since in the world Ellen Raskin didn’t write, people’s happinesses so often conflict. I would rather read about a world in which at least some people, in some situations, do have to accept unhappiness gracefully, and everything doesn’t work out perfectly. That’s the world of The Tattooed Potato; which I definitely do recommend.
My vision:
It was night. I was lost. Then I saw the tree that grows wild and free welcoming me with open arms.
It whispered a name:
“CAPRI.”