Revisiting Beverly Cleary, a favorite author of my youth, with a book that was about 10 years old when I first read it and already sounded like "Once Upon a Time" to a young teen immersed in the "Age of Aquarius":
Fifty or so years later, and reading with more experienced eyes, it's a true journey back in time to 1956 when this book was originally published, taking the reader to a world that is no more. We find ourselves in a close-in suburb of San Francisco where its first tract houses have just been built for the influx of newcomers and are subtly criticized for their sameness and small bare lots, where teenage girls must wait for the phone to ring with calls from boys, and wear white gloves and suits for a dinner date in the city, where there are horse meat deliveries for family dogs and pet cats pampered with lamb liver from the local butcher, and finally, boys who fix up old jalopies and wear stainless steel ID bracelets engraved with their names. The town has a single movie theater and a café (aka a malt shop/soda fountain) where all the kids go. It goes without saying that everyone is White. Aside from these obvious time-stamp references and some more subtle, the fifteen-year-old heroine Jane Purdy is much like the girl I was and how most girls have always been: yearning for romance with a likely boy, wanting to feel confident and successful in her social setting, and being embarrassed by her clothes and family in her desire to look and feel "cool".
Jane is in the midst of all this, and by chance meets a new-in-town sixteen-year-old boy, Stan Crandall, while she is babysitting for a particularly difficult child. Stan is good-looking, well-mannered, and industrious – he already has a CDL (commercial driver's license) since he drives the delivery truck for that horse meat company. Shocking period detail: when Stan makes his deliveries, he walks into the UNLOCKED homes and leaves the delivery in the kitchen if no one is there.
Stan is also resourceful enough to track down Jane via her employer, and then confident enough to call her and ask her for a date. A gentle and gradual romance begins and progresses through the school year.
There are numerous travails, awkward moments and doubts. As she gets to know him better, Jane realizes that Stan is no more sure of himself than she and with this revelation, they form a bond of mutual understanding and affection. It culminates in Stan giving Jane his ID bracelet to wear – they are now "going steady" – a happy ending for Jane and the book, though we readers, through the eyes of maturity, know that this is only the beginning of growing up.
Beverly Cleary was a beloved and renowned author of children's and young adult books, and while Fifteen is dated as to its setting and circumstances, the predicaments and hearts of teenage girls haven't changed. Cleary handles it all with insight and humor, never with condescension or preaching.
No comments:
Post a Comment