Kids Today. Or Was it Yesterday?

"No earthly way of knowing, which direction we are going," squeaks a little six year old voice in her best Gene Wilder imitation. Fortunately, from the back of the minivan, I don't hear the next line of the song "is the grisly reaper rowing?."

"Ok, Mom, now you sing at the same time the Oompa Loompa song and we'll make that spooky song blend with the Oompa Loompas."

I oblige my daughter's attempt at harmony and begin my rendition of "Oompa, Oompa doopity doo" as she adds some extra spook to the scariest song in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.  We end at the same time with me singing, "You will live in HA-PI-NESS too.  Like the Oompa, Loompa, doopedy, doo!."

Why is this suddenly very disturbing to me?  The Oompa Loompa's aren't happy!  They're prisoners of a madman with red faces, green hair, and endless wheelbarrows of chocolate to push.  There is something strangely dark and sinister about this whole minivan ensemble we have going on.  I guess you could say we've watched Charlie and the Chocolate Factory one too many times during this holiday season.


Last week, in an attempt to prepare the girls for their first experience of the Nutcracker at Chicago's Joffrey Ballet, I checked the original Nutcracker story out from the library.  Written in 1815 by E.A. Hoffman, it is a morbid story with dark undertones and a lonely, bleak view of humanity and relationships.  Far from cute dancing candy canes and sugar plum fairies (made famous almost 80 years later  when Tchaikovsky's famous ballet premiered in 1892), the original Nutcracker story is deeply disturbing.  After the battle with the seven headed mouse king and the toy soldiers, Marie (aka. Clara) lies in a pool of blood on her bedroom floor.  She is mocked by those who are supposed to love her.  She enters a magical but sinister 'Candy Land' by a portal that is strangely familiar to a CS Lewis reader..the sleeve of a fur coat in a WARDROBE.  Not unlike Willy Wonka's factory the candy land where Nutcracker reigns as prince is populated by dancing treats but also strange creatures.  The toy maker, Dr. Drosselmeyer, is darkly sinister and scary.  He appears above the clock as an evil apparition and shares secrets only Marie knows.  Spoooky.

Alice Liddell & her sisters.
Lewis Carroll's famous story is believed
 to be inspired by his relationship with Alice.

The 19th c. gave rise to the Romantic ideal of 'childhood' as a time of innocence, exploration, and imagination.  Part of this was connected to the movement to stop child labor and introduce compulsory education to the masses, but part of it was also due to the religious and intellectual movements of the day. Coincidentally, the creation of our modern idealized view of a Currier & Ives Christmas also developed.  We look back at ages past and think of Dickens' "God Bless us Everyone!" or the little girl in It's a Wonderful Life proclaiming "Daddy, Teacher says, 'Every time a bell rings, an angel gets its wings.'"  We wonder why life can't be like that now.  Kids these days are so ruined.  Where has the innocence gone?  But was it ever there?

Tim Burton is honest and insightful in his remaking of Alice in Wonderland and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (even though the 1971 version is FAR scarier in my mind).  There is a darkness and a danger to these children's stories that is scarier than any of the 'in your face' shows of today. A writer for the LA Times says, "Burton's mission is to reclaim a children's classic, resharpen its edges and remind everyone that sapping the weirdness out of a tale often renders it flat and forgettable" (Read It). Alice and the Nutcracker's Marie may travel through mysterious portals to magical lands, but they are far from safe, secure places where a child feels known and loved.  Part of what makes Charlie and the Chocolate Factory  (based on the 1964 children's book by Roald Dahl) so scary is the look in Gene Wilder's eyes.  "You are about to be destroyed, and it is a game to me," they say.  This is not unlike the children's literature that grew out of the 19th c.  The idea that children could have their own genre of story was new, and it paralleled the growth of Gothic literature which combined romance and horror in an attempt to thrill and terrify the reader (think Dracula- monsters, ghosts, hidden rooms, etc).

Looking back just a few decades,  consider A Charlie Brown Christmas (1964).  It is a TV classic whose main theme song has become iconic for the sound of pop culture Christmas.  It's warm and fuzzy, right?  Snoopy decorates his doghouse, Charlie Brown loves a little Christmas tree, and we all laugh at Lucy in her extreme approach to life.  Last Saturday I took the girls to a local production of the show.  Bright cheery costumes and a very talented cast, with those super expressive faces and Annie kind of theater voices that children love, dominated the show.  I was sure it would be a hit.  After the production, Eleanor walked out with a long face.

"What's wrong?," I asked her, "Did you like the show?."

She shrugged her shoulders and said, "Mommy, why are the kids so mean to Charlie Brown?  Why do they yell at him, tell him he's stupid all the time, and make him feel so miserable?  I didn't like it at all."

I wonder, sitting in the driver's seat of the minivan today, how she is so intrigued by Gene Wilder's evil song and yet so bothered by Charlie Brown?  I can't help but wonder if the evil of Willy Wonka is easier to handle because it is encased in a dark fantasy.  Children know evil exists.  Spend ten minutes chaperoning an Elementary School recess and you will be certain of this. It is why the PTA can't ever fill these volunteer positions.  Watching children be cruel to each other is just too painful for adults. Dostoevsky knew and understood the darkness of the human heart even in the experience of a child (read more about this in a previous blog entry "Boogers in the Library"). He didn't idealize original sin. Out of that honesty he tells a powerful story which points to true redemption.

Upon what Savior do you gaze this Christmas?  Is it a Romantic image from a 19th c. print?  A creation of our own imagination?  Or is it the Mighty God who put shepherds flat on their faces merely from seeing His angels?  Does He have power to save?  But from what?  Darkness is real.  Our children see it.  Do we?  And when we do, will we see the One who has power to save?

**if you're curious about which Willy Wonka song I'm referring to watch it here**