The author reading her daughters, The Phantom Tollbooth, in March 2021. (Courtesy)
When I was in fifth grade, and starting to experience real difficulties at home, I spent a lot of time in my public school’s library. I’m adopted, and it was around that age that I found myself more reflected in stories, than in the faces and personalities of my family. I sought refuge in books the ones I read over and over, and the ones people thrust into my hands, saying, “I think you’d love this.”
Our school librarian, an older woman named Mrs. Ross, had a reputation for being mean and scary. To me, she was like a grandmother. I sat with her and talked for hours. She gave me a book for every mood, for every woe. “Have you read this one?” she’d say. “Ooh, and this one reminded me of you.” Once, she added “The Phantom Tollbooth” by Norton Juster to the pile in my arms. “You really must read this one too!” Its blue cover with a young boy eye-to-eye with a big dog, its
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The 1970 film adaptation of Norton Juster s novel The Phantom Tollbooth
Credit: MGM
How sad to learn that Norton Juster, one of those writers made world-famous by a single book, died on Tuesday. He was 91 and would soon have been celebrating the 60th anniversary of the publication of the novel forever associated with his name, The Phantom Tollbooth, which was launched in 1961 and has remained in print ever since.
It tells the story of an amiable American boy named Milo, 10 years old and bored with everything. He is puzzled when a strange parcel arrives in his bedroom, containing a model tollbooth through which he can drive his toy car. So he does – onto roads that lead into the Lands Beyond, peopled with curious creatures, kindly or menacing. The book appeared 100 years after the pioneering work in its genre, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, was conceived by Charles Dodgson, an Oxford don with a passion for puzzles, conjuring tricks, verses and limericks. Alice launched a new
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