The Story of Freginald by Walter Rollin Brooks
My rating: 3 of 5 stars Who’s a Sissy? OR Too Much Circus, Not Enough Plot, Depth, or Freddy Rather than the usual protean porcine protagonist, the fourth book in Walter S. Brooks twenty-six book Freddy the Pig series, The Story of Freginald (1936), centers on a young male bear called (at first) Louise. Louise’s father wanted to call him Fred and his mother Reginald, but his grandfather, thinking he was a girl, named him Louise. The girl’s name ostracizes Louise from his fellow bears (“We don’t want to play with girls!”) and leads him to become a natural poet, composing poems to deal with his loneliness. Early in the story, Leo the lion recruits Louise to join Mr. Boomschmidt's Colossal and Unparalleled Circus, because they need animals with unusual abilities to satisfy their audiences, and a bear called Louise is unique. And when Mr. Boomschmidt discovers (and exploits) the bear’s poetic talents, the circus enters a new era of success. The only problem that a young girl elephant also called Louise and the bear dislike each other, because the other animals like to call “Louise!” and watch both animals come running. Eventually, the bear changes his name to Freginald, joining the two names his parents wanted to give him. The novel is episodic, a series of exciting and comical adventures leading to a big climax and a satisfying resolution. Freginald recruits a cantankerous mouse to perform as an expert diver; Freginald and Leo are captured by a band of wild southern plantation domesticated animals still fighting the Civil War; a boy shoots at Fregninald and Leo (it’s America after all); Freginald has trouble with a tall, dark man with a long, black mustache; a rival circus tries to drive Mr. Boomschmidt out of business; Freginald enlists Freddy as a detective; etc. In addition to the circus competition, there is a fair amount of American capitalism here, grounding the whimsy in details like circus tickets costing twenty-five cents, photographs of Freginald selling for ten cents, mistreated animals going on strike, better work being found for them with a contractor, and so on. Brooks finishes the book by saying that if we tell Freginald we know the author, we’ll get a free pass to see Mr. Boomschmidt’s circus. Like other Freddy books, there is much humor here. There’s a cute scene where Freginald tries to convince Leo that it’s impossible to jump on one’s shadow: “But you never get anywhere arguing with a lion.” And there’s a funny moment where Freginald receives a cryptic message from Freddy, because his typewriter is missing the n, i, and y keys, so he substitutes m, w, and j for them. There’s slapstick humor like with Jerry the rhino, who’s so near-sighted that when you want him to charge something, you’d better point him in the right direction. There are exaggerated character traits, like “it would have been pretty hard to tell whether Mr. Boomschmidt was awake and singing or asleep and snoring.” Much of Brooks’ whimsical humor derives from humanizing his animals (who speak English with other animals and people and have human names) while retaining some of their natural traits (Freginald tries but can’t stay awake in winter and finally hibernates in his circus wagon till April). Brooks’ narrator provides quirky facts about animals like, “It is no use trying to explain to an ostrich, though few people realize it. It isn’t because they are really stupid, but they are so vain they won’t listen.” Throughout the book, Brooks dispenses dollops of wisdom. A man explains that clowns paint their faces “Because there ain’t anybody can tell the same jokes over twice a day, week after week, year after year, and not get pretty sour.” Louise gives Freginald some writing advice (that Brooks himself follows): “Louise noticed that when she used ordinary language she said much more interesting things. He tried it with his poems, and he found that the simpler they were, the better people liked them.” Fregninald also learns “that suspicious people are the easiest to fool.” The monochrome illustrations by Kurt Weise enhance the charm of the book. His animals are far from Disney, being realistic rather than cartoonish. As a result, the anthropomorphisizing of Brooks’ text forms a pleasing mismatch with the art. At the same time, the pictures have as much whimsy as the stories, and are funny and apt. The humor in the book concerning masculinity and femininity becomes a theme: be yourself and don't worry what other people think. Freginald doesn’t mind being Louise, while Leo doesn’t feel his masculinity compromised by getting his mane permanented into beautiful long curls. However, the message gets mixed. Later when Freginald visits his home, another bear continues calling him Louise, so he forces a confrontation by calling him Mabel, while Leo strikes a leopard who laughs at him after getting a permanent. Leo says to Freginald, “Sure, Fredg, have a manicure,” only to have a squirrel mock the bear, “Shiny-toes! Sissy-toes!” Leo is a brave, intelligent lion—the right paw of Mr. Boomschmidt—who permanents his mane and manicures his claws, but the few female characters in the story are mostly made fun of. Like other Freddy books, apart from the animals, this one is white. Only one character of color plays even a minor role, a scary Native American called Pedro who has no lines, when most characters talk a lot. The book has offensive touches dating it to the 1930s. Once, Leo says, “We tried dressing up the monkeys in fancy costumes and advertising them as members of the wild African tribe of the Bwango-Bwango, but the people saw through the disguise.” Elsewhere, Freginald convinces a “dull and dowdy” wren that if he made a nest from Leo’s gold hair, his children would be “much brighter colored,” which would give them social advantages: “It’s no good being bright inside if you aren’t bright outside.” The kindle version has typos: misspellings (e.g., Shakspere, coud) weird punctuation (“the ceremony was very. impressive”), random letters (e.g., “wilder and more ferocious I than any wild animals can possibly be”). It’s a pity, because Brooks’ straightforward American prose is clean, unadorned, and fun. At times it waxes almost beautiful: “The countryside was so wide and mysterious under the stars, and the woods through which they passed were so deep and black and yet friendly, too.” Mr. Boomschmidt’s circus appears in several other Freddy the Pig books. It adds humor to the novels (owner and animals being idiosyncratic and amusing), as well as enhances the themes on the humane treatment of animals initiated by Mr. Bean’s farm where Freddy lives. However, a little circus goes a long way, and The Story of Freginald is less charming, funny, and focused than the best of the Freddy books, so readers new to the series should start with the third, Freddy the Detective. View all my reviews
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