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Gregory J. Hollands

The book Little, Big outlines our lives from birth to death in every way. A main point is that our lives are preordained, and we can do naught but follow this path to its end whether we accept it or fight against it. In the book, this destiny is referred to as a "Tale" and is controlled by the fairies. The book reads like a year, with spring, summer, autumn, winter, and back to spring again, representing our lives in that cycle. Violet's tarot-like cards show how we have some ability to see how it will be, but that we are powerless to stop its inevitable cycle. Even the old orrery proves this with its perpetual motion engine moving the planets around the sun in perfect rhythm. From the beginning with creation (our birth, Edgewood's building), through each character's unique life, to the final and ultimate journey to the next world (a place that we have known about our entire lives, but that we have no knowledge of except for that with which we are born), we see this theme. Little, Big is meant to be read on many levels; this is one of them.

Throughout Little, Big there is mention of a "Tale," a story that encompasses the lives of the Drinkwater clan. It is this story that the book follows. The Tale is controlled by the otherworldly fairies and is one of many. From Violet's discovery of these fairies and to the journey into that strange land made by her descendents, the fairies play a pivotal role in each character's life. They hide unseen to all but those with the distinctive unibrow, and remain hidden in their own little world. It is discovered by Dr. Bramble that this realm can be entered through various "doors," and we see Violet, Alice, and others enter this realm on many occasions. It is this realm and these fairies that are the center of each character's life. They try to understand, but never succeed. Violet tries one time to write what she knows on her typewriter, but cannot.

This story symbolizes our lives. It is religion, as Smoky so often suggests, that the fairies represent. They are the controlling powers: the gods. Their realm is that of Heaven: paradise. When Auberon writes the script of "A World Elsewhere" it seems to its viewers to be paradise. To the rest of the world, the Drinkwater clan lives in paradise, and they have found the way to Heaven; into the fairy land. Everyone seeks utopia, but the Drinkwater clan has found it.

Through the story, the idea of seasons plays a great roll in how we perceive it, and how the story relates to that of its readers. When the story begins, it is summer. On his way to Edgewood, Smoky plans to sleep outside. He and Alice marry, and their honeymoon is spent outdoors in the forest. They hike through the meadows and fields around Edgewood; the summer weather allows it. Earlier, when Violet and John Drinkwater had lived, it had been spring. He'd build Edgewood, the great and mysterious house, and many people came to live nearby. Indeed, it was the very beginning of the Tale.

After many years, when Smoky is teaching at the school, and Alice and he have children, Crowley describes the leaves on the ground and it is Autumn. The house is not as well kept as it once was, but it's not in too poor of an order. A few years later it is winter. It seems as if winter began when Eigenblick became president (on his inauguration day a snowstorm occurred), and continued for many years. The Drinkwaters skate on a ice-covered lawn. It's cold and they all drink cocoa. It is now that the clocks cease to be synchronous (a thing that could symbolize an end of some sort), and the entire house seems to be falling apart, and not for lack of attempts at upkeep. This depression paved the way for the beginning of a new age.

"If Winter comes, Spring can't be far behind," (133) is the one good thing about winter, and we soon see that this is true. Lilac comes to Edgewood, and everyone she visits has the impression of spring. In just a few days, they hold a meeting, and on Midsummer's Day, they journey to the land of fairy, where it is spring eternally. These seasons represent the entire story as a year. With a beginning, a middle, an end, and a new beginning, just as this cycle is part of our own lives. In fact, our lives are in their entirety just such a cycle: with birth as the beginning, growth as the middle, death as the end, and a similar journey as the new beginning.

Violet had come to possess in her youth (spring) a deck of cards with which she, Cloud, and Sophie each learned in turn to read. In them they saw the future and could better understand the Tale. They would use these cards to see both the future and the present regarding their lives in great detail. In many instances, the Fool is used to represent a person or many people. At the end of the book, this very card is found separate from the deck, against a window, as if trying to escape. Eigenblick, the Lecturer, had been a fool. In his foolishness he was defeated. What he didn't know hurt him. And through the book this point is made clear. What people think is often wrong, and we don't know nor admit the reasons behind our actions. But, as is made so clear by this scene, we cannot escape our destiny. Smoky or Auberon or Sophie may have tried to do just such a thing, but in the end they each did just as they were meant.

When at last they travel on Midsummer's Day, they each do so in very different and unique ways. Alice goes on ahead, realizing her place and her destiny to pave the way and make all ready. It is she who will lead them in this new land. George and Auberon go through the wilderness. George becomes a farmer at its edge and Auberon, seeing Sylvie, follows her there in time for them to marry. Smoky realizes that his attempts to forestall and even avoid this end are pointless, and then realizes that he has nowhere to go, for no matter how hard he tries, he can't help but reach his destiny. The rest travel through the woods and over a stream on their way. To all it is a journey, and all make it there, however hard they try to do that or otherwise. And the journey is much like that through death to that unknown after-life. They go from the world they know to a perfect world, but it is only one step, for that world is not the most perfect, but is only part way in, only one step closer to utopia. In this new world there is a banquet, for Smoky has died in trip, giving us more proof that it is a journey through death. But after his funeral is Auberon and Sylvie's wedding, and we see that through death there is life and the beginning of new birth.

The characters in this book represent all parts of the world. Their names hold much meaning. Many of them are after nature. Some such examples are that of Rudy and Rory Flood, Betsy and Robin Bird, Phil Fox, Irv and Walter Stone, Hannah Noon, the Lakes, the Woods, the Dales, the Junipers, and many, many more. Indeed, every name seems to have a meaning. The firm of lawyers that play a role in the story even have and interesting name: Petty, Smilodon, And Ruth (My, what a confusing group of names). Most importantly of all though, is the name Drinkwater. Perhaps it refers to the belief of cleansing through water (as many religious rites such as baptism stem from), or maybe it has some other meaning, such as the tasting of the otherworldly before they are doused completely in it.

Violet Barnable is the character that begins the Tale. She is the first with the unibrow, a distinctive mark that seems to represent the understanding or ability to deal with fairies (gods or greater powers). She speaks with the fairies and travels to their world, speaking with the not-quite-omnipotent (she seems such but says she's not) Mrs. Underhill. Violet was the first to find her way out of the winter and to the spring. The violet itself is commonly an early spring flower. When he met her, John Drinkwater too came upon spring.

It seems Violet was the missionary type, the founder of a new cult. She was born with a skill to interact with those not wholly of this world, and because of that people would come to her, wanting answers or simply wanting to be part of something greater. "John Drinkwater never visited the fairies as Violet was able to do, but he did build Edgewood which is the centerpiece of the whole story...[a building] of mystic import," (McClain). Drinkwater was the founder of the entire cult. It was he that brought them together and he that built the means to do so. Though he saw no fairies, he is just as necessary as Violet, and perhaps even more so. Violet said to Mrs. Underhill one time "You might have told me...that all the houses I'm to live in are one house." That was the only one house that Violet could have lived in her entire life, and Drinkwater built it, giving a home to the center of the Tale.

Auberon Drinkwater was Violet's first child, born into this new spring. He was fascinated with the fairies, but could not see them, convinced that he could find a way to understand the secrets that the others knew, much as another Auberon would many generations later. He represented the scientific type; the one who, through evidence and study, would search for proof that fairies did exist. He would be seen with his cameras at all times, and often he would photograph his sisters and later other children, for in their innocence they were able to bring forth the fairies. Only a few of his photos ever showed a creature clearly, and in the end his studies were inconclusive, as all studies of the supernatural turn out to be. But he paved the way for later generations to seek Truth and to understand the magical.

August was the first one to make a deal with the fairies, and is he, perhaps, that brings the end of summer to Edgewood. August trades his mother's cards for power over all women, and for quite some time he lives the life of a Casanova. When at last he decides that this life is not for him, the cards return and he disappears, leaving a litter of children behind. This brings an end to the happy summer, and autumn arrives. The fairies turn him into a trout, and as Grandfather Trout he gives advice to his children through the winter years. When the time comes for his children to journey, he is returned to his human form to make his own journey with the girl he loved.

Smoky is no doubt the main character of the story. He seems to represent the more normal aspect of life at Edgewood. But as Bill McClain supposes, "Smoky is somehow produced by Them to fulfil their bargain with Alice. This is why he is vague and anonymous until he meets her, and why he is not at the Banquet at the end. He is in some sense less "real" than the others," At one point in the book (as McClain points out), Smoky's real name is given. It is intended, I'm sure, for Evan S. Barnable to sound much like evanesce Barnable, meaning "to dissipate like vapor," (Merriam-Webster). Smoky is meant to portray the reader, as lleu@ulster.net states, "I often felt like Smokey myself (which I'm sure Mr. Crowley intends), confused and wishing things would make a bit more sense." Smoky is the man who is never told the entire story, but is left to puzzle out the bits he overhears. Smoky arrives at Edgewood during the latter part of it's summers. The grounds aren't as well-groomed, and paths are hard to find in some places, but it's still the beautiful paradise that it was when Violet first saw it.

Smoky's wife is Alice Drinkwater. Halfway through the book she realizes her destiny and when the end comes, she takes her place as the matriarch in the new land. She goes from the summer, through the fall and winter, and goes on to lead a new life in coming spring. She speaks to Grandfather Trout (August) and she understood the Tale as much as Violet once had. It is because of this that she rules in the world to come. For awhile, Alice forgets what she had known as a child, and it is only later, during the winter, that she remembers the fairies and what she'd known as an innocent.

Lilac, the daughter of George Mouse and Sophie Drinkwater, comes to be raised in the fairy land by Mrs. Underhill. She experiences the same things that Auberon does as a child, but on the other side. This shows how, though worlds are different, there are things that are much the same. Even the afterlife becomes familiar to the Drinkwater clan before they enter it. Lilacs, like violets, bloom in the spring, and indeed, Lilac does come to represent spring to everyone at Edgewood. When at last Lilac returns from a long sleep in the fairy land, she is as if unaged since ten. She is the representation of new life; spring and rebirth. Like a real lilac, she slept through winter, to appear again in the spring. When she returns after the dreadful winter months, it is as if life has returned. In her wake events once again begin to happen, and at her direction they go on to a better life; and grow in their new world.

Auberon is Lilac's cousin, and he goes to find his fortune in the city, even though the Drinkwaters are "protected" (Crowley's way of saying that nothing bad could happen, and that they'll never have to worry about the mundane). He stays at George Mouse's house with a girl he meets, Sylvie. He is the classic young man out to seek adventure in the great world. After Sylvie disappears,he goes through his own winter; a much more severe winter than that of any other Drinkwater. After consulting Grandfather Trout, he finally understands his role in the Tale. There is a soap opera called "A World Elsewhere" that he begins to write for. Under his direction it becomes a story about his family, and it brings hope to the people of the world in this winter of time. It's the end. Everything is falling apart, and bad times have fallen on society. The story based on his family's life brings hope! People see that as his family understands that something great is meant for them, perhaps something great is meant for all people. Their lives seemed at last to have meaning. Auberon brings hope to the world.

In every story, there must be an antagonist, but not so in life. If this is merely a story, than it's not quite right, but it's more than a story; it's a story about life, and there is no antagonist per se. The Noisy Bridge Rod and Gun Club certainly does seem to be the evil in this tale, but it doesn't affect the main characters, and when it affects any of the minor characters it doesn't harm them. The Club is merely a force at work with that of fate. It has power and it controls the country and the presidency, but it tries to stop the decay that comes with time. It hires Ariel Hawksquill, a descendent of Violet Bramble and Oliver Hawksquill. Through her work, she meets the Drinkwater family, but unlike them she believes she has the power to successfully avoid her destiny. She is wrong, and as August especially had found out, she would be punished. When at last she is killed, she doesn't die, but her soul is found sharing a stork's body with that of it's original owner in the fairy land. No one can avoid his destiny.

Edgewood is the estate on which the Drinkwater family lives most of the book. It was built by John Drinkwater as a "midlife crisis". He created it as many houses in one, and it comes to be much more than he expected it to be. When Smoky first enters the house, Crowley writes, "In later years he would wonder, sometimes idly, sometimes in anguish, whether having once entered here he had ever again truly left" (28). This is a common thought about Edgewood. George Mouse thinks the same thing on one occasion. Later, when the house is falling apart, it seems to Smoky that it has a life of its own.

Dr. Bramble speculates at the beginning of the book that the fairy world can be reached by various "doors" throughout the world, but that each can be taken only once. We later come to learn that Edgewood is the exception to this rule. Many people travel to that other world over and over again from Edgewood, and it is this very property of the place that allows them to leave en masse at the end. Edgewood represents a safe haven where people can grow up and grow old without trouble. For the Drinkwaters, money isn't a problem, and for a long time they have everything they need right there. When hard times come to the world, their effects are felt less severely here, though they do affect Edgewood none-the-less.

Like Edgewood, the city represents a part of our lives. When Auberon returns to Edgewood for a short while, Smoky tells him the following about his own time in the city.

This is what the city represents. It represents life at it's peak, things happening, adventures, work, failings, success, and all the other exciting things that involve the lives of those who are at the edge.

The city represents change, in society and in people. The city changes Smoky in one major way: it brings him to Alice, and from there he becomes part of the Tale. The city changes Auberon in a much more drastic way. He falls in love, and his love leaves him, or rather is taken from him. This causes him great sadness, and through this horrible turmoil in his life, he matures. He grew up. When his mother sees him again, she exclaimes over how he had aged in the city. At the end, the city began to decay, things started slowing down, and there were riots, bombings, and shootings. Change had come to the city, and had changed it; the very thing that caused change in others.

When Smoky realizes that an end is approaching and change will come, he tries to find a way around it. He sees Edgewood's decay as the reason they must leave. He rushes around, trying vainly to stop its decay, but he cannot. At last he sees the old orrery in its room at the top of the house as the real problem. After much work, he gets it running. With its electricity, he lights up the house, and it seems that this energy has brought it back to health. None-the-less, they must all leave, and when everyone walks past him, Smoky finally understands what everyone else had. With his last realization, he dies, and his death is our death. But the story goes on to a new beginning in a new land; it was meant to be, and all he could do was realize this. He couldn't stop his inevitable death just as he couldn't stop his birth. The story is not about him, nor the others. It is about our lives. We are born, we grow, we face struggles and hardships, love and loss of love, and in the end we pass on to a new and wonderful existence.

The book Little, Big follows our lives. What we do is a result of the decisions of those things greater than we. Some call them Fate, other gods, and in this book they're fairies. Through the book, we see that our lives can be represented as a cycle. The beginning is spring and the end is winter. This book represents our lives in their entireties, starting in the beginning with creation (our birth, Edgewood's building), through each character's unique life, to the final and ultimate journey to the next world.