Should Wizard hit Mommy (John Hoyer Updike)

 

Should Wizard hit Mommy (John Hoyer Updike)

Think as you read (Page 48)

Q1. Who is Jo ? How does she respond to her father’s story-telling ?

Answer: Jo is a little girl who is four-year-old. Her full name is Joanne and Jo is her nick-name. His father has been telling her a story out of his head in the evenings and for Saturday naps. Previously she would fall asleep after listening the story. But now she had started asking questions. When he told her spiders ate bugs, she would ask her mother, “Do they really ?”

Read and find out (Page 53)

 Q1. What possible plot line could the story continue with ?

Answer: Jo’s father Jack was telling her the story of Roger Skunk, who smelled very bad. The wise old Owl asks him to go to the Wizard who will help him. Moreover, he would solve his problem of bad smell. The Wizard was a tiny little old man with a long white heard. Roger Skunk told him that all the little animals run away from him because he smells so bad. The Wizard thoroughly searched and found an old stick called a magic wand. He asked Roger Skunk what he wanted to smell like. Roger Skunk told him that he would like to smell like roses.

The Wizard chanted and Roger Skunk started smelling like roses. When Roger Skunk went home, his mummy said, “What’s that awful smell ?” Roger Skunk said that it was he who smelt like roses. She asked him who made him smell like that. Roger Skunk said that the Wizard did so.

She said that they were going right back to that Wizard. Roger Skunk said that all the other animals would run away because of his bad smell. But his mummy said she did not care. They went to the Wizard who made him to smell bad again. She said then that he smelled the way a little Skunk should have smelled. At this twist of the story Jo said, “No” and put her hand out to touch his lips. She said then the Wizard hit her on the head and did not change that little Skunk back. But Jack said in negative.

 Read and find out (Page 54) 

Q1. What do you think was Jo’s problem ?

Answer: Jo’s problem was that she did not like that the Mummy Skunk should get the smell of Roger Skunk changed from the smell of roses to the previous unpleasant bad smell. She strongely feels that Roger Skunk’s mummy should not approach the Wizard to change the smell of roses. As a very little child, she failed to understand why Roger Skunk’s mummy wanted it.

 Reading with insight

Q1. What is the moral issue that the story raises ?

Answer: Jo is a four-year-old little girl whose father tells her a story in the evenings and for Saturday nap. He tells her nearly the same story with a little variation. He was telling her a story about Roger Skunk who smelt very bad. The wise old owl directs him to the Wizard for his problem of smell. He does not like the smell of his body because little animals refuse to play with him. So the Wizard changes the smell of her body and he smells like roses now.

But when he goes home, her mummy is not happy with the smell he had acquired now. So she takes him back to the Wizard and he again smelt bad. But Jo feels that Roger Skunk’s mummy should not have done so. She wants that the Wizard should hit her on the head. So the moral issue that the story raises is that whether mothers should do what their children like or they should do what they feel is right even if the children feel otherwise.

Q2. How does Jo want the story to end and why ?

Answer: Jo does not like that part of the story when Roger Skunk’s mummy takes him to the Wizard to get the smell of his body from the smell of roses to the unpleasant bad smell he previously had. Jo is hardly four-year-old girl, so she cannot understand why Roger Skunk’s mummy was doing so. She grew a sort of repulsion for Roger’s mummy. She feels that the Wizard should hit her on the head and should not change that little Skunk back. But Jack said that the Wizard said O.K. and Roger Skunk did not smell of roses any more and smelled very bad again.

Jo felt that Roger Skunk’s mummy was a stupid mummy. But Jack said emphatically that she was not a stupid mummy. Jo told her father that she wanted him to tell her the story that Wizard took that magic wand and hit Roger Skunk’s mummy, right over the head. That is how Jo wants the story to end because she strongly feels that Roger’s mummy should not have done so.

Q3. Why does Jack insist that it was the Wizard that was hit and not the mother ?

Answer: The little Jo wanted that the Mummy Skunk should not get the smell of Roger Skunk from the smell of roses to his previous unpleasant bad smell. When Jack told her that Roger Skunk’s mummy took him to the Wizard and hit the Wizard right over the head, Jo said no. She put her hand out to touch his lips, yet even in her agitation she did not quite dare to stop the source of truth. Then inspiration came to her.

She said the Wizard hit Roger’s mummy on the head, and did not change that little Skunk’s smell of roses. But Jack insisted that it was the Wizard that was hit and not the mother of Roger Skunk. He said that the point was that the little Skunk loved his mummy more than he loved all the other little animals and she knew what was right. Jack insisted because he wanted to convince Jo that Roger’s mother was right to do what she did.

Q4. What makes Jack feel caught in an ugly middle position ?

Answer: Jack’s childhood experiences do not seem to be smooth and pleasant. When he narrated how Roger Skunk was jeered at and was not allowed to play with other little animals, he remembered certain “humiliations of his own childhood”. Jo said about the mummy Skunk that she was a stupid mummy. He said emphatically that she was not stupid. At the same time he believed from Jo’s expression that he was defending her own mother.

But he could not let Jo believe that Roger Skunk’s mummy was not right. So he says that the point was that the little Skunk loved his mummy more than he loved all the animals and she knew what was right. When Jack went to Clare he saw that the woodwork, a cage of mouldings and rails and baseboards all around them, was half old tan and half new ivory. Then he felt caught in an ugly middle position. He could not let Jo think that mother could be wrong though he knew how his mother had treated him. That is why he felt that he was caught in an ugly middle position.

Q5. What is your stance regarding the two endings to the Roger Skunk story ?

Answer: The two endings of the story are one by Jack as he told to Jo and, the second is what Jo told him to end the story. Roger Skunk smelled very bad and the Wizard turned him to smell like roses. When he went to his home, his mother said that the smell was awful. His mother said that the little Skunk should smell the way a little Skunk should have smelled. So, she takes Roger Skunk to the Wizard, hit him on the head and the Wizard changed the smell of the Roger Skunk again to a bad one. But Jo insisted that the Wizard hit Roger Skunk’s mummy on the head and he did not change the smell of roses.

I think both Jo and Jack were thinking in their own way. Jack did not want to let Jo believe that mummy could be wrong. Jo as a child did not want that Roger Skunk should suffer because of his smell because the little animals did not play with him because of his bad smell.

I think the ending of the story which Jack told would be more suitable. Roger Skunk smelling of roses would seem quite odd amongst other Skunks. Moreover Roger Skunk should do what her mother says because love of her mother for the little Skunk should be more important than playing with other little animals.

Q6. Why is an adult’s perspective on life different from that of a child’s ?

Answer: An adult’s perspective on life is different from that of a child’s. It is because a child symbolises innocence, whereas an adult symbolises experience. A child’s mind is pure, simple and devoid of any deception or doublemindedness. But an adult undergoes many experiences in life which make him more mature and worldwise. A child has to learn by virtue of his own experiences, whereas an adult can foresee the future circumstances and act accordingly.

In the story ‘Should Wizard Hit Mommy’ ? a child’s perspective on life is shown through the four-year-old Jo. She represents innocence. But the prospective of an adult is shown through Jack, who represents experience, maturity, practical wisdom and the realities of life. That is why Jo thinks that what Roger’s mummy did to get his smell changed was wrong. On the other hand, Jack tries to justify that what she did was right.