Five Little Peppers Abroad

Two scenes are repeated ad nauseam throughout this novel.

1) Polly: Oh my goodness, I'm just so excited about going to [name of place that was probably a popular spot on Victorian-era tours of Europe]!

Jasper: Me too!

Everyone else: We agree!

*Everyone goes to the place and takes photos and paints pictures without commenting, most of the time, on what is being seen*

I understand this. A book talking about a visit to the Statue of Liberty doesn't require a detailed description. I assume that the undescribed places in Sidney's work were similarly familiar to her audience. But most of them are not familiar to me. It would have been nice to know what the Peppers and Kings were so excited about. And about 85% of the time, there was no clue.

2) Jasper: Let's go do something artistic and/or athletic that we both love!

Polly: Oh, Jasper, I can't do that, because Mamsie will be upset if I 1) don't do something Phronsie wants to do, 2) don't martyr myself by doing something boring for someone I don't care about or 3) make Mr. King sick by not complying with plans that he might have, even though he's perfectly healthy and I could ask him about his plans.

Jasper: Okay, we won't do that.

Polly: No, no! I can't disappoint you! Mamsie would be horribly cross with me if I did that! *bursts into tears*

Reader: *facepalms after reading this for the billionth time*

2a) The Phronsie Variant:

Mr. King: Come along, Phronsie. Let's visit the tourist attraction you've been excited about for three days.

Phronsie: Oh, grandpapa, we can't do that, because I'm worried about a doll, a donkey, or a man who stole your wallet recently. Also, for some reason I am still talking as if I'm younger than my age, only now I'm supposed to be eight instead of nine and the author thinks that I was three when we moved in with you, not four.

Mr. King: Never mind, I think an eight-or-nine-year-old acting as if she's three is adorable. Don't worry about the doll, the donkey or the man. There! Problem solved. Shall we go?

Phronsie: Oh, no, grandpapa, as I'm certain that they need help that only you can provide, and I really, really need to know that they're all right. *puppy eyes*

Mr. King: ...you're going to keep guilting me out until I agree, aren't you?

Phronsie: The author seems to feel that as an innocent child, I'm a Christ figure leading others to greater goodness. And it's already been established that I only have to climb in your lap for you to agree to anything I ask for.

Mr. King: I might as well give in now as later. Let's go do what you wish, Phronsie.

If the Phronsie Variant is somewhat creepy in your eyes, it is to me, too. There's a difference between loving a child and being hopelessly besotted. I honestly wouldn't be surprised if Mr. King married Phronsie in a later work.

In addition to Phronsie's age having altered yet again, Polly starts this book at age fourteen and has her fifteenth birthday in the Netherlands...which makes absolute hash of her age in previous books. It's not important, but it is annoying. *sighs*

Other things happen besides enthusiasm for vagueness, Polly being guilty and passive-aggressive, and Phronsie being an obnoxiously good brat. Impoverished little old men on steamships are actually earls incognito whom they care for during an illness and who befriends them afterwards. Polly's piano playing is so good that the greatest music teacher in Europe (who doesn't know who she is) is eager to listen to it. A hotel that they're in catches fire. And so on. But there's no cohesive plot. It is just a series of events. Most of them aren't even unfortunate.

As I said last time, "If the books don't improve, I'm going to stop reading them." Well, they haven't improved, and I really don't feel any need to continue reading the series. Nor could I recommend it to anyone. This is just treacle from beginning to end.

My pet peeves about travelogues from this time period (Betsy and the Great World, Little Dorrit, Middlemarch, Trollope's Pallisers Series, Daniel Deronda, and even bits of Little Women) is that the stories are rarely about Europe. They're all about the people they meet(often from their own country), the travel issues, the problems back home. This is mimicked in The Grand Tour. Which, as you think about it, makes sense. "A Grand Tour" was something everyone did, a rite of passage for many youthful men and women(and their chaperones or new husbands).

But, not having gone to Europe, I'm more interested in what they saw. However, what actually happens, is probably worth a paper somewhere. Whenever I have the time/desire.

Mark Twain, as always, is the exception.

2 stars for waiting until reading it in my 60s, as opposed to reading it when I was in grade school. I think I'd've enjoyed it more back then.

Harkening back to my childhood, just because I can (and the book was free!)

Mr. King and Jasper escort Polly, Phronsie, their parents and friends on a grand tour of Europe before depositing Polly for a fall of music training. Their natural friendliness endears them to an earl and his son, traveling incognito, and Polly reforms the young man simply by existing. What wonderful powers. At the same time, they shake off the more socially-conscious matrons - though their daughters adore Polly and would be better people if only their mothers would allow it, just to please Polly. Good bedtime reading - you can fall asleep and it really doesn't matter, plus nothing scary to disturb your dreams.

This isn't nearly as good as the original, but I guess sequels almost never are. Good old Mr. King takes Polly, Phronsie and Mamsie to Europe and the book details their goodness and their exploits in the "old country." Now that they have money, their problems aren't as absorbing.

Very old-fashioned but wonderful to dip into as a way to experience what a Grand Tour of Europe must have been like a century and a half ago. (Staying for over a year!). An old childhood favorite, probably not best first encountered as an adult.

A lovely book all about the Peppers' first trip to Europe. As always, a delight to read and over much too soon.