The Annual Back to School Column: Neil Gaiman’s Coraline
I'm a dull realist, I fear. I'm not typically drawn to adult fantasy fiction (completely my loss, I know), although Sara Webb Quest's beguiling reviews in her alternative writing column may soon change my mind. Years ago, I was enamored with Clive Barker's Weaveworld, and I used to enjoy Alice Hoffman's writing, and I was entertained by Updike's The Witches of Eastwick; perhaps I simply need to let down my guard and try again. Whereas I struggle against the adult fantasy line, I'm reeled in, hook, line, and sinker, by fantasy in children's books. The Harry Potter books (Note to J. K.: we're all salivating for volume five!) glued me to a chair for a week straight last summer. When I do let down my Rapunzel-realist braid, I may let it unravel with adult fiction by Neil Gaiman, who is best known for his fantasy DC Comics series Sandman. Gaiman kept me plastered to the couch last night with Coraline, his latest foray into children's literature (illustrations by Dave McKean).
As the title implies, the heroine is Coraline, not Caroline, as she repeatedly reminds her neighbor above, the eccentric Mr. Bobo, who is training mice for the circus, and her neighbors below, Ms. Forcible and Ms. Spink, retired actresses who once "trod the boards, luvvy." Coraline is an intrepid veteran explorer. She and her parents have moved into a new home, and while her work-at-home parents are busy in their separate studies, Coraline busies herself exploring the new terrain outside. She finds "a rock that looked just like a frog, and a toad that looked just like a rock." She is careful to locate and mark the well Ms. Forcible and Ms. Spink warn her against so that she doesn't forget and fall down it. One rainy day, when the rain's "business was turning the garden into a muddy, wet soup," Coraline's father suggests that she explore the interior of the house. He gives her a list: count the doors, the windows and everything blue and "mount an expedition to discover the hot water tank." Coraline quickly completes her mission. She notes, however, that of the fourteen doors in the house, only thirteen open (ah, lucky thirteen!). Her mother fetches a rusty key and unlocks the door only to reveal a brick wall constructed when the house was converted from one dwelling into two sets of rentals.
Bored one day, while her mother runs out to get some food for lunch, Coraline decides to try the key again. This time, she finds not a brick wall but a dark, mysterious passage. Summoning her courage, she follows the creepy corridor, convinced that she isn't traveling down it alone, and finds a house that looks disarmingly like her own, complete with an "other mother" and "other father," duplicates of her own parents except for some disturbing features, such as the button eyes and the mother's writhing Medusa-like hair and red talon-nailed hands. In this alternative universe, things are mirror images, but not exactly. The images are distorted somewhat, much like people distort Coraline's name by switching the "a" and the "o." (A talking cat will later lecture Coraline on the unimportance of names.) This alternative universe includes, in addition to the articulate feline, a replica of Mr. Bobo, who plays with rats rather than mice, and younger versions of Ms. Forcible and Ms. Spink, perpetually acting as Proserpina and Ophelia. Coraline visits for a bit but becomes uncomfortable with the neediness the other mother exudes. She wants Coraline to stay forever. When Coraline returns home, she discovers her own parents are missing. They're missing for days. When she calls the police, she is advised to find comfort in a mug of hot chocolate.
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