Everyday Heroes

What if, all you had to do to become a hero was leap across the watery chasm to the land beyond? What if all you had to do to become the mighty ruler of a beautiful woodland kingdom was close your eyes, and... keep your mind really open? Your pencil flies across empty paper and then voila! The denizens of Terabithia leap into life from carbon and parchment...

Yesterday, I went to watch Bridge to Terabithia with Shauna. It was a nice movie. The film is based on a book by Katherine Paterson. I used to see this book everywhere in my old secondary school library. For someone who read Lord of the Rings and the Chronicles of Narnia, this book never once caught my eye. =/ I've always felt that watching a movie was a cheater's way out of not reading the book, since all you had to do was sit there for two hrs and you get what would have been a day's (or more) worth of reading.

In any case, the movie was a good one. Some books translate well into small films about the everyday, while others... become a monumental task. Perhaps the reason Bridge to Terabithia (the film, not the book) resonates so well with me is because I do believe in the power of art in the real world. Some people call art and fantasy the opium of the masses, the bridge to illusions and escapism. Not true, as Bridge to Terabithia tells us - there are trolls and monsters in the real world too, and stories help reconcile us to the fact that they exist and have to be dealt with. The ending may come to shock some, since it is supposed to be a "kiddy" film, but I think it works well by anchoring a fantasy film firmly in reality. No worries, I shan't spoil it for people who are planning to watch it and haven't, and if you aren't planning to... nevermind.

So saying, I still don't intend to pick up the book. I never liked it, because it was attempting to explain to me the value of the imagination and story-making, two things which any reader can easily point out. It's not like you can like these things and not understand the value of fiction. Hence, reading it would have been a pain as the protagonist would have to go through the painful steps to enjoy what it is this frantic and aggreived reader already does. I'll keep saying "I told you so" to the character, which would quite take out the pleasure of the book. It's been said that there are two kinds of readers: the kind that just read, and then there is the other kind. I hope I fall into the second category.