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Sometimes a borrowed book becomes more interesting because of the scribbles in the margin. Next to the mind of the writer, you get an insight in the mind of the reader who preceded you. You can agree or disagree. You can have great conversations about the book. Maybe you could even add to the margins.
What would be even more interesting is the writer himself who fills these margins and gives extra depth to the story that's been told. What does a writer think anyway? Why does he put things in a certain way? In The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet the margins overflow with diagrams and extra info. The story of boy genius T.S. expands and deepens right next to the official recounting of his life. In the margins unfolds what T.S. the narrator doesn't dare to say. We find explanations not in footnotes, but right next to the piece of text they talk about. The margins also reveal more about T.S. and the things he decides not to talk about.
Author Reif Larsen paints a vivid picture of a 12 year old genius mapmaker living in Divide Montana. His family is rather strange, but then again all families are psychotic. T.S. tries making sense of the world around him by meticulously drawing, writing, mapping everything around him, from how to log wood or chuck corn till the loneliness in Chicago Illinois. The methods he uses are old fashioned, but his work is scientifically sound. It is so well done that he gets a call from the Smithsonian offering him a very prestigious prize. Little do they know that their top illustrator is only twelve.
For T.S. this call is the start of a big adventure. He rides freight trains across the U.S. to reach his destination in Washington D.C. The story of the long voyage to the other side of the continent is a proved method to tell a story of coming of age. T.S. is only twelve. He's only a child, but he's asked to do very grown up things, like making scientific drawings for the Smithsonian. He excels at the scientific method, but in the end he's only a kid, trying to comprehend why grown-ups act so strange.
Coming to age is also coming to terms with what's in the past. These parts of the story are the ones that are revealed in the margins. There's much that happens in the margins of our own life, or what gets pressed toward the margins. People are storytellers, and what happens in the margins gets forgotten. In The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet it gets a prominent place, because we don't forget the margins, we merely try.
There's another layer in the book, namely that it's a plea for the use of a sound scientific method. Wondering how things work, is the start of wonderful stories and wonderful artwork. Not all of us have the ability to map the world, but we can all appreciate a drawing that explains things so much better than pages filled with words. The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet is filled with wonderful, wondrous and astonishing drawings. They explain and add to the text. They make the book a little jewel to examine long after having read it all. It brings a reader close to the idea that science doesn't demystify. It is the source of more stories.
What would be even more interesting is the writer himself who fills these margins and gives extra depth to the story that's been told. What does a writer think anyway? Why does he put things in a certain way? In The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet the margins overflow with diagrams and extra info. The story of boy genius T.S. expands and deepens right next to the official recounting of his life. In the margins unfolds what T.S. the narrator doesn't dare to say. We find explanations not in footnotes, but right next to the piece of text they talk about. The margins also reveal more about T.S. and the things he decides not to talk about.
Author Reif Larsen paints a vivid picture of a 12 year old genius mapmaker living in Divide Montana. His family is rather strange, but then again all families are psychotic. T.S. tries making sense of the world around him by meticulously drawing, writing, mapping everything around him, from how to log wood or chuck corn till the loneliness in Chicago Illinois. The methods he uses are old fashioned, but his work is scientifically sound. It is so well done that he gets a call from the Smithsonian offering him a very prestigious prize. Little do they know that their top illustrator is only twelve.
For T.S. this call is the start of a big adventure. He rides freight trains across the U.S. to reach his destination in Washington D.C. The story of the long voyage to the other side of the continent is a proved method to tell a story of coming of age. T.S. is only twelve. He's only a child, but he's asked to do very grown up things, like making scientific drawings for the Smithsonian. He excels at the scientific method, but in the end he's only a kid, trying to comprehend why grown-ups act so strange.
Coming to age is also coming to terms with what's in the past. These parts of the story are the ones that are revealed in the margins. There's much that happens in the margins of our own life, or what gets pressed toward the margins. People are storytellers, and what happens in the margins gets forgotten. In The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet it gets a prominent place, because we don't forget the margins, we merely try.
There's another layer in the book, namely that it's a plea for the use of a sound scientific method. Wondering how things work, is the start of wonderful stories and wonderful artwork. Not all of us have the ability to map the world, but we can all appreciate a drawing that explains things so much better than pages filled with words. The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet is filled with wonderful, wondrous and astonishing drawings. They explain and add to the text. They make the book a little jewel to examine long after having read it all. It brings a reader close to the idea that science doesn't demystify. It is the source of more stories.
