Goodnight Moon – A lunar eclipse of the senses

Occasionally a book is released with some notoriety and success but is still under appreciated for its true significance. When Margaret Wise Brown wrote Goodnight Moon in 1947 it was met with instant acclaim in the Children’s Book genre. New generations are reconsidering her opus magnum, not on its achievement as a bedtime story, but on its literary merits and as a seminal example of mid-20th century symbolic poetry.

Detractors note, correctly so, that GM lacks full character and plot development and suffers greatly because of its terseness. Much of it is devoted to (at least on its surface) simply labeling items in a young rabbit’s room. It has a repetitive style, rudimentary pentameter, and worst of all – a predictable ending.

Yet, what the work lacks in length it makes up for in sheer boldness and creative expression. As a product of a post World War II culture, GM is wrought with the same loss, disillusionment and dark confusion that dominated the national consciousness but was taboo to articulate. Subtly, the book lays out the dismal scene through its excruciating inventory of the world in a literary technique reminiscent of Proust’s most enigmatic tomes. The unexplored oedipal tensions between the rabbit and quiet old lady add a parallel stress to the already anxious narrative and her abrupt and awkwardly timed disappearance underscores their strained relationship. DH Lawrence had his ‘Sons and Lovers’ and Margaret Wise Brown had her mouse and little house. The chaotic mood is reinforced with rotting food on the nightstand and rodents and cats allowed to roam free. At the point when the protagonist reluctantly says “goodnight light”, the story reaches a turning point and surrenders to a resigned fatalism. The room gets increasingly dark, the fire wanes and the time on the clock gets later. Lonely and estranged and with a final goodnight to “nobody”, our rabbit relents - seeking unrealized solace in the ephemeral world of moon and stars. Does he fall off to sleep or is it to the eternal sleep? Brown leaves it intentionally open-ended and the reader is left to ponder the conflict long after the book is done and his own bedroom lights are off.

If Brown fails to reach her objective it is perhaps because she tries to accomplish too much. Who can accurately capture the hush in our minds during that mysterious interim between awake and asleep, between life and death? Yet, Brown dared to aim for the moon and for that she deserves reassessment and respect.