I was a contrary child. When my family went on long car trips, a few decades ago now, I would, in my sunny way, announce to my parents, “I hate trees, love bumpy roads”. Guess what my parents were talking about prior to this pronouncement from their co-operative first-born? This refrain, as you can imagine, has become one of those enduring family jokes, and particularly so now with my gums-inspired blog.
Anyhow, the thing is, while reading my current book, Andre Gide‘s The immoralist, I came across a description of trees:
Huge olive and carob trees, with cyclamen growing in their shadow; above, woods of chestnut trees, cool air, northern plants; below, lemon trees by the sea. The last are arranged in small terraces because of the slope, like a staircase of gardens, almost all the same, with a narrow path running through the middle from end to end. One enters them silently, like a thief. There one can dream, in the green shadows. The foliage is dense and heavy, no direct light can penetrate. The fragrant lemons hang like thick drops of wax; in the shade they look greenish-white; they are within reach, and taste sweet, sharp and refreshing.
And I realised that I have always loved trees. I did say I was a contrary child, didn’t I?
Trees are the stuff of childhood – they evoke adventure, magic, imagination. They are places to climb, to hide or rest in, to swing from or, of course, to read in. I had a climbing tree when I was young – a lovely old spreading custard apple tree. It’s an important part of my childhood memories. Naturally, this got me to thinking about my childhood reading and I realised that trees were always there too. I didn’t “know” many of them in my Australian environment but I loved the sound of them – large spreading oak trees, fragrant magnolias, lush weeping willows, elms, lindens, firs and so on. Trees, in fact, abound in children’s books, so I’m choosing just three that are particularly memorable to me. I’d love to know whether trees conjure up any special feelings from your childhood.
Like many young girls, I fancied myself Jo March (of Louisa May Alcott‘s Little women fame). What better role model could we find but this lively, adventurous young woman who also loved to read:
“No,” said Jo, “that dozy way wouldn’t suit me. I’ve laid in a heap of books, and I’m going to improve my shining hours reading on my perch in the old apple tree…”
Another favourite childhood novel was Johanna Spyri‘s Heidi (of which I was recently reminded by Iris). When Heidi is sent to Frankfurt to keep the sickly Clara company, she misses her home in the Alps:
It was still early, for Heidi was accustomed to get up early and run out at once to see how everything was looking, if the sky was blue and if the sun was already above the mountains, or if the fir trees were waving and the flowers had opened their eyes.
Heidi was one of those books which introduced me – an urban child – to the love of the countryside. (It also made me crave white bread rolls. Those rolls seemed so much better than anything I’d ever seen, and they introduced me to the vicarious enjoyment of food through literature, but that’s another story).
In Australian books, there were of course the gums, the most memorable being the one in Seven little Australians:
There was a tree falling, one of the great, gaunt, naked things that had been ringbarked long ago. All day it had swayed to and fro, rotten through and through; now there came up across the plain a puff of wind, and down it went before it. One wild ringing cry Judy gave, then she leaped across the ground, her arms outstretched to the little lad running with laughing eyes and lips straight to death.
I’ve always been fascinated by the fact that while Louisa May Alcott had the sweet, gentle Beth die, Ethel Turner did the reverse and chose that fate for the “cleverest” of the siblings, the one whose “brilliant inventive powers plunged them all into ceaseless scrapes”. Interesting eh?
Whispering Gums 