Willie: “Horrible germs and things, you’ll get the stomach ache”
And also
Willie: “You will be rolling around in terrible anger, there was a boy who died from eating a dirty apple, and it was on the wireless”.
Willie: “one bite that’s all, one bite and him was dead”.
Willie uses his mind to attack back where as Peter uses his fists. The boy’s emotions change rapidly: first minute their friends then in a flash their fighting. Peter spits on Willie, and Willies really angry bit soon forgets and carries on a conversation with Peter like nothing ever happened. Children don’t hold grudges. Their attitude towards a boy called Donald is very negative.
Peter: “Him ain’t got nern of a ball or nothing! The sissy, hims scared of everything
The boys may not like him but they share sympathy for him because of his mum.
Willie: “I saw her hit’n with a shovel, right round the yud.
Peter: “Honest”
Willie: “cut his mouth and is ear n all”
There is a sympathetic silence for Donald that the two boys share for him; this suggests to me that even though they are young they can still empathise. When the gang spots a squirrel they all get excited and chase after the squirrel, they are intent on killing the squirrel. The gang throw sticks and stones in the trees to try and knock it down. They make noises to confuse the squirrel and to vent there excitement. The gang tease Raymond because he has remorse for the squirrel. This shows signs that he for the squirrel and that makes him look weak in front of the other boys. They tease Raymond about showing his sadness by teasing him about his stutter problem.
Raymond: “W-why don’t we l-l-leave it al-lul-lone?
Peter: “Hark at him”.
John and Willie: “When the mum-moon shines on the cuc-cowshed”.
The gang soon change their way of thinking when one of them starts to feel guilty; one by one they all start feeling guilty. The gang try and hide their guilt by saying that if they didn’t kill the squirrel would have attacked them.
John: “They don’t half sink their teeth in mind, when they get the chance. We had to do it (swallow) didn’t us?”
As not to feel all the guilt himself John adds by saying
John: “didn’t us”
John says this to include everyone and to take some of the burden of guilt off his shoulders. When Raymond was feeling sympathetic to the squirrel when the gang was chasing it about and they laughed and teased him they all thought he was weak and a sissy, but now they all feel this way. In general Potter is saying that children do things to impress the people around them and they are not in control of what they feel at the time. Potter shows that being a boy and showing weakness will get you laughed at by your siblings because you show a weakness and it is seen as sissy and not manly. He also shows that kids on a certain level know when something isn’t right and before they admit that they have done something wrong, they would rather justify it by any other means a part from what happened at the time.
The boys play war games, but the girls concentrate on caring for people by playing mummies and daddies. The girls like to act grown up and mature. The only thing that is similar about the boys and the girls in this play is that the girls are just as cruel as the boys. Donald is treated badly by the girls, the use him when they need him and the discard him when they are tired of him. The girls via for his attention when they play mummies and daddies. Angels plays mummy and wife to Donald, Donald plays the husband and Audrey doesn’t know what to be. Angela says that Audrey can be her naughty daughter, but Audrey refuses. Angela at the time is getting attention from Donald, but earlier in the game Donald pretends hurts his thumb and Audrey decides to be a nurse and heal Donald. So now Audrey is getting Donald’s undivided attention, which annoys Angela.
Audrey: “What’s wrong with your thumb”.
Donald: “Oh, that’s a good un, you can see to my finger. I mean my thumb when I have a bit of tea.
Donald: “cut the bugger off, ant I”
Angela tilts her head in disapproval, Angela is now jealous of Audrey and Donald, so decides to be spiteful to Donald for giving Audrey so much attention by saying,
Audrey: “You want to stop swearing, Donald duck”
Donald is not very confident and so the nickname Donald duck, doesn’t help his self a steam at all. Donald hates when people call him Donald duck. The girls get bored of playing mummies and daddies and decide to both gangs up on Donald just for a laugh.
Angela: “Quack, quack, quack”.
The boys show some element of sympathy, the girls don’t. Angela and Audrey’s relationship is one of closeness; they are also concerned with who is the better friend to each other, because neither of them wants to lose the friendship because they need each other. Angela pretends that she does not need Audrey as much as Audrey needs her, but in fact Angela values their friendship a lot more than she lets on. The girls are far more open about relationships than the boys; the girl’s interests lay around getting married and who the strongest boy is. When girls are concerned with whom the better friend is boys are concerned about who is the toughest. As you can there are ranks for both the boys and the girls.
The boys act embarrassed, especially Peter because Audrey makes out to the other boys that there is something going on between them, which the boys think, is funny and disgusting. Boys act like the girls are nasty but it is just because they are not mature enough, and also it is a very taboo subject which they have been brought up to think is naughty and should never be talked about in public. Girls are more in tune with their sexuality. Even though the boys are embarrassed about the thought of them being interested in girls it is still very exciting to them. Boys can’t talk about their feelings because it shows a vulnerable side to them and that makes them look weak. So talking about kissing or anything else a bit more detailed than that makes you a sissy in the boys eyes. Showing any kind of emotion is too much to handle for the boys. Boys are unaware of their sexuality but it is a very taboo subject all the same, they make jokes because they don’t know how to handle the subject. The fight that occurs later is all for show for the girls to see who the strongest boy is between John and Peter. The girls egg the boys on to fight; each girl picks the boy they want to win and they start cheering and egging them on even more. Angela sides with John and Audrey sides with Peter.
Angela: “Don’t let him down John, hit him back”.
Audrey: “Give him one Peter, knock him down”.
The fight is also tot do with what ranks the boys are in, they fight to decide who is the strongest. Peter and John are rivals for the number position of strongest. Peter loses the fight leaving John the winner, leaving John the title of second strongest to another boy Wallace Wilson. Angels is proud and sucks up to John. Peter is defeated in front of his friends and the girl that was cheering for him so he runs off in a strop.
Peter doesn’t want Audrey following after him because he doesn’t want pity from a girl so he tells her to
Peter: “Bugger off, leave I alone”
Audrey feels neglected and unwanted so she decides that she doesn’t like Peter and says to him
Audrey: “Cowardy-cowardy-custard”
The fight has made John number second strongest and that has given him more power because being the second strongest earns you more respect from his friends and the girls. Peter is the third strongest sealing his ranking because before that know one knew who was second strongest because there was no fight to decide, so John and Peter were considered joint second. As Peter storms off everybody now thinks he is a wimp. Donald is a victim of his mother and the gang of boys and girls. Donald is an outsider and is alienated from the group; he is lonely and abused by his mother. The boy’s views of him are that he is a sissy and a boy who likes playing with jam jars and setting things alight. In the play you find that Donald doesn’t have a dad and it makes him feel better, portraying what he would have had from a father figure. Peter and Willie also think he is scared of everything. Peter treats Donald like dirt because his status as the weirdo and sissy. Peter changes his opinion of Donald when Donald lets Peter in on his scam. Willie’s scam is to rip off a newsagent by selling the jam jars to the newsagent’s man, but what he doesn’t know is that Willie has broken into his stock of jam jars and Willie is just selling them back to him. Peter starts to admire Donald’s cunning plan.
Donald: “Them be as good as new Peter, hundreds and thousands of em”
Peter says in an impressed voice: “Bloom-in heck”
Peter passes remarks about his dad, but realises that it is a touchy subject and it upsets Donald to talk about it because his dad is gone and starts to have sympathy for Donald. They both try and put the subject in the past. Peter starts to like Donald a little more and begins to understand Donald a bit more. Peter gives Donald false hope, by saying that his mum would have Donald but Peter’s dad wont. Donald’s chance to escape from his abusive mum doesn’t happen.
There is a thin line between fantasy and reality and the gang are mixing the two together. In the Play Angela is crying for doll when she leaves it behind but at the time the real situation is that a prisoner of war has escaped bit Angela still doesn’t grasp the seriousness of the situation. Angela still thinks this is all a game, Angela genuinely cries for her doll. Angela doesn’t know that this is a real situation. Even though John has been stated as the second strongest he cowers with fear because the seriousness of the situation is too much for him to handle. The gang nominate John to fetch the doll from the woods where Angela left it behind but he cant, he is too scared. His bravery is tested and he fails to live up to up to his ranks in front of the gang. When Peter reappears, John and Peter realise that working together is better, they now take off together. The two strong characters unite to get the doll for Angela. John takes some convincing but in the end he goes. When they come back from retrieving the pram, John and Peter decide to have a little fun by pretending to the rest of the gang that the prisoner of war has caught them, which scares the others.
Even though somewhere in the woods there is a prisoner of war that has escaped, and they could be killed the boys have still no drawn a line between fantasy and reality. After the gang realise its them its them messing around they get angry with them but decide that they should go and play the trick on Donald. What the gang don’t know is that Donald is very unstable in the head, he has heard about the escaped prisoner of war and he is determined not to let the prisoner get him. Donald locks himself in the barn. Donald’s obsession with fire which makes him a pyromaniac. Donald’s got mixed emotions from talking about his dad and the prisoner, he is having a mental breakdown. When the gang pretend to be the escaped prisoner, mainly Willie pretends to be an Italian, and scare Donald by making him think an Italian is trying to get him. Donald dies and the children try to make Donald hear that it was a joke and they try to bang the door down but by now it is too late.
The tragedy of Donald dieing in the barn makes Raymond express deep sympathy for Donald. Peter though can’t handle the guilt so decides to go for the easy option, denial. Soon everybody starts to deny the situation of the barn blaze.
Peter: “No I wasn’t, t was bloody mile away”
Audrey: “You was with me Peter”
Willie: “we was altogether”
John: “That’s right, we didn’t see nothing”
Raymond: “Poor old quack-quack”
The children act like adults do most of the time when they can’t deal with the pain of a situation; they deny that it ever happened. Potter’s view of children is that although children don’t know the world fully they still posses all the traits of an adult. Also he wants to show that children are not angels their human beings, and when you’re not with them they get up to all sorts and last of all Potter shows that there is always a heavy competition to the best.
