Penrod and Sam

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Penrod and Sam (1916) by Booth Tarkington ⭐⭐⭐⭐

My copy is a 1923 photoplay edition with pictures of the First National Picture. In addition to the photos of the film, the original illustrations are included. According to Wikipedia, the film exists in the EYE Film Institute, Netherlands.

The name Ralph E. Buckner is written in pen on the front flyleaf. Did you know that they sometimes used to use discarded books to help bind books? Well, the spine cover on my copy of Penrod and Sam is disconnected on the back, and you can read some of the discarded book on the spine. I did some googling, and was able to find out that they used Ruggles of Red Gap by Harry Leon Wilson to bind this edition! I thought that was pretty cool.

This book is very much like the first book in the Penrod series that I blogged about previously. It chronicles incidents in the life of the mischievous Penrod Schofield and his friend Sam Williams, along with the kids down the street named Herman and Verman. All of the schoolchildren from the first book make an appearance, and it was fun to hear about them again. There is even an addition of Carlie Chitten, who is worse than Penrod, as Carlie does his mischievous things malevolently.

I rather liked this one more than the first book. Tarkington’s insight into the minds of 12 year old boys is uncanny, thought he was around 50 when this book was released.

This being said, there are a lot of problematic things in this book, most notably the racism. I really did like that Herman and Verman were included more than they were in the first book. In fact, I would have loved to have a spin-off book called Herman and Verman, but I can’t see that there would have been a market for that in the early 1900s when this book first came out.

Penrod is basically a free-roaming kid who gets himself into a lot of situations. He’s pretty much a victim of terrible parenting, and really doesn’t think much past the situation at hand. He almost never thinks of the consequences of his actions, mostly because their are none.

There was an especially nerve-wracking experience with the kids stealing a gun from a drawer in Sam’s parent’s room. Playing with it, they almost (accidentally) shoot a black guy, and subsequently get it taken away and stolen by him.

Then there is the situation when they find a lost horse and decide to keep it to see if they can get a reward. They give him everything they can think of to eat, including a loaf of bread from the table in Penrod’s kitchen. This paragraph made me laugh.

“Whisperings within them began to urge that for boys to undertake an enterprise connected with so huge an animal as an actual horse was perilous. Beneath the surface of their musings, dim but ominous prophecies moved; both boys began to have the feeling that, somehow, this affair was going to get beyond them and that they would be in heavy trouble before it was over—they knew not why. They knew why no more than they knew why they felt it imperative to keep the fact of Whitey’s presence in the stable a secret from their respective families; but they did begin to realize that keeping a secret of that size was going to be attended with some difficulty. In brief, their sensations were becoming comparable to those of the man who stole a house.”

In the end, it was misunderstood by the adults that Penrod and Sam were doing a marvelously heroic thing in taking care of a lost horse — being kind to it and feeding it everything they could to make it comfortable. Turns out that the man from the humane society knew the horse, and had been looking for him. They were awarded medals for their decency!

“On the following Saturday a yodel sounded from the sunny sidewalk in front of the Schofields’ house, and Penrod, issuing forth, beheld the familiar figure of Samuel Williams waiting.
Upon Sam’s breast there glittered a round bit of silver suspended by a white ribbon from a bar of the same metal. Upon the breast of Penrod was a decoration precisely similar.
“’Lo, Penrod,” said Sam. “What are you goin’ to do?”
“Nothin’”
“I got mine on,” said Sam.
“I have, too,” said Penrod. “I wouldn’t take a hunderd dollars for mine.”
“I wouldn’t take two hunderd for mine,” said Sam.
Each glanced pleasantly at the other’s medal. They faced each other without shame. Neither had the slightest sense of hypocrisy in himself or in his comrade. On the contrary!
Penrod’s eyes went from Sam’s medal back to his own; thence they wandered, with perhaps a little disappointment, to the lifeless street and to the empty yards and spectatorless windows of the neighbourhood. Then he looked southward toward the busy heart of the town, where multitudes were.
“Let’s go down and see what time it is by the court-house-clock,” said Penrod.”

The end of the book, just as in the the first Penrod book, is a large children’s party scene. Penrod is jealous that the girl he likes is dancing with other people, and so he sulks in the corner the entire day. Meanwhile, Carlie Chitten goes to the upstairs bathroom and puts glue in everyone’s shoes and throws them in the tub, accidentally leaving the faucet on. Pandemonium ensues as the party breaks up, and all the servants are left to clean the huge mess, including the leaking ceiling. We are reminded that Marjorie loves Penrod.

I think this book was a lot more cheeky than the first one, though it seems like most people like the first one better than this sequel. I’m curious what the third book has in store for us. Stay tuned!

Read Penrod and Sam on Gutenberg. https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/1158