This article in the series inspired by John Christopher’s Guardians is mainly about some minor connections and a major influence that I detected.
Feeling different and Eoin Colfer's imp No.1
Both Rob Randall and the little imp Number One from Eoin Colfer's Lost Colony feel - and are - different from their colleagues. They take opposite approaches when it comes to saying this out loud.
Number One tells his teacher that even thinking about the slime associated with 'warping' makes him sick; he also tells him why:
“Rawley shook his head in disgust. 'Slime makes you sick? What kind of imp are you? The others live for slime.'
No.l took a deep breath and said something aloud that he had known for a long time. 'I'm not like the others.' “
Mike asks Rob Randall why Conurbans are not permitted to enter the County; Rob doesn't like to tell Mike why he found the courage to overcome his programming and enter the forbidden area:
"“Conurbans are not allowed to come into the County. Why is that?”
“They don't want to come.”
“You did.”
Rob could hardly say he was different from the rest. Immodesty, by the standards of the County, was one of the deadlier sins."
Incidentally, immodesty is not the only thing that does not go down well in the County:
“To be described as clever was not, as Rob had discovered, a complimentary thing in the County. Most people who were clever did their best to disguise it.”
“One did not enthuse about things that impressed one: it was not customary.”
Custom rules all in the County; it is definitely not the right place for someone like Rob Randall!
Money management, impulse control and Antonia White
As previously mentioned, the early part of The Guardians is much more detailed than the later chapters. For example, John Christopher tells us exactly what Rob does when he arrives at a huge rail terminus in central London after running away from the hated boarding school.
Descriptions of how he disposes of his school blazer and tie and buys his ticket etc. are not very interesting, but another scene has an unexpected connection.
Rob has had nothing to eat since his meagre breakfast and he is very hungry. A huge screen advertises golden brown roast chicken with crisp fried potatoes; there are delicious smells too! Rob is very tempted; he could - just – have afforded the meal but he knows that he must conserve his limited resources so buys a - very unsatisfying – sandwich instead.
This shows that he has more impulse control and resistance to temptation than Antonia White had when she bought the expensive handbag that left her with insufficient money for her return journey!
The Citizen of the Galaxy influence
I suspect that The Guardians would not exist if Robert A. Heinlein had not written Citizen of the Galaxy or John Christopher had not read it.
John Christopher was a science fiction writer. His short stories appeared in a string of American science fiction magazines. He knew some of the prominent SF writers. He was surely familiar with the works of Robert A. Heinlein. I think he liked Citizen of the Galaxy so much that he decided to write a similar story. I am not talking about plagiarism, just inspiration: the two books have very different settings and outcomes.
This is not the place to go into this in great detail – it would take a very long article to list and comment on all the similarities - but here are a few examples of common elements that provide supporting evidence for my theory.
Rob Randall reminds me of Citizen of the Galaxy's young hero Thorby. They are both orphans; they both get taken in by a family with a lifestyle that they later decide is not for them; they both learn a terrible secret and find a cause to fight for. They both put duty first.
Thorby learns that his parents were murdered - so incidentally does Anthony Lockwood in Jonathan Stroud’s Empty Grave - and Rob suspects that his father was murdered.
Thorby experiences many dislocations in his young life and has to learn to adjust to different lifestyles and customs; it is much the same for Rob. Where Rob has his adopted relative Mike Gifford as mentor, Thorby has his adopted brother Fritz. Thorby’s adopted mother reminds me a little of Mrs Gifford.
Boys on the run
Both novels have a scene where the young hero is on the run. In both cases someone conceals them and sends the pursuers off in the wrong direction. Both boys have to wait in their hiding places for a while until the coast is clear.
This is from Citizen of the Galaxy:
“Hi there, mother!“ It was a man’s voice. “You been out here long?“
“Long enough. Mind that pole, you’ll knock the clothes down.“
“See anything of a boy?“
“What boy?“
“Youngster, getting man-tall. Fuzz on his chin. Breech clout, no sandals.“
“Somebody,“ the woman’s voice above him answered indifferently, “came running through here like his ghost was after him. I didn’t really see him—I was trying to get this pesky line up.“
“That’s our baby! Where’d he go?“
“Over that fence and between those houses.“
This is from The Guardians:
“Looking for someone?”
“A boy, about thirteen...Seen anything of him?”
“White shirt, gray trousers?” the man asked.
“That's him! He's brought us out here on a wild-goose chase...”
“Yes, I saw him. He dodged up through the Millers' garden. That's two houses along.”
These remarkably similar dialogues are surely not just accidental!
Local customs
Both Thorby and Rob Randall have adjustment problems when it comes to fitting in with their new families and an unfamiliar, custom-ridden environment.
From Citizen of the Galaxy:
“Margaret, I’m never going to understand these people!“
“Fritz was born into the People; most of what he knows—and he is a very sophisticated young man—is subconscious. He can’t explain it because he doesn’t know he knows it; he simply functions.“
From The Guardians:
“It was one of the moments which made him realize that this was a strange and alien land - that the whole cast of Mike's mind was foreign to his.“
“What was customary and what was right. There was so much to get hold of, and then hang on to. It would never be easy and automatic for him as it was for those, like Mike, who had been born and reared to it.“
I rest my case!
