Peter Pan - Many Stages, One Life
Peter Pan is a tribute to the miracles and wonders of childhood. Childhood as presented in Peter Pan incorporates both sadness and happiness. This is a very important realistic element of Barrie's play. In order for children to appreciate happiness, and to fully experience it, they also need to become acquainted with sadness. The children in Neverland - the Lost Boys as they are referred to - are free, adventurous, and happy. However, at the same time, they are stranded, and do not have mothers. Although a fantasy world where children can escape to, Neverland is not an idealized place. Neverland incorporates both happiness and sadness in the same way that real life does. It is commonly accepted that with the passage of time, memories of childhood become less and less clear. This is what J.M. Barrie strives to achieve with his play: he wants to depict childhood in its entirety; in this sense, his projection of the three Darling children, as well as that of the Lost Boys is aimed at painting a complete picture of childhood for adults to remember and help them relate to their children. It is also important to note here that there are no parents in N
Peter has very little memory and no sense of time. Darling or Wendy as an adult, only limits the child's experience. This can be explained at a metaphorical level as Peter represents an a temporal state. Although imagination as well as the ability and opportunity to take refuge in another world diminish considerably upon entering adulthood, everyone can return to their childhood for a second, and remember how easy it was to fly. In this sense, Peter Pan exists in all of us during our childhood, and that is why the play is also popular with adults, because we all need a tiny bit of Neverland to fly to once in awhile. At the same time, parents represent authority, hence rules, and imagination does not abide by any rules, but is free and independent very much like the Lost Boys. The fact that Peter Pan teaches the Darling children how to fly is a symbol of childhood itself. Mothers' efforts to "tidy up" their children's minds are in fact parents' attempt to shelter their children from sadness and fear. This is why, when Wendy turns on the light as an adult, Peter is both terrified and disappointed because he realizes that Wendy is no longer a child, and that he does not fit into her life anymore. Darling - just like any other mother, as Barrie writes - tries to tidy up her children's minds and let only the good things come to surface for children to experience the following day is in fact, her attempt to protect her children from hurtful images or language that they might have seen or heard during the day. Imagination has no limits, and children benefit from it the most. Darling leaves the light on in the nursery is another indication that the wants to protect her children from everything that is harmful since darkness has always been associated with fear and danger. Children we can travel anywhere, and do anything.
Common topics in this essay:
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JM Barrie,
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Acceptance Essays
