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# 2016-12-01 - Hope For The Flowers by Trina Paulos |
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Book cover image |
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I read this together with a loved one and was charmed. The |
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experience is difficult to articulate here, but it reminded me of |
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being read to by a librarian in the children's section of Josephine |
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County Library. Interestingly enough, Hope For The Flowers is kept |
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in the adult section of the Eugene Library. |
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I appreciated the cute illustrations and humorous language; simple |
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and endearing. The main characters are caterpillars named Stripe and |
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Yellow. They are drawn with beady little eyes. Their surprising |
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range of emotion reminds me of emoticons and other minimal symbols. |
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My favorite line is when Yellow speculates "If i have inside me the |
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stuff to make cocoons, maybe the stuff of butterflies is there too." |
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One could call it a working hypothesis. Or, one could call it faith, |
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hope, and trust. Nomenclature aside, this line goes beyond wishful |
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thinking because Yellow had the courage to act on it. |
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The story seemed to be an allegory for the conflict between a |
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material and a spiritual focus in life. The main characters gain |
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temporary relief by dropping out of the rat race. However, in the |
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long term they are not satisfied by their happy little bubble. Here |
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they part ways, one returning to the materialistic path and the other |
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embarking on a new spiritual path. Invigorated from their respite, |
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they are both successful in their prospective endeavors. The |
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materialistic path results in destruction. This misuse of the |
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climbing instinct was a cruel hoax on caterpillars in general. |
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Butterflies are a classic metaphor for transformation. I will avoid |
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the question of an afterlife, but the metaphor brings two |
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associations to mind. |
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The first association is the song Following The Moon by Osprey, which |
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includes the lyrics below. In the song, our hearts are beating for |
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freedom, held in the temporary safety of this body. |
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"We can build a cocoon together ... Somebody clipped your wings, but |
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listen how the caged bird sings, for freedom, can you hear it, it's |
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your own heart beating." |
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The second association is the book Yoga Lessons For Developing |
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Spiritual Consciousness by Swami Mukerji. |
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"It is quite necessary that we should pass through certain |
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experiences, that we rise from ideal to ideal. We create our own |
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fate. Our sufferings, our joys, are so many projections from |
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ourselves. We alone are responsible for them. Like the silkworm we |
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build a cocoon around the soul and then feeling "cramped," we set to |
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loosening the bonds." |
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The tale ends in the formation of a new "pillar." Extrapolating from |
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the allegory, the materialistic path could be considered an |
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inevitable part of life, absurd but necessary for our evolution. |
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author: Paulus, Trina |
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detail: gopher://gopherpedia.com/0/Hope_for_the_Flowers |
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LOC: PZ4.P327 Ho |
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source: https://archive.org/details/HopeForFlowers-English |
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tags: ebook,counterculture,fantasy,fiction,graphic novel |
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title: Hope For The Flowers |
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# Tags |
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ebook |
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counterculture |
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fantasy |
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fiction |
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graphic novel |
