The Whipping Boy

Catching up on older classics, I recently read Sid Fleischman’s Newbery Medal winning book from 1986, The Whipping Boy. I’m not sure if it would win a Newbery Medal if it were published today, because later stories (like Kate DiCamillo’s, The Tale of Despereaux and The Magician’s Elephant), perhaps inspired by this comical, yet moving adventure story, have set a new standard for this style of writing. Nevertheless, The Whipping Boy is an amusing tale with plot twists and turns, as the kindly whipping boy is forced to accompany the hated, Prince Brat as he flees from King and castle. Lies and deceptions, murderous thieves, and compassionate peasants will keep the reader guessing about fates of Prince Brat and his whipping boy. show more Unlike DiCamillo’s stories, The Whipping Boy is a tale of historical fiction, revealing the lifestyles of both medieval royalty and peasantry. And yes, if you’re wondering, according to the author’s end note, “some royal households of past centuries did keep whipping boys to suffer the punishments due a misbehaving prince. History is alive with lunacies and injustices.”

A quick read with black and white illustrations by the renowned Peter Sis, The Whipping Boy is still relevant today, more than 20 years after its debut. show less

Cute. A little moralistic, but pretty good for something that short. Somewhat more realistic than The Prince and the Pauper, too - the confusion between them is entirely engineered (intentional fraud), not just based on appearance. I doubt I'll read it again, but it wasn't bad. And plenty of Fleischman's signature odd characters, good and bad.

So, I get that the author is trying to convey the importance of putting ourselves in other's "shoes." However, this book is EXTREMELY short. It probably only took me a little over an hour to read (about 80 or so pages). I would have liked to have seen it be a little longer. I felt that the plot was great, but I would have loved to have seen it fleshed out a little more and seen more of the thoughts from the prince's point of view to show readers how he is really beginning to see how the lives of the less fortunate really are. It was a decent read and a good lesson, but by far, not my favorite Newbery book.

Sometimes these Newberry winners baffle me. This was not a bad book. But it's written for 2nd or 3rd graders, which I thought was a bit below the age range for Newberry consideration. The story is very simple, as are the characters. They have no depth. It would have been better suited to a longer picture book than a novel format.

That said, the story is of a dreadful prince, who, being the prince, cannot be spanked. So when he is naughty, they bring in the "whipping boy", who is a servant child who is punished in the prince's place. The prince decides to run away, and take the whipping boy with him. In the scant 90 pages, they run into murderous brigands, a girl with a dancing bear, soldiers, a kindly potato seller, and a sewer full of show more rats. The prince returns to the castle afterwards a changed boy and everyone (except the brigands) live happily ever after. show less

A didactic fable-like story about a boy named Jemmy who's whipped in place of Prince Brat (what everyone calls him, I'm not sure we are told his real name) whenever the spoiled prince pulls pranks or acts out. When the prince decides he's had enough and leaves the palace, he brings Jemmy along with them and the two of them fall in with outlaws. The outlaws can't quite believe that the prince is really who he says he is, so they treat Jemmy as the prince instead. Will the boys band together or will Jemmy make a break for it?

Meh. The story was pretty bland, predictable and well, kinda dumb. I listened with half an ear to the narration, and that wasn't a great production either. Spike McClure does a reasonable job of all the voices, but he show more sounds very much like an old man trying to sound like a boy, I could hear the effort of the narration (breathing or swallows, perhaps), and the thing that sticks with me most is that he pronounced the voiceless "w". I didn't hate it, but I'll probably forget most of it by the end of the month. show less

I listened to this book, the 1987 Newberry winner, over the course of about a month. Every time I started listening, I fell asleep. I am not exaggerating when I say I listened to the first 10 minutes about 20 times. I loved the voices and accents of some of the characters and I enjoyed listening to it again and again just to hear the prince say, "Pish-posh, I can always get someone to write my name for me." Other than that, the story was just okay.

I picked this up at the library for my daughter after I read a much earlier adult novel by Mr. Fleischman, Shanghai Flame, published in the 1950s as one of those classic Gold Medal originals (http://www.librarything.com/work/6739087). Interested in the writer, I dug up his bio on the Internet and discovered his later, highly successful career as a children's book author. So, I thought I'd see what my 7-year old thought about his writing. She hasn't gotten around to this one yet, for some reason, but now that I have read it myself, I will recommend it to her highly. It has humor, it has adventure, and it has meaning as it tells the story of whipping boy, a poor lad from the streets who must take the punishment any time "Prince Brat" does show more something wrong. However, after a few years (but only a few pages), Prince Brat gets bored and runs away from home, taking the whipping boy with him. And that's where things get interesting, as they run into a couple of highwaymen, a girl and her bear, and a traveling potato seller. Along the way, both boys begin to change, and that is the heart of the story, which Fleischman tells exceedingly well. It's a short, effortless read, but a story that will stick with you for quite a while. Very highly recommended for children AND adults. show less