posted on 14 Jun 2017

The Tale of Angelino Brown by David Almond

David Almond is a master storyteller who manages to squeeze in plenty of contemporary references without interrupting the flow of the plot. His latest book is a modern fairy tale which owes much to Thumbelina and Pinocchio as a tale of an unconventional child being adopted by childless adult/s. As this child is also an angel with wings, it also has some echoes of Almond’s most famous novel Skellig where the angel figure was much more ambivalent. This time, he is a miniature boy angel who mysteriously appears in the top pocket of grumpy bus driver Bert Brown, and transforms his and others lives thereafter. Bert takes Angelino home to his wife, Betty and together they feed, clothe, teach and learn to love him as their own little son.    

Almond is an ex- teacher who has often indicated his contempt for the way in which traditional schooling can constrain imagination and narrow children’s knowledge and understanding of the world. This time he returns to this theme using a tongue in cheek approach which children and adult readers will get in different ways. Much of the action is centred in the school where Betty works as a dinner lady and where Angelino experiences his first taste of formal education in Class 5K. He meets the Acting Head Teacher, Mrs Mole who is doing her best to bring the school out of Special Measures after the Head teacher who ‘has been off school with his nerves since the last School Inspection’.  Here Almond describes an exchange between Professor Smellie and one of the children with great relish as he imposes the tedious requirements of the curriculum that focuses on the teaching of Standard English grammar:

‘This is my sentence, Jack says. “I am starving, consequently I cannot wait to get stuck into me dinner.”

“Technically correct,” says the Professor. “However, starving is hyperbole, stuck into is slang, cannot wait is hyperbole again, it is lunch not dinner, and it is my lunch not me lunch…”

Later in the story we meet Cornelius Nutt the Government Advisor who lavishes praise on the Professor’s approach and together they come up with a list of boring educational bullet points, a process which will resonate with anyone who has worked in schools in the last thirty years or so. There are also references to Narcissus Spleen, the Secretary of State for Education – Almond is having tremendous fun with all this.  The mood is always subversive with echoes of Lewis Carroll’s and Roald Dahl’s disdain for formal schooling.  There are also two inept pantomime policemen characters which probably indicate Almond’s views about authority in general. And the priest explains to Betty that angels are rather old fashioned and that the church is now more modern:

‘Like getting the guitars out, and the church website, that kind of thing’.

To contrast with the unimaginative teaching by Professor Smellie, Almond gives us the delightful art teacher, Mrs Monteverdi, who instead encourages and inspires everyone in her supremely inclusive classroom. There is always time to experiment and everyone relaxes when they realise that they can create something. Art is redemptive and powerful and this author clearly wants to get this message across.

Most of all this is a story that makes no bones about celebrating the importance of childhood and the need for adults to remember happy times. In this way Bert and his friend share their memories of playing at bus driving when they were very small and he realises that his job is actually quite a  special one:

‘Who’d have thought that the dreams he’d dreamed in Mrs Stubbs’ Reception Class would lead to something as marvellous as this’?

Even the incompetent baddies, Kevin Hawkins and Henry Falstone (aka The Boss) who try to kidnap Angelino are not all that bad once they start to dimly remember their own childhoods. But Basher Mallone is one deeply damaged character that Almond suggests is going to be harder to save from himself. He still embodies darkness (even the pages about him are black). At this point in the story there is a real tension between good and evil but the good children and Angelino eventually win, as in all the best fairy tales.

The happy ending includes a feast of forgiveness with plenty of cheese-and-onion pasties, cake, custard, a jug of pop and midget gems for everyone, including Kevin and Henry. After this the ever sensible and maternal Betty suggests   'baths and cocoa and an early night'. The next day there is more art for everyone and a truly wonderful school bus trip for all the children and school staff. Although there are sad undercurrents and sharp social observations threaded in amongst the anarchic humour, the overall mood is generous and optimistic showing a world where most people are kind and creative, and there is even hope for Basher Mallone and others like him.

I really enjoyed this enthralling story which is beautifully written and is packed with splendidly evocative passages. The lively illustrations by Alex T. Smith add to the complexity of the story but also keep it light and frothy. I probably need to say something about one of Angelino’s more unusual habits: farting. Of course this was also a characteristic of Dahl’s BFG, but that writer described it as ‘ whizzpopping’. Children of a certain age seem to love any references to forbidden bodily functions so I am sure that they will be delighted that Almond has mischievously included the word many times – it can’t be avoided.   Will there be complaints from parents? I do hope so!

Karen Argent

June 2017