“FRIDAY RE-VERSO”
“There was something unpleasant in that wait, it was as if everything around him was about to explode.”
The writer of this review has an (unhealthy?) passion for stories about the wickedness of children. One of the best novels on the subject (leaving aside Golding) is “Nothing” by Janne Teller: we recommend it. Let’s be clear, ours isn’t a morbid curiosity; rather, it’s about dissecting that part of the self that is then inevitably influenced by education, family, and the so-called civilized society. Perhaps “wickedness” isn’t the right term; “ruthlessness” is certainly more accurate.
In Hill’s pages, the psychology is subtle and never didactic, the tension building slowly and inexorably. The relevance: disarming.
There are a father and son, rich but decadent (or decadent), in a huge post-war English country house; the father is looking for a governess who, who knows, might become something more. The governess arrives, along with her own little son. The two adults like each other very much, but the kids, Hooper and Kingshaw, don’t. It’s war. Hooper experiences Kingshaw’s arrival as if it were an invader in his palace. His father, who thinks of himself as inept (and he certainly is), is a paternal model that must be methodically, surgically overturned: the son knows what he wants and takes it, and what he wants is to chase the invader away.
Given the historical and social context, you might wonder where the relevance lies, where the empathy lies.
Well, the dynamic that develops between the two children can easily be translated into a context we would today define as bullying. A systematic, manipulative, undoubtedly ruthless bullying. The bully (Hooper) doesn’t use physical force but weaves a dense web of small terrors around his opponent’s weaknesses, lying, scaring, and subverting the concepts of truth and justice not only in his victim’s mind but also, and above all, in the hypocritical eyes of his parents, who, far more involved in their budding relationship, stubbornly refuse to see the silent psychological violence unfolding before their eyes. Kingshaw is a sensitive and intelligent boy, yet his tools are useless against the crystalline will to harm of his tormentor—unstable, capricious, and fearful, yet devoid of any scruples, as well as the awareness that could undermine his self-esteem and blind arrogance.
In the final section, Fielding appears, a kind, honest country boy who could represent for both of them a concrete escape from the sick game they’ve played, entangling them like insects in a web of lies, hatred (yes, children allow themselves to hate), and low blows—a web, we repeat, woven in the total absence of a parent’s gaze. But it’s late, their movements are clumsy, helpless, and every attempt at escape is futile. This is a painful and relentless book, masterfully written, which not only stages but provokes in the reader invasive, not necessarily noble, emotions, uncomfortable feelings that, just like the wickedness of children, we would like to keep locked away and inaccessible in a forgotten room of our minds.
Written by Delis
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Susan Hill, Sono il re del castello, Sararà, Pordenone, 2025
Original edition: I’m the King of the Castel, Hamish Hamilton, London, 1970