The Tale of Despereaux
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| The Tale of Despereaux | |
| Author | Kate DiCamillo |
|---|---|
| Illustrator | Timothy B. Ering |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Fantasy novel |
| Publisher | Candlewick Press |
| Publication date | 2003 |
| Media type | print (paperback) |
| Pages | 272 pp |
| ISBN | 0-7636-1722-9 |
The Tale of Despereaux: Being the Story of a Mouse, a Princess, Some Soup, and a Spool of Thread is a 2003 Newbery Medal winning children's fantasy book written by Kate DiCamillo. It tells the story of a mouse, named Despereaux, on a quest to rescue a beautiful human princess. The book was adapted into an animated film in 2008.
Contents |
[edit] Synopsis
The Tale of Despereaux is told in four separate stories called "books". Book the First tells of Despereaux's beginning, Book the Second tells of Chiaroscuro, and Book the Third is about Miggery Sow. All the characters are brought together in Book the Fourth.
[edit] A Mouse Is Born
In a castle, a tiny mouse, named Despereaux Tilling, is born to his parents Lester and Antoinette Tilling. He is the only mouse to survive his birth in his mother's litter and is born with huge ears and with open eyes. One day, Despereaux and his sister, Merlot, find a book to eat, but Despereaux instead begins to read the words of the story about a knight saving a princess. Despereaux then hears music and follows it to the bedroom of Princess Pea, where her father, the King, is playing guitar for her. Despereaux falls in love with Pea, causing him to go and speak to her. This event is witnessed by Furlough, who then tells his parents and the mouse council. Despereaux is brought to trial before the mouse council and sentenced to the dungeon, which is filled with rats. A red colored thread is placed around Despereaux's neck by the mouse thread master, named Hovis. However, Hovis encourages Despereaux to be brave for the Princess. Despereaux is then brought to the dungeon where he finds a long rope tied to the ankle of the castle jailer, named Gregory. Gregory protects Despereaux from the rats. And in return, Despereaux tells him a story.
[edit] Roscuro
Set before the birth of Despereaux, an innocent rat named Chiaroscuro ("Roscuro" for short), is eating the rope at Gregory's ankle. Gregory catches Roscuro and burns his whiskers with a match. However, Roscuro is entranced by the light from the match and declares that goodness and light is the meaning of life, but another rat, named Botticelli Romorso, puts Roscuro into a trance by swinging a locket in front of his eyes. Botticelli tells Roscuro that his only purpose as a rat is to torture prisoners by pretending to be their friends only to take away the most important thing from them. Roscuro then meets a prisoner guilty of cow theft. The only thing the prisoner has with him is a red tablecloth that he got when he traded his own daughter for it along with a hen and some cigarettes. Roscuro then takes the tablecloth from the prisoner leaving him to suffer without it, but in his disappointment with the experience, decides that the concept of torturing a prisoner is one he strongly dislikes.
Defying Botticelli, Roscuro begins to explore the castle's upstairs, where the light is. While there, the light loving rat, entranced by the royal family's grandeur, climbs a chandelier during dinner and is seen by Princess Pea. She calls out to everyone to take notice. Roscuro slipped accidentally and caused him to fall into the Queen's soup tureen, causing her to have a heart attack and die. Roscuro escapes back to the dungeon along with the Queen's soup spoon. Heartbroken, he then vows revenge on the Pea for causing the event to happen and forcing him back underground. The grief-stricken king outlaws soup throughout the Kingdom of Dor and orders for all rats to be hunted down and killed.
[edit] The Tale of Miggery Sow
Set many years before Despereaux and Chiaroscuro, a six-year-old girl named Miggery "Mig" Sow witnesses the death of her ill mother. Afterwards, Mig is sold to work by her father for some cigarettes, a hen, and a red tablecloth to a man Mig calls "Uncle". Uncle occasionally beats Mig over her ears until she goes slightly deaf and her ears look like cauliflowers. On Mig's seventh birthday, she sees the Princess Pea riding by on horseback with her company. Princess Pea waves at Mig, but Mig is too surprised to wave back. When Mig does wave back, Princess Pea and company are already too far away. It is then that Mig decides that she too wants to be a princess. Five years pass until the day that the king bans soup and the king's guards arrive at Uncle's house to take away bowls and spoons. They also take Mig away from Uncle because slavery is illegal.
Mig is then set to work in the castle where she gains a lot of weight and begins to become lazy during her chores. One day, Mig is sent up to the Pea's room to deliver a red colored spool of thread. She gets distracted in conversation with the Pea that she is then assigned to work in the kitchen under a plump female chef named Cook. Mig is sent to the dungeons to deliver Gregory his meal and, while there, she meets Roscuro and tells him that her greatest wish is to become a princess. Roscuro plans to make Mig suffer into hearing what she wants and manipulates Mig into granting her wish if she helps him kidnap the Pea to make her become a servant girl so Miggery Sow can become a princess.
[edit] Recalled to the Light
Despereaux escapes the dungeons on a tray of Gregory's that Mig brings back to the kitchen, and overheard her conversation with Roscuro. However, Despereaux is soon discovered by Mig and Cook and, as he is attempting to flee, Mig chops off Despereaux's tail with a knife. Despereaux then spends the night in pain, sleeping on a sack of flour. Meanwhile, Roscuro leads Mig to Princess Pea's room with a knife, and the two kidnap the Pea and lead her to the dungeon.
The next morning, the castle is in a panic over the missing Princess. Guards are sent to search the dungeon, only to find Gregory dead from being lost in the dark. Despereaux is then seen by the mouse council who mistake him for a ghost because he is covered in flour. Despereaux forgives Lester for sentencing him to the dungeon and goes on to seek the King. Despereaux tells the King that he knows that Pea is in the dungeon, but the King refuses to believe him because Despereaux is a rodent, similar to a rat.
Despereaux then goes to Hovis, who gives him the entire spool of red thread and a sewing needle for his quest to the dungeons. Despereaux cuts back through the kitchen only to see Cook making soup. However, Cook is delighted to see Despereaux because he is a mouse and not a castle guard. She gives Despereaux some soup to eat and he then makes his way to the dungeons. While there, Despereaux meets Botticelli, who tells him that he will lead Despereaux to the Pea, however, this is only an act, to make Despereux suffer.
Mig then learns that Roscuro tricked her into helping him kidnap Pea, and that Mig will never be a princess. Roscuro plans for Pea to remain locked in the dungeons, so that he can marvel over her brightly colored dress, but Despereaux arrives and Mig chops Roscuro's tail off with the knife. However, many rats arrive on the scene because they followed the smell of Despereaux, and the soup he recently ate. Despereaux threatens to kill Roscuro with the sewing needle, who then begins crying. Pea offers to Roscuro that if he lets her go, she will treat him with some soup, to which Roscuro agrees. Botticelli and the other rats are disgusted by the happiness of all that is happening that they all return into the darkness.
Despereaux and Pea become close friends. Roscuro is allowed access into the upstairs of the castle, and reunites the freed dungeon prisoner with his daughter, Mig, who is seen as a princess by him. Roscuro, Mig, the King, Pea, and Despereaux all join together for soup, as the mice watch in amazement.
[edit] Characters
Despereaux Tilling- The main protagonist of the story, Despereaux was born as a castle-mouse and the only living mouse of his mother's last litter. Named by her from the many despairs of that time, Despereaux has been an oddball among the mouse community from birth, as he was born with a small body, huge ears, and his eyes open. He then grew up to be radically different from the other mice in this tale, choosing to read books instead of eating them, from where he develops a fascination toward fairy tales and learns from them ideas such as chivalry and courage, which his fearful peers dismiss as absurd. Through his large ears, Despereaux is able to listen to the music that the king plays for his daughter Princess Pea, and because of this, he is able to meet and fall in love with the human princess. This behavior, however, does not go unnoticed by the mice, and when he is sent to the dungeon as punishment, Despereaux must rely on his wits, bravery, and inner strength in order to save himself and the princess.
Princess Pea- The Princess of Dor and the only child of the king and queen, Pea is a sharp-eyed and beautiful girl whom Despereaux grows to honor and love upon their first meeting as Pea also comes to adore the mouse. Though kind-hearted and loved by the people of the castle, Pea is often overcome with loneliness after her mother's death. Because of her title as a princess, Pea is not used to being told what to do and sometimes takes slight offense when someone does not appreciate her for her title. However, when her past actions cause her kidnapping, Pea comes to use her forgiveness, good nature, and place as royalty for the good of the other characters.
Chiaroscuro (known as "Roscuro")- The antagonist of the story, Chiaroscuro was born innocent among the evil rats of the castle dungeon some years before Despereaux. Because of a match-related reprimand from the jailer, Roscuro comes to be fascinated by light and goodness, despite objections from fellow rats. However, his love of light is what causes him to make a grave mistake in the human world, resulting in his plot to take revenge on the humans by kidnapping the princess. In the end, it is through the actions of Despereaux and the princess, and Roscuro's own true love for light that he finds his self-redemption.
Miggery "Mig" Sow- Born in the countryside of Dor, Miggery Sow was an often-mistreated child, since nobody around her cared much for what she wanted. Her mother died and her father then sold her to a man whom she called "uncle", when she was very young. Miggery had to work for the man to whom she was sold for many years with little or no thanks. The man would also give her "clouts to the ear," rendering her to be almost completely deaf. However an accidental meeting on her seventh birthday with the royal family causes Miggery to wish to be a princess. When she turns twelve, she is rescued from slavery by the soldiers of the castle, and she is given the position of serving-maid in the castle itself, befriending Princess Pea, but becoming an unintentional pawn in Roscuro's plan.
Botticelli Remorso- Botticelli is a very old one-eared rat who lives in the dungeon and is suspicious of Roscuro and his ability. He is the book's part-antagonist, along with Roscuro. Botticelli believes that the meaning of life is suffering, specifically the suffering of others, and that Roscuro should take action, and become a part of the rat community. He had taken a golden heart-shaped locket from a prisoner and hung it on a thin braided rope. Whenever Botticelli spoke, the locket moved. Botticelli is evil, and wishes for the princess to die. Later in the book, he leads Despereaux to the princess in order to kill him later, and intends on feeding the princess to his army of malicious rats.
Gregory the Jailor- When Desperaux tells Gregory a story he saves himself from being killed by the rats. He wears a long rope that protects him from getting lost in the dungeon's darkness. Chiaroscuro chews on his rope and as a result Gregory burns off his whiskers with a match. Miggery Sow is sent to deliver him his food as a new job. He dies from getting lost in the dungeon's darkness and starving to death after Chiaroscuro chews through his rope completely.
Furlough Tilling- One of Desperaux's many older brothers. He plays a huge part in the movie/book and sends Despereaux to the dungeon in a black suit. He tried to teach Despereaux to be afraid of things. He was mentioned much more than any other family members (besides Despereaux's father). He is disappointed in his little brother for not being like the rest of the mice.
[edit] Appearances in other media
The book has been adapted into the CGI animated film The Tale of Despereaux. Released on December 19, 2008, the film features the voices of Matthew Broderick as Despereaux, Emma Watson as Princess Pea, Dustin Hoffman as Roscuro, and Tracey Ullman as Mig. Video games based on the film were released for Playstation 2, Nintendo Wii, and Nintendo DS, and PC formats. Several short movie-based picture-books, including Hero's Quest, The Princess and The Mouse, and No Ordinary Mouse have also been released.
In the novel Brother Odd, by Dean Koontz, a Mafia enforcer named Salvatore credits The Tale of Despereaux (along with The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane) for inspiring him to turn from a life of crime, become an informant for the FBI, and eventually become a monk.
- A World Without Soup, book review in The New York Times, 16 November 2003
| Awards and achievements | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Crispin: The Cross of Lead |
Newbery Medal recipient 2004 |
Succeeded by Kira-Kira |
| Preceded by The Tiger Rising |
Books by Kate DiCamillo 2003 |
Succeeded by Mercy Watson to the Rescue |
