No. 2 from a series of six things all writers can learn from Norton Juster’s The Phantom Tollbooth, based on Laura Miller’s 9 March 2021 article in Slate © 2021 The Slate Group LLC
The cliché of the isolated genius working feverishly through his inspirations is, generally, hogwash.
We all benefit from creative collaborators, well-informed advisors, candid beta readers, and others who challenge and inspire us. Feedback helps us filter our own ideas.
Juster was living in Brooklyn Heights when he wrote The Phantom Tollbooth in 1960, and his downstairs neighbor was the not-yet-famous cartoonist, Jules Feiffer.
(As it happens, Juster and Feiffer were living just around the corner from where H.P. Lovecraft was living when he wrote ‘The Horror at Red Hook’ in 1925. But that’s an entirely different story.)
Feiffer became interested in Juster’s book and supplied some illustrations for it.
This, in turn, inspired Juster to create increasingly fanciful characters and situations.
Juster even tried to come up with things that would be impossible to depict visually, as a challenge to Feiffer.
Posts in this series:
1. Procrastination isn’t always your enemy
3. Don’t be afraid of the big themes
4. No literary genre ever really dies
5. Procrastination IS sometimes your enemy
6. Good writing is as much about what you don’t say
Acknowledgement
In early March 2021 the writer and architect Norton Juster died at the age of 91. He was the author of the beloved fantasy adventure book The Phantom Tollboth, with illustrations by Jules Feiffer. Shortly afterwards, Laura Miller published the article ‘Six Things All Writers Can Learn from The Phantom Tollbooth’ in Slate as an appreciation of Juster. “Every time I return to the book,” wrote Miller, “I marvel at how beautifully crafted is, and not just for a kids’ book. There’s plenty that all kinds of writers can learn from Juster’s masterpiece.” I’m basing this series of posts on that article.
