The Wind in the Willows

“Never in his life had he seen a river before—this sleek, sinuous, full-bodied animal, chasing and chuckling, gripping things with a gurgle and leaving them with a laugh, to fling itself on fresh playmates that shook themselves free, and were caught and held again. All was a-shake and a-shiver—glints and gleams and sparkles, rustle and swirl, chatter and bubble. The Mole was bewitched, entranced, fascinated. By the side of the river he trotted as one trots, when very small, by the side of a man who holds one spell-bound by exciting stories; and when tired at last, he sat on the bank, while the river still chattered on to him, a babbling procession of the best stories in the world, sent from the heart of the earth to be told at last to the insatiable sea.”

The author combines elegant descriptions with metaphors and similes that capture a young person’s imagination. In his words, the river comes playfully alive; he likens it to a man telling stories to a small child. This connects readers to the story—they’re either very young or can remember their youth, with its sense of innocent wonder—and they settle in and listen eagerly.

“Believe me, my young friend, there is NOTHING—absolute nothing—half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats.”

The water rat loves to enjoy himself, and boats provide much of the fun. His enthusiasm infects Mole too. Rat’s life centers on the river, and boats are his way around it. He knows who he is and what he wants from life, and boats are a big part of that. Mole feels drawn to him precisely because Rat shows the rare quality of being at home with himself and his world.

“‘—about in boats—or WITH boats,’ the Rat went on composedly, picking himself up with a pleasant laugh. ‘In or out of ‘em, it doesn’t matter. Nothing seems really to matter, that’s the charm of it. Whether you get away, or whether you don’t; whether you arrive at your destination or whether you reach somewhere else, or whether you never get anywhere at all, you’re always busy, and you never do anything in particular; and when you’ve done it there’s always something else to do, and you can do it if you like, but you’d much better not.’”

Rat expands on his philosophy about how to enjoy oneself. The main point is to not become too focused on the goal but instead to enjoy the process of getting to it. Thus, travel on the river is more about the scenery and the warm sun and the friendly waving to friends than it is about correct rowing technique or whether the oarlocks are perfectly shiny. Those things are important but not vital. Rat’s philosophy about boats is also his philosophy of life.

“It’s my world, and I don’t want any other. What it hasn’t got is not worth having, and what it doesn’t know is not worth knowing.”

Rat knows himself and his world, and he finds it completely satisfying. He feels no need to take the risks of travel and go somewhere else when everything he wants and needs lies before him. His attitude is one of the book’s chief arguments: There’s no place like home, even for adventurers.

“‘Beyond the Wild Wood comes the Wide World,’ said the Rat. ‘And that’s something that doesn’t matter, either to you or me. I’ve never been there, and I’m never going, nor you either, if you’ve got any sense at all.’”

Young animals like Mole are well advised to stay away from places where the only interest the residents will show in them is whether they’re tasty morsels. Mole’s newfound world is so full of wonder and beauty that he can spend a lifetime there and not get restless. Still, things just out of reach exert their pull, and Rat speaks as much to himself as to Mole when he warns against wanderlust.

“Indeed, I have been a complete ass, and I know it. Will you overlook it this once and forgive me, and let things go on as before?”

Behaving like an impulsive child, Mole wrests away the oars from Rat and tries to row the boat but succeeds only in capsizing it. Such extremely rude behavior toward someone with whom Mole has only recently become acquainted might sink their new friendship. Mole realizes he’s become overwhelmed by the wonders of the above-ground world, and he quickly tries to make up for his uncivil behavior. Rat is very tolerant, but he appreciates Mole’s effort to undo a social error. If only Rat’s friend Mr. Toad, whose impulsive antics try everyone’s patience, were able to do the same.

“‘And to think I never KNEW!’ went on the Toad in a dreamy monotone. ‘All those wasted years that lie behind me, I never knew, never even DREAMT! But NOW—but now that I know, now that I fully realise! O what a flowery track lies spread before me, henceforth! What dust-clouds shall spring up behind me as I speed on my reckless way! What carts I shall fling carelessly into the ditch in the wake of my magnificent onset! Horrid little carts—common carts—canary-coloured carts!’”

Swept aside by a passing car, Toad discovers his next big passion—automobiles—and nothing will stop him from driving them. Unlike Rat, who simply enjoys his life on the water, Toad always searches for the next big thrill, and he abandons his previous hobby the instant he discovers the next one. He’s already fed up with his latest hobby, caravan travel, and he condemns it by his cart’s very color, canary-yellow, which he so loved just moments before. A passing automobile overturns it on the road—and in Toad’s mind.

“Drowsy animals, snug in their holes while wind and rain were battering at their doors, recalled […] the languorous siesta of hot mid-day, deep in green undergrowth, the sun striking through in tiny golden shafts and spots; the boating and bathing of the afternoon, the rambles along dusty lanes and through yellow cornfields; and the long, cool evening at last, when so many threads were gathered up, so many friendships rounded, and so many adventures planned for the morrow.”

Many locals drop in at Rat’s house during the winter to visit and tell stories of the previous spring and summer. The author’s vivid descriptions of nature at its most joyful highlight the book’s achievement as a literary masterpiece.

“The Wild Wood is pretty well populated by now; with all the usual lot, good, bad, and indifferent—I name no names. It takes all sorts to make a world.”

Badger explains to Mole that the Wild Wood, where Mole got lost and nearly became a weasel captive, isn’t as bad as it seems. Quite large compared to most Wild Wood residents, Badger has nothing to fear, but he understands that every place contains some who aren’t very good citizens. A bit of caution will foil their attempts at mischief, but, in case that’s not enough, being friends with Badger—the king of the Wild Woods—helps Mole.

“As he hurried along, eagerly anticipating the moment when he would be at home again among the things he knew and liked, the Mole saw clearly that he was an animal of tilled field and hedge-row, linked to the ploughed furrow, the frequented pasture, the lane of evening lingerings, the cultivated garden-plot. For others the asperities, the stubborn endurance, or the clash of actual conflict, that went with Nature in the rough; he must be wise, must keep to the pleasant places in which his lines were laid and which held adventure enough, in their way, to last for a lifetime.”

Mole is a creature of the quiet woods and fields—not someone who can live happily in a wilderness filled with dangerous predators. Although he loves his visit to Badger’s underground home in the Wild Wood, he’s very glad to return to the comforts of Rat’s home. No longer will he wander about, seeking adventure in places where he doesn’t know what he’s doing. His own world is quite interesting enough. The author thus implies that young children who wander too far from what they know may become lost and experience dire consequences. It’s better to build one’s skills before testing them against faraway places and strangers.

“[Mole] did not at all want to abandon the new life and its splendid spaces, to turn his back on sun and air and all they offered him and creep home and stay there; the upper world was all too strong, it called to him still, even down there, and he knew he must return to the larger stage. But it was good to think he had this to come back to; this place which was all his own, these things which were so glad to see him again and could always be counted upon for the same simple welcome.”

Unlike Toad, who can’t balance his needs for both adventure and domesticity, Mole learns, early on, that the call of sensation and the need to be home have equal weight, and that both demand respect. Mole reconnects to his old burrow, a place where he can escape to rest and safety as needed. From there, recharged, he can return to the wonders of the big river and all his friends.

“You’re so eloquent, dear Badger, and so moving, and so convincing, and put all your points so frightfully well—you can do what you like with me in THERE, and you know it. But I’ve been searching my mind since, and going over things in it, and I find that I’m not a bit sorry or repentant really, so it’s no earthly good saying I am; now, is it?”

Badger’s private sermon to Toad, exhorting him to cease his wild ways with automobiles and resume a more respectable life, moves Toad completely while he’s listening. Once Badger finishes his speech, though, Toad’s own thoughts—especially his endless drive to do exciting and dangerous things in cars—take over. It’s a lesson, not for Toad, but for Badger: He can preach all he wants, but his advice won’t stick with anyone whose deepest desires overcome it.

“[…] ‘I wonder if this sort of car STARTS easily?’ Next moment, hardly knowing how it came about, he found he had hold of the handle and was turning it. As the familiar sound broke forth, the old passion seized on Toad and completely mastered him, body and soul. As if in a dream he found himself, somehow, seated in the driver’s seat; as if in a dream, he pulled the lever and swung the car round the yard and out through the archway; and, as if in a dream, all sense of right and wrong, all fear of obvious consequences, seemed temporarily suspended. He increased his pace, and as the car devoured the street and leapt forth on the high road through the open country, he was only conscious that he was Toad once more, Toad at his best and highest, Toad the terror, the traffic-queller, the Lord of the lone trail, before whom all must give way or be smitten into nothingness and everlasting night.”

Toad escapes from his friends, who try in vain to cure him of his passion for speeding in cars, and he steals an automobile in town. He’s obsessed with the excitement of cars, addicted to the sounds and smells, and crazy for the open road. Driving puts him into a druglike trance—hardly a safe state of mind when operating a large and dangerous machine—and this compulsion drives much of the story’s plot. As important to Toad as the thrill of speed is how driving makes him feel: important and heroic. For him, this sensation may be the most compelling of all.

“For this is the last best gift that the kindly demi-god is careful to bestow on those to whom he has revealed himself in their helping: the gift of forgetfulness. Lest the awful remembrance should remain and grow, and overshadow mirth and pleasure, and the great haunting memory should spoil all the after-lives of little animals helped out of difficulties, in order that they should be happy and lighthearted as before.”

The great demigod Pan saves and protects young Portly until Rat and Mole can find him—and then wafts a breeze over them that causes them to forget, lest their vision of the glorious deity make the rest of their lives pale in comparison.

“Lest the awe should dwell—And turn your frolic to fret—You shall look on my power at the helping hour—But then you shall forget! […] Lest limbs be reddened and rent—I spring the trap that is set—As I loose the snare you may glimpse me there—For surely you shall forget! […] Helper and healer, I cheer—Small waifs in the woodland wet—Strays I find in it, wounds I bind in it—Bidding them all forget!”

Rat hears on the wind faint words that almost revive his memory of Pan. Soon, even that will fade, but he intently tries to recall something so alluring. If only he can remember it, he thinks, he’ll be happy. Pan knows better, and soon all traces of Rat’s vision, one too lovely for the human mind to receive without damage, are gone.

“When Toad found himself immured in a dank and noisome dungeon, and knew that all the grim darkness of a medieval fortress lay between him and the outer world of sunshine and well-metalled high roads where he had lately been so happy, disporting himself as if he had bought up every road in England, he flung himself at full length on the floor, and shed bitter tears, and abandoned himself to dark despair. ‘This is the end of everything’ (he said), ‘at least it is the end of the career of Toad, which is the same thing; the popular and handsome Toad, the rich and hospitable Toad, the Toad so free and careless and debonair!’”

Imprisoned for car theft, reckless driving, and sassing police officers, Toad faces 20 years of misery, and no one would begrudge him a large dose of self-pity. Toad, however, loves to over-dramatize himself: When times are good, he’s the greatest toad alive, and when they’re bad, things are utterly hopeless. His emotional extremes are part of what puts him on the path to trouble: When an activity excites him, he overindulges in it, gets into accidents, injures himself, and even damages others during his sprees. His mind rushes from ecstasy to misery, the bad parts pushing him to repeat his mistakes in a wild search to feel, once again, the good parts.

“Nature’s Grand Hotel has its Season, like the others. As the guests one by one pack, pay, and depart, and the seats at the table-d’hote shrink pitifully at each succeeding meal; as suites of rooms are closed, carpets taken up, and waiters sent away; those boarders who are staying on, en pension, until the next year’s full re-opening, cannot help being somewhat affected by all these flittings and farewells, this eager discussion of plans, routes, and fresh quarters, this daily shrinkage in the stream of comradeship. One gets unsettled, depressed, and inclined to be querulous. Why this craving for change? Why not stay on quietly here, like us, and be jolly?”

The departure of seasonal animals accelerates as fall approaches, and suddenly Rat’s happy neighborhood takes on the forlorn and empty look of a resort abandoned by summer visitors. He loves the chit-chat and camaraderie of the river, and when he has few with whom to share that happiness, Rat loses his own contentment. He begins to wonder whether his beloved river is as wonderful as he thought, back when it was much more crowded with animal life.

“‘Why do you ever come back, then, at all?’ [Rat] demanded of the swallows jealously. ‘What do you find to attract you in this poor drab little country?’ ‘And do you think,’ said the first swallow, ‘that the other call is not for us too, in its due season? The call of lush meadow-grass, wet orchards, warm, insect-haunted ponds, of browsing cattle, of haymaking, and all the farm-buildings clustering round the House of the perfect Eaves?’”

Rat, who never wonders what lies beyond the horizon, suddenly envies the birds that prepare to fly south for the winter toward distant lands and warmer sunlight. Rat sees life as home-bound contentment, but now he wonders if wandering might be better. The birds understand that both are important. They’ll return soon to build their nests beneath those perfect eaves.

“[…] to-day, the unseen was everything, the unknown the only real fact of life. On this side of the hills was now the real blank, on the other lay the crowded and coloured panorama that his inner eye was seeing so clearly. What seas lay beyond, green, leaping, and crested! What sun-bathed coasts, along which the white villas glittered against the olive woods! What quiet harbours, thronged with gallant shipping bound for purple islands of wine and spice, islands set low in languorous waters!”

Rat’s yearning for travel erupts: He wants to see distant horizons, where untold wonders and beautiful landscapes beckon. His beloved riverside world suddenly seems dull; his imagination teems with better things just beyond the hills. Love of home battles with love of the exotic, and Rat feels pulled from his normal life.

“And you, you will come too, young brother; for the days pass, and never return, and the South still waits for you. Take the Adventure, heed the call, now ere the irrevocable moment passes! ‘Tis but a banging of the door behind you, a blithesome step forward, and you are out of the old life and into the new! Then some day, some day long hence, jog home here if you will, when the cup has been drained and the play has been played, and sit down by your quiet river with a store of goodly memories for company.”

Rat’s visitor tempts him with visions of travel to distant, exotic lands. Mesmerized, Rat is ready to take to the sea in search of the romantic coastal cities of the world. Not everyone, though, is fit for a life of wandering: Some give up more than they expect when they leave their home turf, hoping for greener pastures and new vistas. Such a temptation can speak to the heart more loudly than the soft whispers of life at home, and it’s not always possible to choose wisely.

“[…] what a clever Toad I am! There is surely no animal equal to me for cleverness in the whole world! My enemies shut me up in prison, encircled by sentries, watched night and day by warders; I walk out through them all, by sheer ability coupled with courage. They pursue me with engines, and policemen, and revolvers; I snap my fingers at them, and vanish, laughing, into space. I am, unfortunately, thrown into a canal by a woman fat of body and very evil-minded. What of it? I swim ashore, I seize her horse, I ride off in triumph, and I sell the horse for a whole pocketful of money and an excellent breakfast! Ho, ho! I am The Toad, the handsome, the popular, the successful Toad!”

Toad thinks very highly of himself, especially when he believes he’s getting the better of life. He doesn’t realize that, primarily, life is getting the better of him. His boyish enthusiasm for adventure, though, always wins out, and it’s hard not to enjoy the gleeful suspense as Toad marches confidently—and completely unwittingly, straight toward his comeuppance.

“The motor-car went Poop-poop-poop, As it raced along the road. Who was it steered it into a pond? Ingenious Mr. Toad!”

Toad drives the same car he stole into a pond but then escapes and, singing a silly ditty in his own honor, thrills to the mischief he caused. Toad needs a reckoning, but somehow fate again smiles on his shenanigans. In the grand tradition of literary comedy, the garrulous and arrogant amphibian usually comes out on top. Trouble continues to find him, and he continues to escape the consequences relatively unscathed—but just barely.

“‘Now I’m going to tell you a great secret.’ Toad sat up slowly and dried his eyes. Secrets had an immense attraction for him, because he never could keep one, and he enjoyed the sort of unhallowed thrill he experienced when he went and told another animal, after having faithfully promised not to.”

Everyone loves to share secrets, but only the most honorable keep them. Toad isn’t one of those. Secrets hold great power, and it’s a thrill—and an exercise of power—to whisper them to others. Toad loves most of all to show of what he knows; thus, telling him a secret is the same thing as giving it away to the world. In this case, Toad needs to know about a secret passageway into his estate to successfully roust the weasels from his home.