A Mother’s Warning
Billy’s mother has succeeded in two things at once. She has made Billy afraid of the possibilities existing with the woods he could see through his window. At the same time, she has piqued his curiosity to the point of obsessive desire to explore the woods himself. This has been accomplished through imaginative use of imagery that includes the rather foreboding name attributed to the area as well as suggestive names for the creatures lying in wait there. A popular poem among the locals is of great assistance in facilitating this mixture of dread and inquisitiveness:
“Beware! Beware! The Forest of Sin!
None come out, but many go in!”
And the name of the monsters:
“Whangdoodles are worse and Hornswogglers and Snozzwanglers and Vermicious Knids. And worst of all is the Terrible Bloodsuckling Toothpluckling Stonechcukling Spittler.”
Entering the Forest of Sin
The imagery used in describing the woods the first time Billy enters it very strongly and suggestively conveys the sense of fear of the place his mother has endowed in her son. The language is equitable to entering not just a natural area of growth not yet fallen victim to the progress of development, but an entirely different part of the world. Perhaps some place not even of this world:
“Very very slowly, he walked forward into the great forest. Giant trees were soon surrounding him on all sides and their branches made an almost solid roof high above his head, blotting out the sky. Here and there little shafts of sunlight shone through gaps in the roof. There was not a sound anywhere. It was like being among the dead men in an enormous empty green cathedral.”
The Gruncher
As it just so happens to turn out, Billy’s mom was right to a point. Although just one monster exists and she didn’t get the name right, the Gruncher does exist. The imagery used to describe him by those who know he exists—the Minpins—is a compilation of increasingly terrifying details:
“He can never see anything in front of him because of all the smoke he belches out from his nose and mouth…they began to smell the revolting hot stench of the Gruncher’s breath…his back legs, huge and black and very hairy, shaped lie lions’ legs but ten time as big. And it is rumored that his head is like an enormous crocodile’s head, with rows and rows and rows of sharp pointed teeth.”
Death of the Gruncher
The demise of the Gruncher after a sort of dogfight with Billy riding on the back of an enormous swan is painted in vivid imagery. Metaphorical language punctuates the action to transform the moment into high drama that is, surprisingly, accompanied only by a very abstract illustration that is hardly representative of the description:
“Swan flew straight towards the lake. It skimmed low over the water. The Gruncher kept going.
Little Billy, looking back, saw the Gruncher plunging right into the lake, and then the whole lake seemed to erupt in a mass of boiling steaming frothing bubbling water.
For a brief moment, the terrible Red-Hot Smoke-Belching Gruncher made the lake boil and smoke like a volcano, then the fire went out and the awesome beast disappeared under the waves.”
