The Tragedy of Peter Pan

Peter Pan is a delightful adventure that conjures pirates, fairy dust, mermaids, and being up long past bedtime. Peter Pan himself is the magical boy of eternal youth that can steal you away from your window and carry you to Neverland. But, as the book points out, there is no such thing as eternal youth--everybody must grow up. Except one.

Peter Pan is famous for insisting that he will NEVER grow up. Consequently, he will also never mature. He will retain his youth along with his juvenile worldview and emotions. While it is wondrous to see the world through the eyes of a child, a child's comprehension is very limited, and their entire focus is on their own well-being. Peter Pan is extremely limited in this respect, and his millennia as a never-aging child give him a rather sinister quality.

For example, after he first meets Wendy and turns to go, she entreats him to stay by saying she could tell him lots of stories. The narrator tells us that Peter "came back, and there was a greedy look in his eyes now which ought to have alarmed her but did not" (Barrie 26). He wants Wendy (or rather, her stories) for himself, and he intends to take her. While persuading her to come, Peter "had become frightfully cunning. 'Wendy,' he said, 'how we should all respect you'" (27).

He does convince the Darlings to accompany him to Neverland. It's a long way, and they get tired. Sometimes, they fall asleep and drop out of the sky, and Peter catches them, but "he always waited till the last moment, and you felt it was his cleverness that interested him and not the saving of human life" (32). 

While the Narrator is describing Neverland, he notes that "the boys on the island vary, of course, in numbers, according as they got killed and so on; and when they seemed to be growing up, which is against the rules, Peter thins them out" (39). That is one of the most disturbing things the Narrator has told us yet--Peter kills off the Lost Boys if they get too old. Another rather violent suggestion the Narrator makes is in the discussion of each boy's unique, perfectly-fitted entrance to their tree-house: "if you are bumpy in awkward places or the only available tree is an odd shape, Peter does some things to you, and after that you fit" (56).

Peter's undiminished hatred toward adults is also evident throughout the story, from his ban on all talk of mothers to the moment when he deliberately takes as many quick, short breaths as he can because he heard a saying that doing so kills grownups (65). It is indicated that Peter was abandoned as a baby and afterward came to Neverland; his resentment and abhorrence for adults is obviously a result of this incident. It is ultimately this that makes him tragic: he can never grow up, and so he hates those who can and will never understand the things they understand or have the love they have.

All of these examples show that eternal youth, especially when that means perpetual childhood, is actually a horrible fate. Peter is only capable of a child's selfish love and seems to have lost his appreciation for the sanctity of human life. He has become extremely manipulative and cunning. He plays with others' lives casually and eliminates them when he is bored. Additionally, because of his immature state, he is incapable of the relational love between a man and a woman: "'You are so [strange],' he said, frankly puzzled, 'And Tiger Lily is just the same. There is something she wants to be to me, but she says it is not my mother'" (81). 

Perhaps the most tragic moment of all occurs when Peter is looking back through the window at the happily reunited Darling family and the newly adopted Lost Boys, and knowing that "he was looking through the window at the one joy from which he must be forever barred" (126). All Peter can do is forget and find new children, all over again.

Peter's whole personality is summed up perfectly by the Narrator's description of every child: "Off we skip like the most heartless things in the world, which is what children are, but so attractive, and we have an entirely selfish time, and then when we have need of special attention we nobly return for it, confident that we shall be embraced instead of smacked" (85). Peter can never grow up to be the one doing the embracing. And that is tragic.

You Before Me

Nearly everyone has heard of the book-turned-movie Me Before You by JoJo Moyes. If you haven't, you've clearly been living under a rock. However, the title alone says a lot--when I first saw it, I thought, "Gee, that's pretty selfish." And guess what? It is.

This book/movie is being presented to society with #liveboldly as its moniker, and tries to skim over the assisted suicide part. AHEM. That's right, assisted suicide.

The book is about mid-30s William Traynor who, because of an accident, is now a paraplegic, very nearly a quadriplegic. A young female caregiver is hired, and she soon realizes she is a babysitter to prevent him from attempting suicide again. He has agreed to behave for 6 months, after which time his parents have agreed to take him to an assisted-suicide facility in Switzerland, where they can legally get away with it. Once she learns this, our narrator tries everything she can to get him to realize life is worth living. By the end of the six months, Will actually has the gall to tell her that, while he does love her, she is "not enough," and he still wants to die. What a crushing blow, in more ways than one! First, he tells her she's not good enough. Then he adds insult to injury by saying he's going to kill himself, AND HE WANTS HER TO BE THERE. And do you know what? After an initial, angry refusal--she does it!

This is so horrific on so many levels, but for the sake of time I will only address the most prominent: Will's assisted suicide.

Ponder this for a moment: murder is universally recognized as wrong, isn't it? When somebody kills another person, completely unprovoked, they are punished and sent to prison. Why? Because it is wrong. No one has the right to take the life of another. In this, we recognize the value of human life. Why is it suddenly different when someone wants to take their own life? It isn't.

The Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in their Iura et Bona ("Declaration on Euthanasia") declares that "No one can make an attempt on the life of an innocent person without...violating a fundamental right, and therefore without committing a crime of the utmost gravity. Everyone has a duty to lead his or her life in accordance with God's plan. That life is entrusted to the individual as a good that must bear fruit already here on earth...but finds its full perfection only in eternal life. Intentionally causing one's own death, or suicide, is therefore equally as wrong as murder; such an action on the part of a person is to be considered as a rejection of God's sovereignty and loving plan. Furthermore, suicide is also often a refusal of love for self, the denial of the natural instinct to live, a flight from the duties of justice and charity owed to one's neighbor...although, as is generally recognized, at times there are psychological factors...that can diminish responsibility or even completely remove it" (Decleration on Euthanasia 5).

It is important to understand that euthanasia is an action or omission that causes death with the intent to eliminate suffering, as was Will's intent in asking for his own death. It is never acceptable to permit the killing of any human life. In fact, "The pleas of gravely ill people who sometimes ask for death are not to be understood as implying a true desire for euthanasia; in fact, it is almost always a case of an anguished plea for help and love" (Euthanasia 6-7).

Yes, suffering can be horrible and debilitating, but "suffering, especially suffering during the last moments of life, has a special place in God's saving plan; it is in fact a sharing in Christ's passion and a union with the redeeming sacrifice which He offered in obedience to the Father's will" (Euthanasia 7).

Suffering can help one grow in the virtues of humility and patience, among others. Absolutely every life is worth living, no matter how difficult to live that life is. It is not up to us to decide when we are finished. We did not give ourselves life; we cannot, under any circumstances, take it away.

If you are interested in reading the entirety of Iura et Bona, please visit this link to the Vatican website with the full document: Declaration on Euthanasia