1.20 How Daddy performed at a school party
A bedtime story from 'When Daddy was a little boy' by Alexander Raskin
A story from a dad’s childhood, narrated to his daughter, written in 1961. Read the introduction below.
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HOW DADDY PERFORMED AT A SCHOOL PARTY
When Daddy was little, a neighbouring school invited his school to be their guests at a school party. It was a return visit. The other children had performed at a party at Daddy's school. They had sung, danced, recited poems and put on a gym show. They had even produced a scene from Pushkin's Boris Godunov.
True, the boy who had played Grigory had got stuck on the window-sill when he was supposed to jump through the window and had pulled down the whole set. But this could have happened to anyone. On the whole, they performed very well.
Now, Daddy's school was to perform at the neighbouring school. They wanted to astound the other children. But how could they do that? They talked it over.
"We can sing, but so can they. We can dance, but they also dance. They're even better than we are. But our gymnasts are almost just as good as theirs. And if our pyramid falls down, well, their whole set fell down. We can recite poetry, but so can they. What do we have that they don't?"
Everyone began to think hard.
"We've got Misha Gorbunov," someone finally said. Then everyone began to laugh and shout:
"He can bark!"
"He can crow!"
"He can miaow!"
"He can walk on his hands!"
"Please don't all shout together!" the teacher said.
The noise died down and Misha said: "So what? Anybody can do that. If I knew how to write poetry, that would really be something."
And he looked at little Daddy. Everyone else looked at little Daddy, too. The teacher said: "How right you are! We have our own poet."
"And they don't!" the children shouted.
Then little Daddy said that he had never performed on a stage and in a strange school, besides, to say nothing of the fact that he would be reciting his own poems.
But by then everyone was shouting:
"Don't worry about that!"
"That doesn't matter!"
And the teacher said: "Everything will be fine. But don't forget that you're not
Pushkin."
She had said this to him before and he had not forgotten.
The terrible day finally dawned. Little Daddy, trembling with fear, set off for the strange school together with the gymnasts, dancers and singers. He was standing in the wings of a strange stage, looking out at a strange auditorium.
It was filled with strange boys and strange girls. Sitting in the front row were a strange principal and strange teachers. They were all looking at the stage with strange eyes and laughing strangely.
You have probably realised by now that the auditorium was filled with very ordinary boys and girls and teachers. They looked at the stage, laughed and clapped exactly as everyone did in little Daddy's school. But little Daddy had such a case of stage fright in the strange school that everything seemed odd.
In vain did Misha whisper in his ear: "There's nothing to this school. It's the same kind of people as in ours, even worse."
In vain did the girls give him sweets.
In vain did the teacher say: "Shame on you! You know the poems by heart, don't you?"
"Yes," little Daddy answered with trembling lips.
And finally the terrible moment arrived.
"You will now hear a poem written and recited by our school poet," he heard the announcer say.
Everyone applauded. Misha shoved little Daddy and little Daddy, dragging his leaden feet, stumbled out. He had never been so terror-stricken in his life.
The auditorium was spinning. His mouth was as dry as dust. And there was a strange and steady buzz in his ears that sounded like the pounding of the surf.
Little Daddy couldn't make out a single face in the audience. Instead, he saw a great coloured splash moving in fast circles. It was clapping. Then everything became quiet. Everyone was waiting for his poem. But little Daddy just stood there.
Later Misha said that at first little Daddy had been as white as a sheet, then he had suddenly turned blue, then he had become green and covered all over with red spots.
"You should have seen him!" Misha said. "He was just like fireworks! I'll bet no one in their school can do that!"
Then someone in the audience laughed and little Daddy finally began to recite the anthem he had written for his school. At first, everyone listened attentively, but when he got as far as the refrain, the audience became noisy.
This is how the refrain went:
If you were braver than Robin Hood
And looked in every dale and wood,
You'd never find a finer band
Than School 23 in all the land!Since the party was taking place at School No. 9, the children didn't agree with what little Daddy was saying. Naturally they felt that the honour of their school was at stake and they began stamping and shouting.
Little Daddy was too frightened to understand what it was all about. He raised his hand and said: "Please don't interrupt me in the middle of a line. When I finish the stanza you can make all the noise you like."
Everything became quiet. Little Daddy did not realise that he had sealed his doom by making such a request. The children in School No. 9 were very clever. And the recital continued as a merry game. Little Daddy would recite a stanza and everything would be quiet. But then he would come to the refrain and pandemonium would break loose. The children howled, barked, whistled and stamped their feet.
Then the noise would die down. Little Daddy would falter through the next stanza. And the noise would begin again. The poem had very many stanzas and little Daddy kept on reciting one after another until the very end.
When he finally ended, everyone was dying of laughter, both the audience and those who were standing in the wings, all the strange children and his own schoolmates. Misha was rolling around on the floor. His teacher was also laughing. Little Daddy could never forget the disgrace.
Many years have passed. Little Daddy has grown up. But to this very day if a middle-aged stranger suddenly rushes towards Daddy shouting: "If you were braver than Robin Hood!" and then miaows before he disappears, Daddy knows that this middle-aged man used to go to School No. 9 when he was a boy.
He still remembers Daddy's poem. And Daddy has never forgotten that he is not Pushkin.
THE END
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