Lesson 5

Should Wizard Hit Mommy

Introduction
Little children love to hear stories from their parents at bedtime. Such stories are mostly fables and have no
logic behind them. Many a time, parents make up stories out of their own head. Little children take them as
literally true. But as the child grows up, he becomes inquisitive. He begins to ask many questions. He wants
to know why and how certain things happen. He wants to know the reason behind things. Sometimes parents
take this questioning of the child as an affront. They try to discourage it.
They want the child to accept as true whatever is said to him. Is such an attitude desirable? This story poses
this very question. A father tells his child a story out of his head. The child interrupts him a number of times.
She raises questions whenever she feels that the story is wrong. The father feels himself caught in an ugly
middle position. He does not know whether he should accept the child’s version or stick to his own. Thus the
story raises a moral issue and leaves it to the reader to resolve it.
Theme
The story raises a moral issue if the parents should always decide what the children should do or let the children
do what they like to do. Children dream and live in their own magical world. They are devoid of despise,
ugliness, and petty differences. They are pure at heart. This story raises a moral question at this point, “Should
Wizard hit Mommy?” Jo feels that he must. Jack says that it would be wrong because a mommy is always
right. She should be loved and respected.
Characters
1. Joanne: a four year old girl, lovingly called as ‘Jo’.
2. Jack: Father of Joanne
3. Clare: Wife of Jack, mother of Joanne.
4. Skunk: a baby creature with a bad smell.
5. Mother Skunk: Mother of baby Skunk.
6. Owl: a wise creature that solves the problems.
7. Wizard: A magician.
Points to Remember
1. Jack (father) used to tell stories to Jo (little daughter).
2. Every story had a little variation from the basic tale.
3. Each story had a little creature Roger, a wise old owl and a wizard.
4. New story was about Roger Skunk.
5. Roger Skunk smelled very badly.
6. All little animals kept away from him and didn’t play with him.
7. He went to the wise old owl who advised him to go to the wizard.
8. The wizard demanded seven pennies. Roger had four and found three more in a magic well.
9. He gave the wizard seven pennies who made Roger Skunk smell like roses.
10. Roger became happy and other animals began to play with him again.
11. Roger’s mother got angry. She didn’t like her son smelling of roses.
12. His mother took him straight back to the wizard and hit the wizard on his head.
13. The wizard made Roger Skunk smell bad again.
14. Roger’s mother was very happy now.
15. But Jo wanted a little change in the story. She wanted that the wizard hit the mommy and
Roger smelled roses again.
16. But Jack made no changes in the ending.
Gist of the Lesson
1. The chapter captures a very sensitive reaction of a small girl to an important aspect of the story that
her father narrates to her.
2. The story reveals the worldview of a little child to a difficult moral question that shows her mental or
psychological richness.
3. Jo is a little girl of four years. She is engaged in a story session with her father.
4. Jack, the father used to tell her a story every evening and especially for Saturday naps jo feels herself
involved with the characters and the happenings.
5. The story always had an animal with a problem. The old owl advises him to visit the wizard who would
solve the problem.
6. Skunk’s problem- he smelt bad, visited the wizard who changed it to the smell of roses.
7. Skunk’s mother was unhappy with it and took him back to the wizard. She hit the wizard and asked
him to restore the original smell. She wanted her son to keep his identity of a skunk and wanted his
friends to accept him for himself. So the wizard changes him back to smell like a skunk.
8. After hearing the story of Roger Skunk Jo was not happy with the ending.
9. She wants her father to change the ending. She wants the wizard to hit the mother back and let Roger
be which her father was not ready to do to establish his authority. This raises a difficult moral question
whether parents possess the right to impose their will on their children.
10. Her father finds it difficult to answer her question.

TEXTBOOK QUESTIONS
Think as you read (Page 48)
1. Who is Jo? How does she respond to her father’s story-telling?
Jo is a little girl who is four-year-old. Her full name is Joanne and Jo is her nick-name. His father has been
telling her a story out of his head in the evenings and for Saturday naps. Previously she would fall asleep after
listening the story. But now she had started asking questions. When he told her spiders ate bugs, she would
ask her mother, “Do they really?”
Read and find out (Page 53)
1. What possible plot line could the story continue with?
Jo’s father Jack was telling her the story of Roger Skunk, who smelled very bad. The wise old Owl asks him
to go to the Wizard who will help him. Moreover, he would solve his problem of bad smell. The Wizard was
a tiny little old man with a long white heard. Roger Skunk told him that all the little animals run away from
him because he smells so bad. The Wizard thoroughly searched and found an old stick called a magic wand.
He asked Roger Skunk what he wanted to smell like. Roger Skunk told him that he would like to smell like
roses.
The Wizard chanted and Roger Skunk started smelling like roses. When Roger Skunk went home, his mummy
said, “What’s that awful smell?” Roger Skunk said that it was he who smelt like roses. She asked him who
made him smell like that. Roger Skunk said that the Wizard did so.
She said that they were going right back to that Wizard. Roger Skunk said that all the other animals would run
away because of his bad smell. But his mummy said she did not care. They went to the Wizard who made him
to smell bad again. She said then that he smelled the way a little Skunk should have smelled. At this twist of
the story Jo said, “No” and put her hand out to touch his lips. She said then the Wizard hit her on the head and
did not change that little Skunk back. But Jack said in negative.
Read and find out (Page 54)
1. What do you think was Jo’s problem?
Jo’s problem was that she did not like that the Mummy Skunk should get the smell of Roger Skunk changed
from the smell of roses to the previous unpleasant bad smell. She strongely feels that Roger Skunk’s mummy
should not approach the Wizard to change the smell of roses. As a very little child, she failed to understand
why Roger Skunk’s mummy wanted it.
Reading with insight
1. What is the moral issue that the story raises?
Jo is a four-year-old little girl whose father tells her a story in the evenings and for Saturday nap. He tells her
nearly the same story with a little variation. He was telling her a story about Roger Skunk who smelt very bad.
The wise old owl directs him to the Wizard for his problem of smell. He does not like the smell of his body
because little animals refuse to play with him. So the Wizard changes the smell of her body and he smells like
roses now.
But when he goes home, her mummy is not happy with the smell he had acquired now. So she takes him back
to the Wizard and he again smelt bad. But Jo feels that Roger Skunk’s mummy should not have done so. She
wants that the Wizard should hit her on the head. So the moral issue that the story raises is that whether
mothers should do what their children like or they should do what they feel is right even if the children feel
otherwise.
2. How does Jo want the story to end and why?
Jo does not like that part of the story when Roger Skunk’s mummy takes him to the Wizard to get the smell
of his body from the smell of roses to the unpleasant bad smell he previously had. Jo is hardly four-year-old
girl, so she cannot understand why Roger Skunk’s mummy was doing so. She grew a sort of repulsion for
Roger’s mummy. She feels that the Wizard should hit her on the head and should not change that little Skunk
back. But Jack said that the Wizard said O.K. and Roger Skunk did not smell of roses anymore and smelled
very bad again.
Jo felt that Roger Skunk’s mummy was a stupid mummy. But Jack said emphatically that she was not a stupid
mummy. Jo told her father that she wanted him to tell her the story that Wizard took that magic wand and hit
Roger Skunk’s mummy, right over the head. That is how Jo wants the story to end because she strongly feels
that Roger’s mummy should not have done so.
3. Why does Jack insist that it was the Wizard that was hit and not the mother?
The little Jo wanted that the Mummy Skunk should not get the smell of Roger Skunk from the smell of roses
to his previous unpleasant bad smell. When Jack told her that Roger Skunk’s mummy took him to the Wizard
and hit the Wizard right over the head, Jo said no. She put her hand out to touch his lips, yet even in her
agitation she did not quite dare to stop the source of truth. Then inspiration came to her.
She said the Wizard hit Roger’s mummy on the head, and did not change that little Skunk’s smell of roses.
But Jack insisted that it was the Wizard that was hit and not the mother of Roger Skunk. He said that the point
was that the little Skunk loved his mummy more than he loved all the other little animals and she knew what
was right. Jack insisted because he wanted to convince Jo that Roger’s mother was right to do what she did.
4. What makes Jack feel caught in an ugly middle position?
Jack’s childhood experiences do not seem to be smooth and pleasant. When he narrated how Roger Skunk
was jeered at and was not allowed to play with other little animals, he remembered certain “humiliations of
his own childhood”. Jo said about the mummy Skunk that she was a stupid mummy. He said emphatically
that she was not stupid. At the same time he believed from Jo’s expression that he was defending her own
mother.
But he could not let Jo believe that Roger Skunk’s mummy was not right. So he says that the point was that
the little Skunk loved his mummy more than he loved all the animals and she knew what was right. When
Jack went to Clare he saw that the woodwork, a cage of mouldings and rails and baseboards all around them,
was half old tan and half new ivory. Then he felt caught in an ugly middle position. He could not let Jo think
that mother could be wrong though he knew how his mother had treated him. That is why he felt that he was
caught in an ugly middle position.
5. What is your stance regarding the two endings to the Roger Skunk story?
The two endings of the story are one by Jack as he told to Jo and, the second is what Jo told him to end the
story. Roger Skunk smelled very bad and the Wizard turned him to smell like roses. When he went to his
home, his mother said that the smell was awful. His mother said that the little Skunk should smell the way a
little Skunk should have smelled. So, she takes Roger Skunk to the Wizard, hit him on the head and the Wizard
changed the smell of the Roger Skunk again to a bad one. But Jo insisted that the Wizard hit Roger Skunk’s
mummy on the head and he did not change the smell of roses.
I think both Jo and Jack were thinking in their own way. Jack did not want to let Jo believe that mummy could
be wrong. Jo as a child did not want that Roger Skunk should suffer because of his smell because the little
animals did not play with him because of his bad smell.
I think the ending of the story which Jack told would be more suitable. Roger Skunk smelling of roses would
seem quite odd amongst other Skunks. Moreover Roger Skunk should do what her mother says because love
of her mother for the little Skunk should be more important than playing with other little animals.
6. Why is an adult’s perspective on life different from that of a child’s?
An adult’s perspective on life is different from that of a child’s. It is because a child symbolises innocence,
whereas an adult symbolises experience. A child’s mind is pure, simple and devoid of any deception or
doublemindedness. But an adult undergoes many experiences in life which make him more mature and
worldwide. A child has to learn by virtue of his own experiences, whereas an adult can foresee the future
circumstances and act accordingly.
In the story ‘Should Wizard Hit Mommy’? A child’s perspective on life is shown through the four-year-old
Jo. She represents innocence. But the prospective of an adult is shown through Jack, who represents
experience, maturity, practical wisdom and the realities of life. That is why Jo thinks that what Roger’s
mummy did to get his smell changed was wrong. On the other hand, Jack tries to justify that what she did was
right.