Goodnight nobody?
Categories: Development, Education
Have you ever read the story "Goodnight Moon" by Margaret Wise Brown? Most of you are probably quite familiar with this bedtime tale, as it is more than 60 years old at this point. It wasn't until I became pregnant and was given a copy at a baby shower that I became aware--and enamored--of it.
"Goodnight Moon" is the story of a little bunny who says goodnight to all the things in his room before he goes to sleep. It's an evening ritual in which many children partake. The bunny says 'goodnight' to many things in his room, which is to say his whole world, including kittens, mittens, clocks and socks and other things that rhyme.
He also says 'goodnight' to nobody. Literally, in the text there is blank page except for what he says: "Goodnight nobody."
I don't get it. Seriously. I don't get it. My one girlfriend who was also unfamiliar with the book until she had a child said she had to read it many times over before she got it. And she can't explain it.
Oddly enough, it seems appropriate for the story given the young readers for whom it is intended. Still, one would think I was mature enough to understand the fine inner workings of Goodnight Moon. Perhaps not.
I mean, I get "Brown Bear, Brown Bear" and "Guess How Much I Love You" and other kids books. I get "Where the Wild Things Are." But Goodnight Moon has me stumped.
When I was a kid we didn't have such stories, those that asked for a little more imagination. I had Cinderella and Snow White and Sleeping Beauty. Those stories were straightforward and easy to digest. I didn't have a book that tried to get me to think about the concept of nobody, let alone saying goodnight to no one.
My son seems to understand. He is nearly 4 months old. He smiles or coos at 'goodnight nobody.'
Perhaps whenhe's is old enough he can explain it to me.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
WhatWorksForMom 7-20-2007 @ 8:33AM
GOOD question! My husband and I have pondered this same exact thing!
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cancoi 7-20-2007 @ 8:59AM
Hubby and I believe it is just the ramblings of a small child who doesn't want to go to bed, putting it off by saying goodnight to everything in the room. And, if you notice, the "goodnight nobody" comes before the "goodnight mush", which is probably an indication of the bunny's love of mush.
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Amy 7-20-2007 @ 9:06AM
He was originally going to say "Goodnight bunny," on that page, but after the cannibalistic rabbit in the painting caught and ate the bunny, there was no one left to say "Goodnight" to, hence, "Goodnight Nobody."
(Seriously, check out the painting!)
Amy
http://prettybabies.blogspot.com
Revealing the Universe's Mysteries, one children's book at a time!
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Adrienne 7-20-2007 @ 9:18AM
Amy, I have a question about the painting you are referring to. Are you talking about the painting of the bunny fishing on the page that says "Goodnight room"? If so, that is an illustration from another of Margaret Wise Brown's books entitled "Runaway Bunny". That painting is an illustration depicting the baby bunny telling his mommy that he would be a trout in a stream to run away from her. The mother replies that she would be the fisherman who catches the trout.
"Runaway Bunny" is another really great story. The premise behind is that no matter where the baby bunny goes or what he chooses to do, his mommy will always be the one who finds/rescues him. In the end, the bunny decides not to runaway if his mommy will always find him.
As for the "goodnight nobody" mystery...I'm stumped as well!
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Amy 7-20-2007 @ 9:20AM
Adrienne - cannibalistic bunnies are funnier!! :)
I am familiar with Runaway Bunny. My husband and I call it Stalker Bunny. Because if the big bunny were the ex boyfriend instead of the Mom, or something, woah.
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Kim 7-20-2007 @ 10:09AM
I've been reading Goodnight Moon to my two year old for many months. I don't get it either. He likes it so I just go with it, though Dinosaur's Binkit is the current favorite nighttime ritual book.
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Ann Adams 7-20-2007 @ 10:23AM
I'll have to drag it out and look at it again. We wore it out when the girls were little.
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Ann Adams 7-20-2007 @ 10:26AM
Although, thinking about it a little more, I agree with Cancol. The child has run out of tangible object to continue the bedtime stall.
I remember, as I'm sure many of you do, the kids with their bedtime prayers. If I let them, they could tie up another 15 minutes or so while working their through all of us, their cousins, their aunts and uncles, the pets. If all else failed, they'd start on the kids in their class.
Rebecca can still turn a simple table grace into a sermon.
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Ann Adams 7-20-2007 @ 10:29AM
Drat. I can understand my skipping a letter from time to time on a sticky keyboard but an entire word?
Should have been "while working their way through"
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jenniferlallen 7-20-2007 @ 10:58AM
Why so literal? As the story winds down, and my voice tends to get softer and quieter, it seems to go along with the drooping eyes of my son and hopefully his upcoming sweet dreams. Its about the night melting into sleep and dreams. It is actually one of my favorite pages, besides getting to draw out the hushhhhh of "good night to the old lady whispering hushhhhh".
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Lacy 7-20-2007 @ 11:00AM
It's a classic story for children. You just read it, accept it, and move on! There's lots of craziness in the literary world of childrens stories. The Old Woman who Lived in a Shoe...spanked them all soundly, etc. Call CPS on that woman! Humpy Dumpty....a bad acid trip? Little Red Riding Hood - Grandma gets eaten alive by a wolf in her own bedroom? The things we read to our children..... :)
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Mike K 7-20-2007 @ 12:59PM
I read this to my son literally every night and have done so for about a year now. I think "nobody" fits a lot of rolls, first, to maintain cadence, next to reference the empty space, ie the distance between here and there, that has no name in the room, and finally, as others have said, to stall.
If we want to be philosophical about it, it probably references a higher power that has no name.
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silver 7-20-2007 @ 8:27PM
When you were a kid, you didn't have such stories? Goodnight moon is 60 years old!
But I agree with the other posters, it's more stalling before going to bed.
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SKL 7-21-2007 @ 1:39AM
My impression was always that "nobody" recognizes a child's sense that there is often "somebody" there that we can't see, hear, or touch. I remember feeling this frequently as a child - and on rare occasions still feel it. Most of the time it is benign, like the person you're talking to when you talk to yourself. Sometimes it can get scary, like when you feel an unexplained need to check for intruders in your closets and under your bed. This "nobody" was probably the being through which clothing hanging on a hook could become the bogeyman after the lights went out when I was little. "Goodnight nobody" is acknowledging that usually benign somebody and bidding him to remain benign while the child is sleeping. That's my interpretation.
I guess the really cool thing about good literature is that it allows so many rich interpretations.
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Joshua Works 7-21-2007 @ 9:29PM
Two cheers for Mike K's explanation. A simple reference to "the space between", or perhaps it's the bunny's ironic realization that he's talking to himself in an empty room.
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