59 pages • 1 hour read
C. C. HarringtonWildoak
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2022A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Growing into Self-Acceptance
Over the course of the novel, Maggie grows to accept herself as an individual. She learns to use her own strengths to make a place for herself in the world and get herself heard by others. At the beginning, fear constrains Maggie’s world. She struggles because she feels she is different from the other children around her and that she does not fit into her London environment. She is terrified to speak in public because her stutter makes her the object of ridicule. She finds it impossible to make friends at school, and she cannot even count on her own father to support her at home. This lack of social support makes Maggie afraid and self-conscious, and she prefers to hide away inside a small cupboard in her room where she cares for little animals.
However, one of Maggie’s core strengths is her capacity for empathy and compassion. It is through this strength that she is finally able to reach out to broaden her own world and demand that others hear her. She tries hard to reach out to her father and show him love, despite his sternness and lack of compassion for her. Even when she feels excluded by the world, she takes comfort among the small menagerie of animals in her cupboard—she loves them and nurses them back to health.
Maggie’s love for Rumpus motivates her to dig down and find the courage and determination that she needs to save him—and by doing so, to save herself. This connection between her love for Rumpus and her journey toward finding her own unique voice is made explicit in Chapter 25, when Maggie tells Rumpus, “If I ever find my voice, Rumpus…I promise I will speak for you” (173). Later, Maggie is initially terrified of encountering the strange, bearded poacher in the woods again, but “her sense of shame [morphs] into something else. Something fierce. Fierce and determined” (195). When she thinks about the danger the man might present to Rumpus, she is filled with the courage and determination to save him.
Fred teaches Maggie that individuals have the power to change the world when they persist in doing what is right, and Maggie takes this lesson to heart. It becomes the source of her newfound courage and power. She never questions that saving Rumpus is her responsibility, and she willingly accepts it, both in the story’s present and in her future, when she makes a career out of speaking for the animals who cannot speak for themselves.
Like Maggie, Rumpus, too, must find his own unique path forward. Rumpus is in an unusual position: He is neither fully domesticated nor fully wild. Because of this, he does not really fit in properly in either environment. He cannot behave like a household pet and is ejected from Arabella’s home. Once in Wildoak, he cannot hunt like a wild cat and has only a fuzzy sense of what might be dangerous and what might be safe. He associates food not primarily with hunting, but with humans, and he often makes dangerous choices as a result, such as when he goes into the village during the day, looking for food. Lacking some of the abilities typical of his own species, Rumpus must find an individual path into his future.
The story’s epilogue offers insight into how both Maggie and Rumpus manage to find a place in the world that accommodates their individual abilities. Rumpus goes to a sanctuary where he can thrive as a not-fully-wild and not-fully-domesticated animal, and he is even reunited with his beloved sister, Rosie. Maggie grows up to be a conservationist and uses her voice to raise awareness for the environment. In her speech at the Aspen Institute, it is clear that Maggie is still impacted by her communication difference: “Her hands appear steady, but on the inside she is working hard. Public speaking is hard for her” (311). But instead of drawing into herself and focusing on her stutter as a weakness, the now-adult Maggie simply acknowledges the stutter as one aspect of her complete self, asking the audience to be patient because it takes her a little more time to speak. Maggie’s communication differences once felt like a barrier between her and the rest of the world. However, through her experiences with Rumpus and Wildoak, she comes to understand that these communication differences make her who she is and give her something unique to contribute to the world.
The Importance of Communication and Connection
At the beginning of the novel, Maggie finds her communication difficulties overwhelming. Although she desperately wants to connect with others, she cannot share her true self with most people because of the way they react to her stutter. Maggie longs for friendship from the girls at school, but all they offer her is mockery; she longs for connection with her father, but he sees her stutter as something that needs fixing and is dismayed and embarrassed by it. Besides her mother’s unquestioning acceptance, Maggie has few sources of connection with people because of her communication differences. Maggie’s eagerness to correspond with her mother when she is staying at her grandfather’s—an eagerness so great that it sustains her through the dreaded errand to get a stamp in town—is testament to how vital this sense of human connection is to Maggie. Maggie’s bond with her mother is important because it sustains her emotionally and also because it validates Maggie’s opinions—it is Evelyn, after all, who is primarily responsible for keeping Maggie out of Granville since Maggie does not want to go there.
Throughout her stay in Cornwall, Maggie struggles to communicate and connect with her grandfather. Fred wants this connection, too, but instead of pushing Maggie to bond with him, he simply creates a space for Maggie to come toward him in her own time. Fred respects Maggie’s autonomy, and this makes her feel safe with him: Maggie realizes that he looks at her “as if it genuinely [matters] to him how she [is] feeling, what she [is] thinking” (67). As a result, she is able to learn to reach out to her grandfather; gradually, she becomes more secure about communicating with him. Through the connection they come to share, Fred is able to convey influential lessons to Maggie about how to approach difficulties, like the loss of Wildoak, and how to nurture her own individual passions and ideals. Toward the end of the novel, she is finally able to tell Fred everything about Rumpus and insist on his help to carry out her rescue plan.
The novel makes the connection between communication and connection clear through its characterization of Fred and Evelyn. Both of them listen to Maggie patiently, without judgment, because they love and accept the whole person she is. They respect her enough to give her the space to get her words out without hurrying her, interrupting her, or making her feel inadequate. In their company, Maggie feels safe enough to share her deepest self with them. This sense of communion with others is deeply important to Maggie because it makes her feel loved and valued, and because it allows her to draw on others’ help as a resource to save both Rumpus and herself.
Maggie’s communication differences are a burden to her at times, but they also make her more alive to the possibility of nonhuman sources of connection—namely, with animals and the natural world. She has the sense that animals, too, are full of thoughts and feelings that they cannot communicate, and it draws her to them. When she talks to animals, she does not stutter: For instance, in Chapter 3, she is able to tell the animals in her cupboard all about her day at school, sharing fully with them in a way she finds almost impossible with the humans in her life. When she worries about Rumpus, she is able to establish a sense of connection with Wildoak. Since she is able to commune in this way with Rumpus and Wildoak, Maggie grows into a passionate defender of wildlife and an able defender of her own perspective and needs. She mends her broken relationship with her father and, as the Epilogue reveals, becomes someone who devotes her life to speaking for the voiceless.
The Importance of Environmental Conservation
Wildoak is a story about how the natural world helps Maggie grow into her self-confidence while she, in turn, does her best to save the natural world. Maggie becomes more fully herself and learns lessons important to her growth in the environment of Wildoak, and later, she is able to use her newfound courage to rescue Rumpus. The novel advocates this care for animals and nature, and it shows that careless people who harm the environment diminish the world’s beauty and value. Luscious descriptions of the forest and vivid descriptions of Rumpus’s playful, trusting nature create a sense of wonder and empathy for the natural world. The plot and characters, as well, make a strong argument for the conservation of the environment.
The novel’s vivid imagery, plot, and narrative perspective create a sense of Wildoak forest being a magical place that seems to have its own consciousness and that benevolently helps people and animals. When Maggie first enters Wildoak, she has a sense that the forest is an almost holy place, like a cathedral. The light coming through the trees is metaphorically compared to “bars of gold” (78). Later, Maggie hears the ancient oak speaking to her, telling her to be gentle with herself, and she feels a connection to the forest that makes her sure the forest itself can help her in her quest to heal Rumpus: “She was no longer separate from the forest. She was part of it. And in that instant she understood something…. The forest could help” (175). Through Maggie’s eyes, the forest seems precious and irreplaceable, making it tragic when Lord Foy succeeds in cutting it all down.
The novel also portrays Rumpus as a beautiful creature who deserves protection. He is frequently characterized as innocent and somewhat helpless: He does not understand the unfamiliar forest, and he cannot effectively feed or protect himself since he was separated by humans from his wild family when he was just a little cub. Instead, he spends his time playing and exploring, much like any child. Maggie thinks he is “beautiful and magnificent,” and she notices every detail of his appearance and behaviors, and she reacts to him with awe. The chapters that are narrated from Maggie’s perspective frequently describe Rumpus’s pale silver coat, the length of his bushy tail, and the enormous size of his paws, highlighting his beauty and encouraging empathy for him.
The novel characterizes those who threaten the forest and Rumpus as being harsh and unfeeling. Lord Foy and the villagers who assist in the capture of Rumpus are dangerous, callous, and greedy. In contrast, the novel highlights Maggie’s tenderness and courage, portraying her love for nature as an admirable quality. Maggie’s relationship with Wildoak and Rumpus are moving, and the novel demonstrates the forest’s value as it teaches Maggie valuable lessons and helps her heal and protect Rumpus. Ultimately, Wildoak conveys a strong message that nature is worth respecting and protecting.
