Mister God, This Is Anna

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Mister God, This Is Anna is a book by "Fynn" describing the adventures of Anna, a mischievous yet wise five and a half year old who Fynn finds as a runaway. Nineteen year old Fynn takes her in and becomes her caretaker and closest friend. Fynn recounts his time spent with Anna, and gives a very personal account of her outpourings on life, mathematics, science and her mentor, Mister God.

The story begins on the streets of East End London in the 1930s. While roaming the docks at night, the author came across a small girl sitting on the grating below a shop window. He sat down next to her, and from that moment on, his life was never the same. Unable to find out where she came from, Fynn took the child home, only to discover she was an abused runaway. She spent her next three years as Fynn's inseparable companion.

The book gives us a beautiful account of the friendship between them. Anna by nature is the inquisitor, the forever probing creature who likes to find a rhyme and reason for everything. Fynn being the student, has the task of having to follow her hard-to-understand 'simple' logic.

The book asks a lot of questions through Anna and through Anna they are solved.

"At five years Anna knew absolutely the purpose of being, knew the meaning of love and was a personal friend and helper of Mister God. At six Anna was a theologian, mathematician, philosopher, poet and gardener. If you asked her a question you would always get an answer - in due course. On some occasions the answer would be delayed for weeks or months; but eventually, in her own good time, the answer would come: direct, simple and much to the point.

Anna lives her life complete, she is involved with everything. The gist of the book is the philosophy of a child who has the wisdom to comprehend more than what would be expected of her. "She never made eight years, she died by an accident. She died with a grin on her beautiful face. She died saying, 'I bet Mister God lets me into heaven for this', and I bet he did too." (quoted from chapter one of the book.)

The ending of the book describes Anna's death, and Fynn's bitterness about it. He visits Anna's grave and sees it to be a riot of flowers. At that moment he lets go of his angst against God. The answer he realizes is 'God is in my middle'.

This particular reference is to a conversation between Anna and Fynn. God is part of everybody and everybody is part of God. Fynn walks away from her graveyard enlightened.

A rumour identifies Fynn with Sydney 'Sid' Hopkins, from Finchden manor, as described in the book "Mr Lyward's Answer", which can be found in this address: http://www.finchden.com/mla/mlach1.htm. Sid Hopkins spent the last years of his life living in Taunton, Somerset, England. He is buried in the graveyard of Kingston St. Mary, near Taunton.