| Tom Brown's Schooldays | |
|---|---|
| Author(s) | Thomas Hughes |
| Country | England |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | School novel |
| Publisher | Macmillan |
| Publication date | 1857 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback and Paperback) |
| ISBN | 0-19-283535-1 |
| OCLC Number | 42414413 |
| LC Classification | PR4809.H8 T66 1999 |
| Followed by | Tom Brown at Oxford |
Tom Brown's Schooldays (1857) is a novel by Thomas Hughes. The story is set at Rugby School, a public school for boys, in the 1830s; Hughes attended Rugby School from 1834 to 1842. The novel has been the source for several film and television adaptations in the 20th century.
The novel was originally published as being "by an Old Boy of Rugby", and much of it is based on the author's experiences. Tom Brown is largely based on the author's brother, George Hughes; and George Arthur, another of the book's main characters, is generally believed to be based on Arthur Penrhyn Stanley. The fictional Tom's life also resembles the author's in that the culminating event of his school career was a cricket match.[1]
Tom Brown's Schooldays was tremendously influential on the genre of British school novels, which began in the 19th century, and led to St. Trinians, Billy Bunter's Greyfriars, Mr Chips' Brookfield, and Hogwarts. It is one of the few still in print from its time. A sequel, Tom Brown at Oxford, was published in 1861 but is not as well known.
Tom's principal enemy at Rugby is the bully Flashman. The 20th-century writer George MacDonald Fraser would feature the grown-up Flashman in a series of successful historical novels.
Contents |
Tom Brown is energetic, stubborn, kind-hearted, and athletic more than intellectual. He acts according to his feelings and the unwritten rules of the boys around him more than adults' rules.
The early chapters of the novel deal with his childhood at his home in the Vale of White Horse (including a nostalgic picture of a village feast). Much of the scene setting in the first chapter is deeply revealing of Victorian England's attitudes towards society and class, and contains an interesting comparison of so-called Saxon and Norman influences on England. This part of the book, when young Tom wanders the valleys freely on his pony, serves as a sort of Eden with which to contrast the later hellish experiences in his first years at school.
His first school year was at a local school. His second year started at a private school, but due to an epidemic of fever in the area, all the school's boys were sent home, and Tom was transferred mid-term to Rugby School, where he made acquaintance with the adults and boys who lived at the school and in its environs.
On his arrival, the eleven-year-old Tom Brown is looked after by a more experienced classmate, Harry "Scud" East. Soon after, Tom and East become the targets of a bully named Flashman. The intensity of the bullying increases, and, after refusing to hand over a sweepstake ticket for the favourite in a horse race, Tom is deliberately burned in front of a fire. Tom and East eventually defeat Flashman with the help of a kind (though comical) older boy. In their triumph they become unruly.
In the second half of the book, Dr. Thomas Arnold, the historical headmaster of the school at the time, gives Tom the care of George Arthur, a frail, pious, academically brilliant, gauche, and sensitive new boy. A fight that Tom gets into to protect Arthur, and Arthur's nearly dying of fever, are described in loving detail. Tom and Arthur help each other and their friends develop into young gentlemen who say their nightly prayers, do not cheat on homework, and play in a cricket match. An epilogue shows Tom's return to Rugby and its chapel when he hears of Arnold's death.
A main element of the novel is Rugby with its traditions and with the reforms instituted by Dr. Arnold. Arnold is seldom on stage, but is shown as the perfect teacher and counsellor and as managing everything behind the scenes. In particular, he is the one who "chums" Arthur with Tom. This helps them both become men.
The central theme of the novel is the development of boys. The symmetrical way in which Tom and Arthur supply each other's deficiencies shows that Hughes believed in the importance of physical development, boldness, fighting spirit, and sociability (Tom's contribution) as well as Christian morality and idealism (Arthur's).
The novel is essentially didactic, and was not primarily written by its author as an entertainment. As Hughes said:
The book contains an account of a game of rugby football, the variant of football played at Rugby School (with many differences from the modern forms). The book's popularity helped to spread the popularity of this sport beyond the school.
The geography of Rugby has changed greatly since the period in which the book was set. Rugby has expanded enormously, industrialising in the late 19th century and later. For example, most of the named pools along the River Avon that the boys used for authorized swimming were obliterated when the British Thomson-Houston factory was built and the Avon through the new industrial area was straightened and deepened to prevent floods. The countryside where Tom Brown's adventures in the Avon river valley happened, is now industrial area and terrace housing on the north slope of Rugby Hill and the flat land at its foot.
In the book, Tom's first year at the school mentions no transport to Rugby except stagecoach, but the end part of Tom's last year mentions "the train". The London and Birmingham Railway was built through Rugby while he was at the school but none of his adventures mention the railway or its working, or the large rowdy noisy navvy-camp which would have been in the area while the railway was being built.
County boundaries have been changed so that most of the Vale of White Horse is now in Oxfordshire, not Berkshire as the author says several times.
Tom Brown's Schooldays was adapted for film in 1916 (British),[3] 1940 (U.S.),[4] and 1951 (British).[5] In the 1940 U.S. version of Tom Brown's School Days, the role of Dr. Thomas Arnold as a reform-minded educator was given greater prominence than in the novel.[6] Arnold was portrayed by Cedric Hardwicke and the title role was played by Jimmy Lydon. The June 27, 1940, debut of the film version at New York City's Radio City Music Hall was chronicled in a photo spread by The New York Times, "showing some of the pastimes, curricular and otherwise", as the fight scene between Tom Brown and Flashman was captioned.[7] The 1940 film version was released on DVD in 2004, with a cover illustration portraying Arnold lecturing the two dishevelled schoolboys following their fight.
In the 1951 version Robert Newton portrayed Thomas Arnold and John Howard Davies portrayed Tom Brown.
It has also been adapted for television, as a serial in 1971 by the BBC,[8] and as a two-hour ITV 2005 television movie,[9] starring Alex Pettyfer as Tom and Stephen Fry as Dr. Arnold. The 1973 BBC documentary Omnibus: The British Hero featured Christopher Cazenove playing Brown.
A musical version with music by Chris Andrews and Book and Lyrics by Jack and Joan Maitland was presented at the Cambridge Theatre in London's West End in 1971 with Keith Chegwin, Roy Dotrice, Simon Le Bon, Tony Sympson, Richard Willis and Dougal Rose.
The rights to that version were acquired in the late 1970s by Bruce Hertford of Orem, Utah, who had a composer named Mark Ogden flesh out the score. The result played for a sold-out run at Brigham Young University.