We Read The Water-Babies

Eleanor & Alasdair Read That

Eleanor and Alistair revisit Charles Kingsley's 1863 classic 'The Water-Babies', critiquing its heavy-handed didacticism and offensive Victo

Key takeaways

Charles Kingsley used the book to raise awareness against child labor and corporal punishment.
The hosts highlight significant anti-Irish racism embedded within the Victorian text.

Main topics

Charles Kingsley
Victorian Child Labor Reform

Notable quotes

I think it's an extremely boring and bad book.

Conclusion

A critical examination of how a socially impactful classic can be unde

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:01) You're listening to Eleanor and Alistair Read That. The Speaker 2 (0:04) podcast where two redheaded comedians revisit classic kids' books and ask the big questions. Questions like, why did we choose the water babies? Speaker 1 (0:12) Why did we do it? Why? This is awful. Questions like, what's wrong with the Irish, really? Come on. Speaker 2 (0:20) What is wrong with the Irish? Because it can't just be me. Charles Kingsley, the author of the water babies. Speaker 1 (0:26) I'm Eleanor Morton. Speaker 2 (0:27) I'm Alistair Beckett-King. Speaker 1 (0:29) And this episode is... Speaker 1 (0:32) The Water Babies by Charles Kingsley. Boo! Speaker 2 (0:38) Eleanor, you're back from the fringe. I'm Speaker 1 (0:40) back from the fringe. But Speaker 2 (0:41) you're in the same place because you live there. You live in Edinburgh. Speaker 1 (0:44) I'm opening my eyes. I'm crawling out from the fringe rock. I'm looking around. I'm saying, is there any theatre to be done? No. Thank God. I'm almost scared to go into this because behind the scenes, we had lunch together the other day when you were up in Scotland and you wanted to talk about The Water Babies. I said, no, Alistair, leave it. for the monetized conversation. Speaker 2 (1:05) Yeah, exactly. We can't give this sort of thing away free in a vegetarian cafe in the new town. Speaker 1 (1:11) So here we go. I'm trepidatious, but I'm excited because I can feel Speaker 2 (1:15) - Speaker 1 (1:15) You Speaker 2 (1:16) are Speaker 1 (1:16) right to Speaker 2 (1:16) be trepidatious. Speaker 1 (1:18) Alistair, what did you think of the water babies? Speaker 2 (1:22) Hold on, hold on now. Now, okay. I Speaker 1 (1:25) don't want- Speaker 2 (1:25) Wrong way Speaker 1 (1:26) to start? Speaker 2 (1:27) I think it's- I think it's an extremely boring and bad book. Speaker 1 (1:32) Is this the worst book you think we've read? Speaker 2 (1:35) Yes. By a long, long way, it's the worst book. Wow. I really think it's a very poor piece of work. A writer is probably not a bad writer. No. I don't think it's a morally bad book, unless you're Irish, in which case it is. I was going Speaker 1 (1:48) to say, it's one of those things where you forget. You don't forget, obviously, it's a huge issue, 800 years, but you forget how much Irish racism was prominent in Britain to an insane extent in the 19th century until you read these books and you're like, oh, yes, yes, yes. Speaker 2 (2:01) And of course, the way conventional, conventional, traditional anti-black racism, I don't mean to make it sound vintage Speaker 1 (2:07) there. Speaker 2 (2:09) Traditional. The way anti-Irish racism was folded into anti-black racism. Yeah. It's a given that the reader is racist against black people. But wait till you hear about the Irish. Speaker 1 (2:20) I was excited to read this because I had a suspicion it was going to be not bad, but certainly interesting. And all I really remember of it, because I have my copy here that I bought. Yeah, what are your memories? Well, not much. I never actually read the whole thing as a child, and I feel like I know why now. But I think... I was very much drawn to the idea of the water babies, Speaker 2 (2:44) mostly Speaker 1 (2:44) the water baby bit where you get to be a little sort of sea creature and hang around in rivers. And I thought that might be the whole book. And it's not. I mean, it is. But wow, he's really made it seem like the worst thing you could possibly be. Yeah. Speaker 2 (2:58) I remember the animated film from 1978. Speaker 1 (3:02) Yes. Speaker 2 (3:03) Is it directed by Lionel Jeffries? It Speaker 1 (3:05) is of Choo-Choo-Choo-Choo Bang Bang fame. Among others. Also Speaker 2 (3:08) director of the Railway Children. Speaker 1 (3:10) Oh, yes, of course. We Speaker 2 (3:11) talked about previously. Wow, Speaker 1 (3:12) that's crazy. And Speaker 2 (3:14) it's a musical version and it's live action. And then once he goes into the water, it becomes Speaker 1 (3:19) animated. Speaker 2 (3:20) Yes. Speaker 1 (3:20) I Speaker 2 (3:21) remember enjoying High Cochlearum, which is one of the songs. And I also remember enjoying In the Doldrums, which I checked and it's from a different film. It's from the Phantom Tollbooth. There Speaker 1 (3:30) you go. Speaker 2 (3:30) So probably my favourite song from this musical. is from a different musical. Speaker 1 (3:34) I was looking at reviews on Goodreads. Somebody on Goodreads said this was like a shitty Victorian version of The Phantom Tollbooth. That's interesting. If Speaker 2 (3:42) The Speaker 1 (3:42) Phantom Tollbooth was rubbish. Speaker 2 (3:45) I saw a review of the Lionel Jeffries film that said, oh, it's very sort of cutesy and Disney. And they meant that as a criticism, but it's actually an enormous compliment because however... Bland and twee and boring, you might find classic Disney films. The animation quality is so good. They Speaker 1 (4:02) look good. Speaker 2 (4:02) And in this film, it is not. It is the cheapest, most 1970s, like insultingly cheap, invariably hideous. I'm watching a bit where a penguin's wearing a bobble hat and the stripes on the bobble hat keep swapping colours because they've just made a mistake. This is just bad animation. I can't believe I liked this as a child. Speaker 1 (4:23) It suddenly occurs to me that... This is especially painful for you, an animator, to watch. I'm Speaker 2 (4:27) not a proper animator, but I'm enough of an animator to know when I'm looking at some 1970s shite, which is what this is. Speaker 1 (4:34) It has the vibe of it could have been made any time between 1970 and 1995 and you Speaker 2 (4:39) wouldn't know. We only stopped drawing bell bottoms onto characters in the early 90s. Speaker 1 (4:45) I think we should also say that both of us sort of gave up in a way that we wouldn't normally do towards the end. I read it. Okay, he read it. He's a swat. Speaker 2 (4:55) And then I was hating it so much I switched to an audiobook of it, but I kept shouting, Get Speaker 1 (5:00) on with it! Speaker 2 (5:01) of the audiobook narrator who was blameless. Well, Speaker 1 (5:04) I think the beginning is pretty straightforward. Oh, the beginning's good. I was enjoying the beginning. The beginning is not bad. Before we jump Speaker 2 (5:11) into the story, should we give some background? Because it's kind of an important book because it's an issue book. Speaker 1 (5:17) Yes. And Speaker 2 (5:17) it was written to raise awareness and to try to discourage people from beating children. Yeah, Speaker 1 (5:23) me, me, me. Speaker 2 (5:25) Soft. What I'm saying is, it's woke. In spite of what I said about the Irish earlier. Yeah, apart from the Irish bit. So Charles Kingsley is one of those reformer characters who's now just a bundle of contradictions. Speaker 1 (5:37) He's got a classic Wikipedia page, one of my favourite kinds, where you're reading the first two thirds of it and you're like, oh, this is fine. This is good. Oh, it's good. And then you get to a bit that just, I mean, oh, I'm just going Speaker 2 (5:47) to Google it now just so I don't get this wrong. Speaker 1 (5:49) Life and character, death, influences and works, racial views, and then two subsections, Anglo-Saxonism, always good, and dislike of Speaker 2 (5:59) the Speaker 1 (5:59) Irish. Speaker 2 (6:00) But Speaker 1 (6:01) then you read what he says and you're like, oh, fuck. It's really worse than you think. Speaker 2 (6:06) Because I thought, this is great news, because obviously anti-Irish prejudice is one of the ones that two people who aren't Irish can have a laugh about on a podcast. Speaker 1 (6:13) But listen, listen, we can also be mistaken for Irish and that's... Let's say that suppression in itself. When I've been abroad, they always think I'm Irish before they think I'm Scottish, which they also get confused by because I sound English. I Speaker 2 (6:26) mean, to some extent, you've got to accept some blame for that. Meet Speaker 1 (6:30) them Speaker 2 (6:30) halfway. Speaker 1 (6:31) I think I'm more Irish than you genetically. So let's say I'm allowed Speaker 2 (6:35) to. Speaker 1 (6:35) Yes, you are definitely. You're the Speaker 2 (6:37) most Irish. Speaker 1 (6:37) I mean, I'm absolutely not. It is weird when you see someone who is poverty bad, child labour bad, and then Irish racism good. And it's like, he's got this uncomfortable Victorian thing where he thinks poverty is bad, but he also kind of thinks it might be your fault if you're poor. Yes. I think a little bit. It's from 1862. I think. I could be wrong, but certainly, if not the year after, then very close after Alice in Wonderland is published. Speaker 2 (6:58) And Speaker 1 (6:59) when I read Alice in Wonderland and about how it was sort of an anti-moralistic book, I now realise this is exactly the kind of book that Alice in Wonderland is trying not to be. Speaker 2 (7:07) Ooh, yes. This is what Speaker 1 (7:09) Lewis Carroll hated and was like, children are sick of this