Review: (1) Ian Frazier, Tales of Adventure for Boys

Boys‘ dreams of glory in the post-adventure-story age

Johnny Whitaker and Jodie Foster as Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher in the cave. Tom Sawyer, Don Taylor, dir. (1973)

Boys dream of glory—of doing bold, dramatic, action-hero-type things, and winning the admiration of other kids, especially girls. For some boys, life revolves around glory, although today it’s not called that. Probably now it’s thought of as just doing cool stuff. Whenever I see a piece of graffiti in a place that must have been dangerous to get to, I picture the glory-seeking kid who put it there, and I admire and fear for him. In later years the Internet has changed the scene. Today kids use phones to record daring stunts, other kids see the videos online, and other dreams and even-more-daring stunts ensue.