Sweet Whispers, Brother Rush | Literary Qualities

Sweet Whispers, Brother Rush Literary Qualities

Sweet Whispers, Brother Rush is a skillful blend of realism and fantasy. A one-parent family, mental retardation, child abuse, isolation within a crowded city—these are the realistic reflections of contemporary life. But traveling back in time through a small space held in the hand of a ghost—this is reminiscent of the classic fantasies of childhood when Alice traveled down the rabbit hole into Wonderland and Dorothy was carried by a tornado into Oz. Hamilton parallels most closely the C. S. Lewis fantasy, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (1950), where four children, brothers and sisters, step into a wardrobe, push their way through the winter coats and enter the fantasy world of Narnia. Lucy, the youngest child is the first to discover this new world: Next moment she found that what was rubbing against her face and hands was no longer soft but something hard and prickly. "Why it...
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