The Fate of Harold Hill
Recently at a flea market, I picked up The Music Man: A Novel by Meredith Willson, Pyramid Books paperback #R-736. It was published in 1962 as a tie-in to the movie version of the hit Fifties musical. Here's a glimpse of the cover.
I love The Music Man, and so do daisy-knotwise and brotherguy and scarfman and minnehaha K. It is my favorite musical. I've read Willson's account of its creation, But He Doesn't Know the Territory. So for a buck, I knew this belonged in my library.
The book has some nice extras, such as numerous stills from the film, and a listing of all the song lyrics in the back. Nevertheless, it is a weird experience to read a novelized version of a story where you know the characters are supposed to break out into song. Paperbacks can't do that. I suppose there might be some hope for the Kindle. Or one could always turn to the lyrical appendix at the appropriate point in the story, and sing.
I would expect a book like this to be ghostwritten. However, a few things make me suspect it might really have come from Willson's typewriter.
First, it is dedicated "to Rini and Rosalie," an unnecessary touch for a ghostwriter and an insincere thing for the celebrity author to do if he didn't really write it.
Second, in But He Doesn't Know the Territory, Willson makes a big deal about speech-as-music, arranging words in rhythmic chants that seem like music. The most celebrated example is probably the number "Trouble," which is mostly talk and hardly any singing. In a moment, I'll give you an example from the novel.
Anyway, for all those who love this story, and wonder about the fate of the characters, the final page of the novel offers a veiled glimpse of the future. I thought you might like me to share. Naturally, there are spoilers.
The River City Band, having performed together for the first time, has left the school to parade through the street, with an excited crowd of citizens in tow. Marian Paroo, librarian, and Harold Hill, confidence man and salesman extroarodinaire, remain behind.
And Professor Hill. What about that big-haul, great-go, neck-or-nothing, rip-roaring ev'ry time a bull's-eye salesman? How unbalanced would he feel dropping the Professor off the front end of his name? And sharing the rest of it? For life?
He certainly wouldn't try to justify the Professor part, would he? Or, now that he'd actually led a band for the first time in his life, would he? Well, as we used to say back in River City, that's for him to know and for us to find out. We do know that, in his way, he had waited for Marian a long, long time and if "happily-ever-after" ever had, or ever was to have, a chance on this earth it would certainly seem to be with these two-- still locked in each other's arms there in River City's empty assembly room.
The first sentence of the passage sounds like authentic Willson to my ear.
I love The Music Man, and so do daisy-knotwise and brotherguy and scarfman and minnehaha K. It is my favorite musical. I've read Willson's account of its creation, But He Doesn't Know the Territory. So for a buck, I knew this belonged in my library.
The book has some nice extras, such as numerous stills from the film, and a listing of all the song lyrics in the back. Nevertheless, it is a weird experience to read a novelized version of a story where you know the characters are supposed to break out into song. Paperbacks can't do that. I suppose there might be some hope for the Kindle. Or one could always turn to the lyrical appendix at the appropriate point in the story, and sing.
I would expect a book like this to be ghostwritten. However, a few things make me suspect it might really have come from Willson's typewriter.
First, it is dedicated "to Rini and Rosalie," an unnecessary touch for a ghostwriter and an insincere thing for the celebrity author to do if he didn't really write it.
Second, in But He Doesn't Know the Territory, Willson makes a big deal about speech-as-music, arranging words in rhythmic chants that seem like music. The most celebrated example is probably the number "Trouble," which is mostly talk and hardly any singing. In a moment, I'll give you an example from the novel.
Anyway, for all those who love this story, and wonder about the fate of the characters, the final page of the novel offers a veiled glimpse of the future. I thought you might like me to share. Naturally, there are spoilers.
The River City Band, having performed together for the first time, has left the school to parade through the street, with an excited crowd of citizens in tow. Marian Paroo, librarian, and Harold Hill, confidence man and salesman extroarodinaire, remain behind.
And Professor Hill. What about that big-haul, great-go, neck-or-nothing, rip-roaring ev'ry time a bull's-eye salesman? How unbalanced would he feel dropping the Professor off the front end of his name? And sharing the rest of it? For life?
He certainly wouldn't try to justify the Professor part, would he? Or, now that he'd actually led a band for the first time in his life, would he? Well, as we used to say back in River City, that's for him to know and for us to find out. We do know that, in his way, he had waited for Marian a long, long time and if "happily-ever-after" ever had, or ever was to have, a chance on this earth it would certainly seem to be with these two-- still locked in each other's arms there in River City's empty assembly room.
The first sentence of the passage sounds like authentic Willson to my ear.