Kensuke's Kingdom

“Until I was nearly eleven, until the letter came, life was just normal. There were the four of us in the house: my mother, my father, me, and Stella—Stella Artois, that is, my one-ear-up and one-ear-down black-and-white sheepdog, who always seemed to know what was about to happen before it did. But even she could not have foreseen how that letter was going to change our lives forever.”

The repetition of the word “letter” underlines the significant impact the message has on the narrative and builds up suspense about the contents of the letter that would “change [their] lives forever.” In addition, the lovingly detailed visual imagery in the narrator’s description of Stella, the “one-ear-up and one-ear-down black-and-white sheepdog,” reflects Michael’s great affection for the dog. As the story continues, Stella emerges as a motif of The Essential Need for Friendship and Companionship.

“Each morning, I went down the street to ‘the monkey school.’ My father called it that because he said the children gibbered and screeched and hung upside down on the jungle gym on the playground. And, anyway, I was always ‘monkey face’ to him—when he was in a playful mood, that is, which he often was.”

Polysyndeton, the stylistic addition of coordinating conjunctions where none are grammatically necessary, and onomatopoeia, words that imitate the sounds they refer to, combine in the phrase “the children gibbered and screeched and hung upside down” to convey a sense of raucous exuberance. The nicknames “monkey face” and “monkey school” foster a playful mood to evoke the carefree joys of Michael’s childhood, which sets up a contrast to the family’s difficulties after Michael’s parents become unemployed.

“We were going, and nothing and no one could stop us. We were doing what people do in fairy tales. We were going off to seek adventure.”

This passage offers an example of anaphora because all of the sentences start with “We.” The repetition creates a sense of momentum, reflecting Michael’s belief that his family cannot be deterred from their resolve to “seek adventure.”

“I spent most of the time soaked to the bone. I wore all the right gear—the skipper always made sure of that—but somehow the wet still got through. Down below, too, everything was damp, even the sleeping bags. Only when the sun shone and the sea had stopped its heaving could we begin to dry out.”

The author uses imagery that appeals to the reader’s sense of touch, such as “soaked to the bone,” “damp,” and “dry.” These sensory details help Morpurgo convey the day-to-day realities of life on the yacht, which differ from the allure with which maritime life is often portrayed in adventure stories. In addition to reflecting this passage’s soggy subject matter, Chapter 2’s title, “Water, water everywhere,” is an allusion to Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s famous poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.”

“And when I was terrified by the mountainous seas and the screaming wind, I would curl up with Stella on my bunk, bury my head in her neck, and hold her tight. At times like that—and I don’t suppose they were that frequent, it’s just that I remember them so vividly—I always kept Eddie’s soccer ball close beside me as well.”

Vivid diction, such as “mountainous seas,” and auditory imagery, such as “screaming wind,” capture the terror Michael feels during storms. This passage develops the theme The Essential Need for Friendship and Companionship because the loyal dog serves as a motif of the theme and because the soccer ball is a gift from the protagonist’s best friend.

“I’m looking at my log now. The paper is a bit crinkled and the pages are yellowed with age. My scribbly writing is a little faded, but it’s mostly quite legible. What follows are just a few chosen extracts from this log. The entries are quite short, but they tell the tale. This is how I recorded our great journey. This is how it was for an eleven-year-old boy as we rode the wide oceans of the world onboard the Peggy Sue.”

Morpurgo uses visual imagery, such as “yellowed with age” and “scribbly writing” to depict the ship’s log that bridges Michael’s past and present. The passage progresses from concrete, tangible details about the log to more abstract and far-flung subjects like “the wide oceans of the world,” and this shift fosters a mythic majesty around the family’s “great journey.” The anaphora created by the repetition of “this” in the last two sentences adds to the sense of grandeur and excitement around the maritime adventure.

“Three times we came in, but each time we passed her by. Either we were going too fast or she was out of reach. She was weak by now. She was hardly paddling. She was going under. We had one last chance.”

The author utilizes sentence structure to create a mood that is taut with tension. The sentences at the end of the passage are shorter than the ones at the beginning to show how Stella’s strength and the family’s hope of rescuing her are fading.

“I heard the wind above me in the sails. I remember thinking: This is silly, you haven’t got your safety harness on, you haven’t got your life jacket on, you shouldn’t be doing this. Then the boat veered violently and I was thrown sideways. With my arms full I had no time to grab the guardrail. We were in the cold of the sea before I could even open my mouth to scream.”

The passage contains auditory imagery, such as the sound of the wind, and tactile imagery, such as “the cold of the sea.” These vivid sensory details underscore the importance of the pivotal moment in the plot when the protagonist falls off of his family’s yacht, an event that sets the remainder of the story into motion.

“The terrors came fast, one upon another. The lights of the Peggy Sue went away into the dark of the night, leaving me alone in the ocean, alone with the certainty that they were already too far away, that my cries for help could not possibly be heard. I thought then of the sharks cruising the black water beneath me—scenting me, already searching me out, homing in on me —and I knew there could be no hope.”

The author captures the narrator’s desolate, petrified state immediately after he falls off his family’s yacht through the repetition of the word “alone” and through diction, such as “terrors,” “dark of the night,” and “no hope.” In addition, the use of the past progressive tense in the phrase “sharks cruising the black water beneath me—scenting me, already searching me out, homing in on me” conveys Michael’s fear that the sharks are already hunting him and will inevitably find him.

“I was fast losing the last of my strength. I would go down, down to the bottom of the sea, and lie in my grave amongst the seaweed and the sailors’ bones and the shipwrecks.”

The polysyndeton and alliteration in the prepositional phrase “amongst the seaweed and the sailors’ bones and the shipwrecks” add a poetic quality to the eerie fate the boy envisions for himself. The repetition of “down, down” adds to the passage’s ominous tone.

“I was woken by a howling, like the howling of a gale through the masts. I looked about me. There were no masts above me, there were no sails. No movement under me, either, no breath of wind. Stella Artois was barking, but some way off. I was not on a boat at all, but lying stretched out on sand. The howling became a screaming, a fearful crescendo of screeching that died away in its own echoes.”

The passage teems with onomatopoeia, including “howling,” “barking,” and “screeching.” These sound effects foster suspense by establishing that Michael is in a new setting that contains wild, potentially dangerous animals. The simile “like the howling of a gale through the masts” suits the story’s genre as a maritime adventure and adds to the tense mood.

“The wide blue sea was as empty as the cloudless sky above. No Peggy Sue. No boat. Nothing. No one. I called again and again for my mother and my father. I called until the tears came and I could call no more, until I knew there was no point.”

The simile comparing the emptiness of the “wide blue sea” to that of “the cloudless sky” emphasizes Michael’s isolation. The fragments “No Peggy Sue. No boat. Nothing. No one” all contain negative words to stress Michael’s dire predicament. The repetition of the verb “called” underscores the boy’s desperation to rejoin his family and the futility of his actions.

“Even then, as I stood there, that first morning, filled with apprehension at the terrifying implications of my dreadful situation, I remember thinking how wonderful it was, a green jewel of an island framed in white, the sea all around it a silken shimmering blue. Strangely, perhaps comforted somehow by the extraordinary beauty of the place, I was not at all downhearted. On the contrary I felt strangely elated. I was alive. Stella Artois was alive. We had survived.”

The metaphor and visual imagery of the “green jewel of an island framed in white, the sea all around it a silken shimmering blue” conveys the setting’s “extraordinary beauty.” The movement from long, flowing descriptive sentences into simple three- and four-word sentences highlights the simple truths that give Michael comfort. The repetition of the word “alive” adds to the passage’s hopeful tone.

“I kept the red bananas all to myself. I ate every single one of them. They weren’t at all like bananas back home, but much sweeter, much juicier, much more delicious. I could have eaten a dozen more.”

The repetition and gustatory imagery in the description “much sweeter, much juicier, much more delicious” emphasize the red bananas’ tastiness and indicate how ravenous Michael feels after going a full day without food. The fruit is a gift from Kensuke and thus an example of the essential need for friendship and companionship.

“I wanted so much to see him again, to talk to him, to hear a human voice. Stella Artois had been a wonderful companion to me, good for confiding in, good for a cuddle, good for a game, but I so missed human company—my mother, my father, lost to me now, perhaps forever.”

Morpurgo expresses the protagonist’s loss and longing for human companionship through his use of lists in this passage. Asyndeton is the deliberate omission of coordinating conjunctions, as seen in the list “to see him again, to talk to him, to hear a human voice.” This technique lends a sense of urgency to Michael’s narration.

“If this one had come, I reasoned, then another one would come, had to come, and when it did, I would have my fireglass ready, and a cache of paper-thin, tinder-dry leaves. I would make such a blazing inferno of a fire, a fire that would send up such a towering smoke signal that the next ship that happened along would have to see it.”

The repetition of the verb “come” underlines Michael’s desperate hope that another ship will approach the island. The diction with which he describes his plan, such as “blazing inferno” and “towering smoke signal,” shows the intensity of the fire he intends to build as well as the intensity of his anger and resolve.

“I lay there drowning in my misery, thinking of nothing but the hopelessness of it all, how I would never get off this island, how I would die here, and my mother and father would never even know what had happened to me. No one would, except the old man, the madman, my captor, my persecutor.”

In the passage’s final sentence, asyndeton adds emphasis to the phrase “the old man, the madman, my captor, my persecutor.” This excerpt marks a low point for Michael’s mental health and his relationship with Kensuke, making the closeness and understanding that later develops between the two characters all the more significant.

“He taught me where the bigger fish were, where the octopuses hid under the rocks, how to stand still as a heron and wait, spear poised just above the water, my shadow falling behind me so that the fish were not frightened away. I tell you, spearing a fish for the first time was like scoring a winning goal for the Mudlarks back home—just about the best feeling in the world.”

The simile “still as a heron” conveys the fishing expertise that Kensuke passes on to Michael. Herons can be found in the United Kingdom as well as Japan, making them a fitting reference point for the cross-cultural friends. The simile comparing Michael’s first success with spearfishing to “scoring a winning goal for the Mudlarks back home” connects Michael’s past with his present as Michael’s memories of playing soccer with his best friend are among the happiest moments of his childhood. The comparison expresses how much Kensuke means to Michael at this point of the story.

“The gibbons howled their accusations at me all the way, the entire forest cackling and screeching its condemnation. I just hoped Stella would not bark back at them, would not betray where I was.”

The onomatopoeia in the phrases “howled their accusations” and “the entire forest cackling and screeching its condemnation” creates a tense mood and reflects Michael’s feelings of guilt. The moment marks a turning point for the novel’s central friendship. Kensuke feels deeply betrayed when he discovers that Michael tried to send a message, but this incident ultimately leads him to reconsider his belief that Michael should stop trying to reunite with his biological family.

“We lived each of us in our separate cocoons, quite civil, always polite, but not together anymore. He had closed in on himself and wrapped himself in his thoughts. The warmth had gone from his eyes, the laughter in the cave house was silenced. He never said so—he did not need to—but I knew that now he would prefer to paint alone, to fish alone, to be alone.”

Morpurgo uses the metaphor of “cocoons” to capture the emotional distance that separates Kensuke and Michael after Kensuke discovers Michael’s attempt to send a message in a bottle. The auditory imagery in the phrase “the laughter in the cave house was silenced” speaks to Kensuke’s pain, and the repetition of “alone” in the last sentence reiterates how the characters’ former closeness has been damaged.

“The beach looked completely deserted. The waves lapped listlessly. The moon rode the clouds, and the world felt still about me as if it were holding its breath.”

The author’s diction in his choice of precise adjectives and adverbs like “deserted” and “listlessly” creates a subdued mood. This shifts to a mood of anticipation with the personification of the world in the phrase “as if were holding its breath.”

“‘One day a ship will come, Micasan. Maybe soon, maybe not so soon. But it will come. Life must not be spent always hoping, always waiting. Life is for living.’ I knew he was right, of course, but only when I was lost and absorbed in my painting was I truly able to obliterate all thoughts of rescue, all thoughts of my mother and father.”

The passage contains several instances of repetition that lend the prose rhythm and a lyrical quality. The repetition of the words “maybe,” “Life,” and “always” underline Kensuke’s wisdom and patience while the repetition of the phrase “all thoughts” highlights Michael’s longing to reunite with his parents.

“The shots cracked so close now, splitting the air and echoing around the cave. There were distant yells of triumph. I knew only too well what this must mean. After that, the hunt moved away. We could hear no more voices, just the occasional shot. And then nothing.”

Morpurgo builds suspense by focusing on auditory imagery and sound effects as Michael, Kensuke, and the animals hide from the poachers. For example, the author employs the onomatopoeia “cracked” to depict the poachers’ gunfire, and the complete silence that settles over the island at the end of the passage adds to the scene’s eeriness.