I'm the King of the Castle. Susan Hill.

If you read a piece of fiction depicting evil as a recurrent theme wouldn't you possibly expect it to centre around adults? Wrong. Try again. Children? Surely not.

This story depicts not only the constant tension and bickering between two 11 year old boys who are thrown together but torment and cruelty. Both boys, Kingshaw and Hooper are damaged "goods" and deeply disturbed. Kingshaw narrates his sad tale of victimisation and he gives us such a worrying insight into his innumerable insecurities, fears and abject misery as soon as he arrives at Warings with his mother, Mrs Helena Kingshaw who is really looking for another husband rather than a job as a housekeeper with all the trimmings of security and stability.
 
Hooper, an only child, spoilt and devious, Kingshaw's nemesis, hates the boy for invading his home and at every opportunity he torments the boy who has had a history of being bullied. Hooper enjoys inflicting cruelty on weak-minded boys like Kingshaw making his short life utterly miserable.
 
He is just like Jack, the head boy in Golding's Lord of the Flies who degenerates into a murderer. Frightening but no doubt both writers believed that children, especially boys, were capable of becoming so evil as to want to kill and enjoy the taste of blood.
 
What is also extremely worrying is that the adults are totally oblivious to this intense hatred between the two boys because they are so wrapped up in their own dream worlds. Helena is preoccupied with making herself look attractive to Mr Hooper whilst he is thinking of his sexual needs.
 
Both parents are self-centred, unable to show real love and understanding to their children when they need it the most. Mr Hooper fails to understand or care about his son in the way that his father showed similar neglect and lack of interest in him as a child. History is merely repeating itself.
 
So, as a consequence, the boys have not experienced love and they both grow up feeling insecure, frightened and evil. The only normal person is a child called Fielding who tries to befriend Kingshaw until Hooper tries to destroy this friendship. Hang Wood is appropriately named, a dense copse near Warings where the boys become lost and we see how vulnerable these boys actually are.
 
It's a chilling tale with tragic consequences. Hill admits that this was written for adults but do they read it? Not usually. Teenagers are the ones who not only read it but study it at school. Amazing isn't it? Read on....
 
Publishers: Penguin.  ISBN: 0-14-003491-9
 
 
 COPYRIGHT 2012. PERMISSION MUST BE OBTAINED FROM THE AUTHOR TO USE THIS ARTICLE.
 

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