THE WHIPPING BOY

1. BIBLIOGRAPHY
Fleischman, Sid. 1986. THE WHIPPING BOY. Ill by Peter Sis. New York: Greenwillow Books. ISBN 0688062164

2. PLOT SUMMARY
Jemmy is a young boy in the Middle Ages who has become the Prince’s whipping boy. From putting bullfrogs in the moat to tying banquet guests’ wigs to their chairs the prince has rightfully earned his nickname “Prince Brat”. Jemmy is even whipped when the prince refuses to do his lessons, but Jemmy does benefit from learning to read, write, and cipher.

When Prince Brat decides to run away in the middle of the night, Jemmy is forced to go with him. Upon the road, they meet the feared highwaymen/murderers Hold-Your-Nose-Billy (whose name is derived from his garlic eating remedy to avoid the Plague) and his side-kick Cutthroat. Because of his writing skills, Jemmy is thought to be the prince while Brat, the whipping boy. Brat uses every opportunity to show that he is the rightful heir to the throne, but eventually is whipped for the escape of the two boys. The experience changes his attitude, along with finding out that his royal subjects dread the day “Prince Brat” is crowned king.

With the help of Betsy and Petunia (her dancing bear) and the Hot Potato man, the boys eventually escape the scoundrels (who after a chase through the sewer, look like they are wearing a fur coat-of sewer rats-and the two eventually stow away on a ship headed for a convict island). Brat aka Prince Horace, helps Jemmy convince the king he did not set up the whole plot for a “king’s ransom” and the king lets them off easy with a promise that if they run away again, they take him along. Prince Horace assures his friend that no more whipping would occur because HE would cry and scream if Jemmy was whipped, and the boys live together as friends in the castle.

3. CRITICAL ANALYSIS
Sid Fleischman created a page turner with one adventure after another from beatings in a castle, to dancing bears in the forest, to kidnapping, sewers, and role reversals.

The characters are well developed with Jemmy realizing that although he misses his freedom, he would miss “the shelves of books he’d left behind in the castle. In the sewers, he hadn’t been aware of his own ignorance. But he realized that he’d lost his taste for ignorance.”
Prince Brat develops from a selfish, bored royal (“A whipping boy is supposed to yowl like a stuck pig! It’s no fun if you don’t bawl!”) to a thoughtful future ruler (“Prince Horace tells me it’s thanks to you that he’s back, sound and safe”).

The setting is believable because Fleischman uses vocabulary and items from that time including lords, ladies, powdered wigs, velvet breeches, silk stockings, ballad sellers, knights, Highwaymen, cobbled streets, writing with a hawk’s feather and beet juice for ink, rat catchers, and sewer rats.

Peter Sis’s illustrations add to the book, especially the visual of Billy and Cutthroat escaping from the sewer, covered in rats.

Fleishman shares in his author’s note that “the most surprising part of it(this work) is true. Some royal households of past centuries did keep whipping boys to suffer the punishments due a misbehaving prince”. He also adds that “history is alive with lunacies and injustices”.


4. REVIEW EXCERPTS
Winner of the Newbery Award

Publisher’s Weekly:”With his flair for persuading readers to believe in the ridiculous, Fleischman scores a hit. Sis’s skillful pictures emphasize events in the adventures of the orphan Jemmy, kept in his king’s palace to be thrashed for the offenses committed by the royal heir, known as Prince Brat. It is forbidden to punish Brat, whose tricks multiply until Jemmy is tempted to escape the daily round of flogging. But the Prince himself takes off and forces the whipping boy to go with him. As they get into and out of trouble on the outside, Jemmy hears that he has been accused of abducting Brat. When the prince arranges for their return to the palace, poor Jemmy fears the worst, but things turn out for the best at the story’s satisfying close. Colorful types like a thief called Hold-Your-Nose Billy, Betsy and her dancing bear Petunia, et al., increase the fun.”

School Library Journal:”Roles are changed when young Prince Brat, as everyone calls him (He is so altogether rotten that “Not even black cat would cross his path”), runs away with Jemmy, his whipping boy (the commoner who takes the Prince’s punishments). Because Brat has never learned to read and write and Jemmy can, a couple of prince-nappers decide that Jemmy is the real prince. Chiefly through Jemmy’s cleverness, the two escape and return to court. Brat has learned much and changed for the better during his adventures. He winds up calling Jemmy “friend, “and he is certain to be a better prince hereafter. Full-page black-and-white illustrations, somewhat grotesque but always complementary, add attractiveness to the story. The mistaken identity plot is always a good one: children, even fairly old ones, like disguises and this kind of mix-up. Supplementary characters are well-drawn both by Fleischman and by Sis, so the whole hangs together in basic appeal. Readers could well move from THE WHIPPING BOY to its much longer cousin, Mark Twain’s THE PRINCE AND THE PAUPER.”

5. CONNECTIONS
Students can discuss the different versions of “Prince and Pauper” stories/movies they have come across. Some recent movies are MODEL BEHAVIOR, MICKEY MOUSE’S PRINCE AND THE PAUPER, and BARBIE’S PRINCESS AND THE PAUPER.

Older students could research the Middle Ages and present the information they find in a Renaissance Fair. This would include exhibits set up that share the class system, diseases, games and dances, dress, food, careers, etc.

Students could create a missing persons poster for Prince Brat and/or a wanted poster for Remmy.

Research References:
Cels, Mark. LIFE ON A MEDIEVAL MANOR (MEDIEVAL WORLD). ISBN 0778713857
Eastwood, Kay. WOMEN AND GIRLS IN THE MIDDLE AGES (MEDIEVAL WORLD).
ISBN 0778713784
Elliott, Lynne. CHILDREN AND GAMES IN THE MIDDLE AGES (MEDIEVAL WORLD).
ISBN 0778713814
Elliott, Lynne. CLOTHING IN THE MIDDLE AGES (MEDIEVAL WORLD). ISBN 0778713830
Elliott, Lynne. FOOD AND FEASTS IN THE MIDDLE AGES. ISBN 0778713806
Elliott, Lynne. MEDIEVAL MEDICINE AND THE PLAGUE (MEDIEVAL WORLD).
ISBN 0778713903
Elliot, Lynne. MEDIEVAL TOWNS, TRADE, AND TRAVEL (MEDIEVAL WORLD).
ISBN 0778713822
Groves, Marsha. MANNERS AND CUSTOMS IN THE MIDDLE AGES. ISBN 077871389X
Trembinski, Donna. MEDIEVAL LAW AND PUNISHMENT. ISBN 077871392X

Other Historical Fiction Novels from the Middle Ages include:
Avi. CRISPIN: THE CROSS OF LEAD. ISBN 0786808284
Cushman, Karen. CATHERINE, CALLED BIRDY. ISBN 0064405842
Cushman, Karen. THE MIDWIFE’S APPRENTICE. ISBN 006440630X
Jacques, Brian. REDWALL. ISBN 0441005489Schlitz, Laura Amy and Robert Byrd. GOOD MASTER! SWEET LADIES! ISBN 0763615781