How’s the Weather?

by Margaret Lucke

Is it hot enough for you? Here where I live in Northern California, we’re sitting under a long-lasting heat dome—heat meaning 100° and more. And we’re not alone. Most of the country has been enduring extreme weather this summer—ultra high temperatures, severe thunderstorms, tornados, the season’s first destructive hurricane.

But at least we don’t have to endure oobleck.

Have you ever encountered oobleck? It’s green, sticky, relentless. It gummed up an entire kingdom and brought all activity to a halt.

As a little kid, I loved the stuff.

I discovered the green goo in a book in my kindergarten classroom: Bartholomew and the Oobleck, by Dr. Seuss.

Bartholomew is a lowly page boy serving the royal court of the Kingdom of Didd. The king has become bored with endless cycle of sunshine, rain, snow, and fog, and he summons his royal magicians from their secret cave and asks them to make something new come down from the sky. Bartholomew protests that this is a bad idea, but the king insists. The magicians oblige him by creating oobleck, and what results is a disaster of epic proportions. It’s up to the humble Bartholomew to save the day.

By the time I reached first grade, I’d read that book 1,247 times (approximately). I’ve been a big fan of weather in literature ever since. (If not always a fan of what’s going on when I step outside my house.)

Dr. Seuss violated the first of Elmore Leonard’s famous rules for writers, which is: “Never open a book with weather.” This book doesn’t just start with weather; it has weather on every page. Without weather, there would be no story at all.

And that’s very much in keeping with the reason Leonard gives for his directive. A description of weather may set a mood, but that’s not enough pull readers into a story. Readers want to meet the characters and jump into the action. They don’t care that it’s a dark and stormy night–at least, not until they see how the characters react to the storm and find out how it impedes the hero’s ability to solve the problem or meet the challenge set forth by the plot.

I’ve often heard it said that the purpose of fiction is to provide the reader with an emotional experience. Weather is one experience that everyone shares, and anyone whose heart has felt lighter on a sunny day or who has gripped the steering wheel tighter while driving on an ice-choked road knows that weather can evoke emotion.

When an author uses it well, a bit of weather can transport readers into the world of the story and help them relate to what the characters are going through. As E.L. Doctorow said, “Good writing is supposed to evoke sensation in the reader–not the fact that it’s raining but the feeling of being rained upon.”

Or being ooblecked upon. What a horrible mess that is! Excuse me while I try to scrape this green, sticky, gooey glop off my boots.

And whatever the weather is right now in your part of the world: Stay cool. Keep dry. Be safe.