# The Phantom Toolbooth **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 30, 2020, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377 "2020-08-30T15:44:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Jasmine](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jasmine/32/2964_2.png) [@Jasmine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jasmine)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2020, 12:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/21 "2020-08-31T12:02:09Z")
When I was ten, I read a science fiction novel, “Wasp”, written by Eric Frank Russell. I thought it was so exciting and hardly put the book down until I read it all. About a year ago, I came across the book at a friend’s house. Excited, I asked if I could borrow it because I wanted to read it again! Well, all I can say is that there is a big difference between the reading tastes of a ten year old girl and an adult woman. Fortunately, though, I didn’t gift it to a dozen people before finding that out. LOL ---
**Author:** ![tofor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tofor/32/13727_2.png) [@tofor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tofor)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2020, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/22 "2020-08-31T12:31:27Z")
> [@amarinth](#): > > I definitely do remember not having the slightest idea what a “turnpike tollbooth” was. Me too! Only in my case it was because I misread “tollbooth” as “tollboth” and didn’t know what that was. It made much more sense after my mother explained it was a “tollb’oo’th” (I did know what that was), but by then I’d already finished the book. It made much more sense in retrospect. Of course, tollbooths are going the way of the dodo in favor of electronic tolling, so future generations may all be very confused by this classic. ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2020, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/23 "2020-08-31T12:34:22Z")
> [@Peter\_Morris](#): > > > [@Hilary\_Algar](#): > > > > So, I re-read many chapters of this back, and man, that was some really tough sledding–so incredibly tedious and boring. How could this have ever been my best book? > > Maybe your father just read you the good parts. You could always make an abridgement leaving out the tedious stuff and political satire. Inconceivable ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2020, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/24 "2020-08-31T12:37:20Z")
I had the opposite experience. I recently reread LOTR, but when I try to go back to The Hobbit, I can’t get past how it’s written down to the audience. ---
**Author:** ![Hilary\_Algar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hilary_algar/32/4282_2.png) [@Hilary\_Algar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hilary_Algar)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2020, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/25 "2020-08-31T12:44:19Z")
> [@amarinth](#): > > I Ouch! 🙃 Point taken ---
**Author:** ![Superdude](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/superdude/32/13450_2.png) [@Superdude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superdude)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2020, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/26 "2020-08-31T13:07:37Z")
Has anyone seen the [animated](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0064806/) movie? Some big name vocal talent. And, apparently, there are [rumors](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1632727/) of another treatment. ---
**Author:** ![Prof.Pepperwinkle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/prof.pepperwinkle/32/13627_2.png) [@Prof.Pepperwinkle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Prof.Pepperwinkle)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2020, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/27 "2020-08-31T13:09:52Z")
I’ve seen the movie. It’s fair, but nowhere nearly as engaging as the book. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2020, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/28 "2020-08-31T13:34:00Z")
I first encountered the book in a school reader–you know, those collections you got in school that had both short excerpts and short stories? I can’t remember exactly which part it contained–part of me thinks it was just the beginning bit, and part of me seems to remember an illustration of a dodecahedron in the reader. It’s one of the few where I found the book, and I enjoyed it. I stumbled upon it again in high school and mostly enjoyed it, too, getting a whole lot more of it–especially since I’d by then found out what a tollbooth was. What I remember now seems pleasant enough: half baked ideas, dodecahedrons, jumping to conclusions, etc. But I don’t remember this political stuff you guys mentioned, so it could bog me down. I do know one thing from my youth that I adored that I couldn’t make it through as an adult: the [Babes In Toyland movie with Drew Barrymore in it](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babes_in_Toyland_(1986_film)). We got it on VHS from the local McDonalds, and I watched it a ton. I kept talking about it as the superior movie to other versions, too, until one day I found it on YouTube and couldn’t sit through more than five minutes. And I’m usually pretty good at putting myself into the mindset of when I was a kid. ---
**Author:** ![Icarus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icarus/32/72_2.png) [@Icarus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icarus)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2020, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/29 "2020-08-31T17:47:51Z")
Count me as one who read it and loved it as a child. What I most recall is that I read the whole book in one day, which at the time I thought of as some olympian feat. ---
**Author:** ![Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slow_moving_vehicle/32/291_2.png) [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2020, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/30 "2020-08-31T18:17:30Z")
> [@DrFidelius](#): > > > [@Peter\_Morris](#): > > > > > [@Hilary\_Algar](#): > > > > > > So, I re-read many chapters of this back, and man, that was some really tough sledding–so incredibly tedious and boring. How could this have ever been my best book? > > > > Maybe your father just read you the good parts. You could always make an abridgement leaving out the tedious stuff and political satire > > Inconceivable And the kissing, too. ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2020, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/31 "2020-08-31T18:23:31Z")
Dunno what to say. Obviously people’s tastes change over time, but I have gone back to re-read _The Phantom Tollbooth_ and _The Lord of the Rings_ many times in my life - from sixth grade on - and continue to enjoy them just as much. Same thing with _Watership Down_. The work that I find un-re-readable that I have re-read enough times at point of my life to be a foundational component of my mental fictionverse is Frank Herbert’s _Dune_. Mainly because I so very much enjoyed the parody of it, National Lampoon’s Doon, which hit so many perfect notes in skewering to me that I can’t read the original now without considering it very stuffy and self-ponderous, if that is a word. Not Herbert’s fault, of course, but the very epicness of the tone of the dialogue that used to impress me no longer seems poetic, but rather hammy. I guess a lot of people view LOTR in the same light, the difference to me being the way The Professor adroitly uses archaic English language constructs to indicate the antiquity or gravity of the speakers. Not everybody talks that way, only when Being Really Grand And Ancient And All - it’s key that the hobbits are the main POV characters. ---
**Author:** ![robardin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/43a26b/32.png) [@robardin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robardin)\ **Post date:** [August 31, 2020, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/32 "2020-08-31T18:25:57Z")
Oh, and I still tear up and cry at the same point of re-reading _Charlotte’s Web_ as I did forty years ago. ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2020, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/33 "2020-09-01T02:37:29Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > I want to read this book. Oh, do. Even if it’s only half as good as I remember it, it’ll be fun. My mom read it to me when I was home sick from grade school. Loved it, and finished reading it on my own. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2020, 3:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/34 "2020-09-01T03:18:24Z")
> [@Hilary\_Algar](#): > > Have you ever had a similar experience? Yes, and oddly enough, the book was The Phantom Tollbooth, which I wasn’t able to slog through when I tried to reread it a couple of years ago. Which is weird, because by and large, I love children’s and young adult literature, and I’ve read (and re-read) a lot of it as an adult and enjoyed it. ---
**Author:** ![GMANCANADA](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gmancanada/32/2837_2.png) [@GMANCANADA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GMANCANADA)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2020, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/35 "2020-09-03T14:12:42Z")
Not so sure your logic on this or what you expected: The Hobbit is a children’s book targeted for 11 to 14 year olds. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2020, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/36 "2020-09-03T14:15:54Z")
> [@Superdude](#): > > _The Hobbit_ still has the same appeal to me as it did at 13, but the rest of the series I just cannot slog through anymore. For me, it’s the opposite. I can read the Lord of the Rings, but the Hobbit is unreadable for me. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2020, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/37 "2020-09-03T14:16:33Z")
I recall liking The Phantom Tollbooth in fifth grade. I recently saw the movie and it was awful. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2020, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/38 "2020-09-03T14:29:50Z")
I’m responding to someone who enjoyed rereading the Hobbit as an adult, but not LOTR. It would have been nice if I was able to enjoy the Hobbit as much as I did when I was a kid, but I’m not amazed that I can’t, just a little disappointed. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2020, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/39 "2020-09-03T14:54:52Z")
I actually never read The Phantom Tollbooth as a kid. First time was reading it to my kid who is now 34. And to his siblings. Loved it each time. I suspect the reading it aloud and seeing the child’s appreciation of the wordplay and Dad joke literalism was part of it. And the drawings. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2020, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377/40 "2020-09-03T15:01:31Z")
I read The Phantom Tollbooth in fifth grade, and then I did a book report or some sort of project on it, for which I re-drew the map shown in the endpapers. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-phantom-toolbooth/919377.md?page=3)