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Plot
Stephen struggles to place a scent that prompts a strange feeling. His daughter tells him that it's just the smell of
privet using its German name: Liguster. Stephen reveals that an event happened years prior which is the reason for
his feelings towards the smell. Stephen decides to revisit his old house in London: "...take a walk down memory
lane...
Stephen returns to the Close he grew up. He recollects his past. We are introduced to some of the characters he
remembers from his past: Keith and his parents, Aunty Dee and Stephen's own family. As Stephen remembers
things he begins to realise he might not be able to quite trust his memory and it's accuracy
Stephen and Keith begin to spy on Keith's mother as part of one of their games. They read her diary and discover
marks which they believe to contain secret meanings. She then discovers the two and send them outside Stephen
and Keith retire to their hideout in the bushes. Keith makes Stephen swear that won't reveal the details they were
uncovering. Keith then makes a sign for their hideout saying 'Privet' which they think says 'Private'
During school time, Stephen and Keith are unable to spy on Mrs Hayward successfully. On Saturday, they follow
Mrs Hayward to Aunty Dee's but she leaves and ‘disappears’. For days, the boys follow Mrs Hayward but nothing
sees out of the ordinary until she varnishes again.
Stephen and Keith realise that Mrs Hayward has not been disappearing but going through a tunnel in the
embankment. There they find a box with a packet of cigarettes in it. Stephen is visited by Barbara Berrill who
shocks Stephen by telling him that she has seen Aunty Dee kissing her boyfriend by the tunnel
Mrs Hayward finds Stephen in the hideout and asks him to stop spying on people and leading Keith astray.
At night, Stephen goes to the railway embankment in the light of the full moon and discovers clothes inside the
box that he and Keith had originally discovered cigarettes. He is discovered by someone and, terrified, grabs a sock
and runs away. When he returns with Keith the metal box has gone. They follow Mrs Hayward to the wasteland
but lose her. The boys amuse themselves by throwing stones and realise that someone is hiding in a disused cellar.
Stephen goes to Keith's house only for Keith to ignore him. Mr Hayward demands his thermos flask which he
believes Keith has taken: he canes his hands. Stephen tells Keith’s mum.
Stephen is on his own for days: apart from Barbara. Mrs Hayward comes to the hideout to give Stephen a letter.
Stephen follows a policeman from Auntie Dee's to the Haywards. Barbara visits the hideout yet again and this time
she and Stephen smoke a cigarette. Stephen decides that Mrs Hayward has fallen in love with a German Airman
that has been shot down
Mrs Hayward convinces Stephen to take a basket of provisions and a letter to the man in hiding. Barbara comes to
the hideout before Stephen has had time to leave. They smoke, she kisses him and insists on seeing the contents
of the basket. They begin to fight when she opens the letter. Mr Hayward calls Stephen and makes him surrender
the basket. Plagued by all that has happened, Stephen begins having nightmares He takes supplies from his own
house but as he approaches, a voice calls his name.
Stephen listens to the man under the corrugated iron. He takes a silk scarf, to Mrs Hayward: he finds that the scarf
is a map of the German countryside. He is discovered by Keith who wounds Stephen with a butter knife because he
believes he has broken their oath. Stephen goes the railway embankment to hide the scarf but he finds the place
full of men.
Back in the present, Stephen looks at the Close and wonders what has become of the silk scarf. He fills in brief
details of the rest of his childhood and what became of some of the characters. He reflects on when he realised
who the man in hiding was. He feels homesick as he turns to leave the Close
Character
Stephen Wheatley
Key Quotations
The third week of June and there it is again
The narrator. Majority of the novel is him There were things that no one ever explained. Things that no one even
looking back on his childhood. He seems to said. There were secrets
have been a shy boy, something of an Those six simple words . . . 'My mother is a German spy'
outsider. He grows up across the text.
He was the leader and I was the led
Keith Hayward
Our house was made even more shameful by the partner it’s yoked to
He seems to leads Stephen astray. He is of
a higher class than Stephen or Barbara. He She’s a stranger in our midst, watching us with alien eyes
has a vivid imagination and a vicious streak. Even the untidiness itself glowed with a kind of sacred light … because
Thinks his mum is a spy.
they reflected the glory of Uncle Peter.”
Barbara Berrill
Stephen Wheatley has become this old man who seems to be me
Stephen has a crush on her. She spies on
Like Keith’s mother he’s putting on a performance; he’s trying to conceal
the boys. She encourages Stephen to break
his true nature
free from Keith and be more independent.
Keith’s eyelids have come down. His face is set and pitiless. He looks like
Mrs Hayward
his father
Keith’s mother. Mystery of novel surrounds
The dark of the moon’s coming, and it’s going to be more frightening than
her: is she a German spy?
we thought
Mr Hayward
A sinister man – spends much of his time There’s something sad about our life, and I can’t quite put my finger on
locked away in his shed. He is capable of what it is
unpleasant violence.
The game’s not over. It’s simply become a more terrible kind of game
Mr Wheatley
Stephen’s attitude to his father changes
over the text – he is not, perhaps, the timid
man first seen.
Uncle Peter
Now she’s trying to supplant Keith as the one who makes the plans and
projects!
Lamorna. A distant land across the sea, blue on the blue horizon.
He smiles his father’s thin smile
The game’s finally over
Auntie Dee’s husband – fighting abroad
and seems to be a war hero.
Everything in the Close is as it was; and everything has changed
Auntie Dee
Mrs Hayward’s sister – she visits her
regularly and seems to ‘disappear’ there.
Stylistic/ Language Features
Themes
Multiple narrators – Stephen as a child. Stephen as a man. He is a self-confessed ‘unreliable’ narrator. Likewise, the third
person narrative voice here is slipperly.
Bildungsroman – this is a novel of Stephen’s growth into adulthood and greater understanding
Mystery novel – as well as the characters, the reader is likewise trying to solve the mystery
Use of humour – sarcasm, military time, naivety of kids – dramatic irony as reader knows more
Sensory details – Stephen’s memories are filled with sensory details – smell is especially important
Symbolism – privet hedge, tunnel, cigarette, bayonet, different coloured belts, scarves, photograph, Lamorna, Summertime
vs Autumn
Foreshadowing – the reader is constantly alert that something terrible happens. Kept guessing until the end. Disquieting
mood of doom lies over the text
Leadership and Power
Awakening
Childhood vs Adulthood
Loyalty and Betrayal
Class and social background -Description of
different houses
Narrative Uncertainty
Truth and Lies
War and Conflict
Role of the imagination
(If you scan in this QR code, you will see an interview
with Michael Frayn discussing the writing of this text.)
Context
Autobiography? – the world around Stephen is from Frayn’s personal
experience. He was likewise twelve at end of the war. He lived in Ewell
and had a friend like Keith
WW2 – RAF crucial to Britain’s safety in war: hence, Uncle Peter is viewed
as a hero. 55’000 Bomber Command airman killed. Bombing raids were
controversial though.
Men and Women – husbands seem to have complete control over wives
on the surface, but both Mrs Hayward and Barbara seem to fight against
this worldview.