I’m really not sure how I felt about The Goats. Perhaps it was just the authority figure in me, but I think I was so dismayed that the camp director and counselors, and even the police officer at the end, showed such an immense lack of responsibility and common sense, that a lot of the story with Howie and Laura was seen through a haze of disbelief. The prank – stripping a boy and a girl to leave on an island, in hopes that they’ll jump all over one another, is just cruel enough to justify their flight. The two children are placed in a position of hardship, but they certainly seem to adjust very quickly. Especially with the boy and girl being as “socially retarded” as they are (the parlance of the times, I suppose), they make their plans for revenge fairly quickly, and take things a lot farther than I would have expected. Of course, the novel wouldn’t have had as much adventure if they had returned immediately to camp as they discuss early on (a much more realistic and perfectly surprising attack, in my opinion), but they seem to go from returning to camp to living life on the lamb without a reasonable transition.
The characters are also only somewhat likeable. Obviously we are meant to sympathize with them, as they are the victims of a cruel prank, and certainly don’t deserve it, but the sympathy never really makes the connection to amiability, at least not for me. As for character development, Cole’s insistence on referring to the children throughout as “the boy” and “the girl” is a decision I’m not sure I agree with. On the one hand, it highlights the fact that the children do not know each other, even as they spend days together. It also demonstrates how character development can occur even without a name to put to the face. However, this anonymity is by no means as important as Cole seems to want it to be, and it hinders the reader’s ability to feel closer to the characters. If I were to teach The Goats, I could maybe use the characters almost namelessness as a jumping-off point for a “what’s in a name” conversation.
The narration also had a certain unlikable something to it for me. Somewhere between the specific details that the narrator picked out in descriptions and the overall journey that the two children took, I felt a certain mental or emotional exhaustion when reading this book. It’s possible that this was driven by the dread that I felt, wanting the two just to go back to camp where they were safe. The high point of this wariness came when they cautiously got into an unmarked car with no door handles on the passenger side, merely because the driver showed them a badge, before veering off onto a back road. Although it turned out that the driver was indeed a police officer, just acting strangely (what on earth was he thinking?!), the entire section just made me feel icky all over. Perhaps the story and narration was styled specifically to create this mental attitude, but I’m not certain that it was. Either way, story arc, tone, and personal connection and reaction to events are all topics that could be taught using The Goats as a text.
The other main theme that this book could definitely be used to teach is conflict. In the traditional “man vs. man, man vs. nature, man vs. self” format, the narrative tone and the thoughts of the characters create a clear “us vs. the world” conflict – even the adults, who are supposed to be the saving grace in this situation, are trying to separate them. Again, like so many of the books I apparently find myself drawn to, the issue of right vs. wrong comes up in The Goats, and could be teachable. Honestly, however, I think the emotional drain this book caused me, and could cause other readers, is likely to prevent me from using this book in the classroom if I have a good alternative.
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