A Study of Character: Captain James Hook

   Welcome back friends! Today's entry into our "Study of Character" series was written by the delightful Mr. and Mrs. David and Sarah Burnett. Once again my guest writers have absolutely shaken me. Their dissection of a legendary villain from the literary world, and a their presentation of the wisdom we can learn from him, is nothing short of magnificent. From here I leave you in their fine company, and ask that you share your thoughts after reading. Enjoy!

The Fear that Haunts Me:

A Literary Analysis of Captain Hook

   We have always been fascinated by the “dark and sinister man” that is Peter Pan’s infamous foe: Captain James Hook. He sails through children’s make-believes, terrorizing them with his razor-sharp namesake and a blade eager to strike. But Hook is a legend in literature, not only for the terror that he strikes in children, but for the uncanny familiarity that he stirs in adults. That is what sparks our fascination.

   His appeal grows as we grow up, and we learn to see in him a dark mirror of ourselves. When we look too long at Captain Hook, we see what we would all shudder to become, and fear we might already be: our own worst enemies.

   Maybe you think Hook’s archenemy is Peter Pan, but why so? Is it because Hook is after Pan like a madman? It is usually the insane extremes of Hook’s pursuit that convince us of his total hatred for Pan. But the apparent insanity is exactly what should make us question it: Maybe it seems insane because it is not what it seems at all.

   Pan, to Hook, is so much more than a boy who fed his hand to the Crocodile. He is an intolerable spotlight on Hook’s own flaws, and that is what maddens him. Hook wants to be powerful, but Pan beats him. He wants to be prestigious, but Pan mocks him. He wants to be the superior man, but he is bested in every way by a child.

   Pride—that steadfast desire to think so well of ourselves—makes us callous to what is wrong within us and seeks to divert our attention by any means necessary. Hook is absolutely ruled by pride, and consequently cannot stand Pan’s exposure of his flaws.

   So why not just leave Pan and Neverland far behind? Author J. M. Barrie provides the answer.

   In a speech given at Eton College, Barrie revealed that Hook was once a student there. He said that Hook would sometimes return from Neverland to visit his alma mater, and sit thinking upon the iconic Old Wall. Barrie shared an anecdote of one such visit, during which an officer approached Hook and asked whether he was an alum. Hook denied it, and Barrie suggested that no Etonian would deny attending such a prestigious institution, unless he were ashamed to bare its legacy.

   Vanity—that steadfast desire to have others think well of us, too—plants a hedge between us and the world, compelling us to hide the very wrongs that we cannot even acknowledge to ourselves. Vanity is a constant companion to pride, and it, too, dominates Hook. He can never really return home, or else his failures might be discovered by people who matter far more than those in Neverland.

   Ruled by pride and vanity, we imprison ourselves with our own shame—the very thing we do not want defining us—and then we wonder why we cannot be freed from it.

   Trapped in this place where Pan can fly with confidence that he’ll live forever, Hook is bound to sail with the unhappy, and quite grown-up, greatest fear of his life:

   “[Hook] sat down on a large mushroom, and now there was a quiver in his voice. ‘Smee,’ he said huskily, ‘that crocodile would have had me before this, but by a lucky chance it swallowed a clock which goes tick tick inside it, and so before it can reach me I hear the tick and bolt.’ He laughed, but in a hollow way. ‘Some day,’ said Smee, ‘the clock will run down, and then he’ll get you.’ Hook wetted his dry lips, ‘Ay,’ he said, ‘that’s the fear that haunts me.’”

   Hook is terrified of dying while still caught in disgrace (shame). But his shame, being self-inflicted, has no end in sight.

   The Crocodile is an admittedly obvious allegory for Time, and it relentlessly pursues Captain Hook. The ticking reminds him that he is indeed mortal, eventually the clock will run out, and death will come for him. When death arrives, all hope for redemption will be lost. Hook’s unconquered shame will define him finally and forever.

   There is so much in life that can bring shame. There will always be someone or something to make us feel powerless, inadequate, or unworthy, and it is easy to allow this shame to define us. We gauge our abilities far more on our failures than successes, and when dreams get difficult, we let them go as youthful fantasies. We forget that all that we once liked about ourselves is still in there, buried beneath the dirt.

   While it is neither any use nor any good to remain a child forever, we often “throw the baby out with the bathwater” when it comes to growing up. We throw away anything and everything associated with our failures, eager to get it done and gone without spending any more time than necessary in embarrassment. We rightly put away the unrealistic expectations and foolhardy tactics that led up to our failures, but we shove out along with them many of the perfectly legitimate values, virtues, and dreams that make future successes worthwhile. With failures behind and the doors to success firmly closed, how could we possibly hope to escape shame?

   But God provides a Key to escape, and it is left to us whether we will use it.

   “Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” (John 14:6, NKJV)

   In Christ, we can acknowledge the vanity holding us captive and overcome the pride that keeps us from facing shame. He invites us to look shame full in the face, and then turn from it—not by pretending to ourselves or to anyone else that it is not there, but by trusting in God to give us an identity apart from it. In Christ alone, real people can find redemption, and it is redemption that Hook so desperately needs. But, ruled as he is by pride and vanity, he cannot endure looking at his shame long enough to realize it.

   Instead, Hook turns his madness outward, and seeks to destroy Pan. He must destroy Pan. This is the only alternative. Pan is the undeniable portrait of a life free from shame, and the contrast with Hook’s own darkness is intolerable. Pan is perfectly free by a means not available to Hook: he never has to face the memories of his failures, because Neverland makes it so that Pan always forgets. Grown-ups like Hook must face reality, no matter how unpleasant, but Pan is free to let all unpleasantness disappear into the mist of lost memories.

   It is only in destroying Pan that Hook can make him face reality, bringing him into the grown-up world. And it is only in destroying Pan that Hook can finally rest comfortably in his self-made prison, no longer tormented by Pan’s glaring light.

“With Pan dead, we’ll both be free.”

   That is why Hook haunts us, even as adults. Because the temptation to give into pride and vanity and their call to hide from shame is always there. Because although there is freedom in redemption, the only way to attain it—for those of us in the real world—is to face shame head-on. Recognizing it, admitting it, and still discerning that our identities are not in it.

“For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” (John 3:17, NIV)

   Shame is a thing of our own making, and Christ is a hand extended to raise us from pits we’ve dug too deep to escape. Shame is inevitable, but we do not have to be imprisoned by it. We can grow up without becoming Captain Hook.

   It is no coincidence that tradition gives us the same actor for Mr. Darling and Captain Hook in film and play adaptations. Mr. Darling is very nearly the same man as the pirate, prone to all the same vices, but there is one decision he makes in the novel that proves he is somebody quite distinct: When the greatest shame of his life comes upon him, he submits to bearing it.

“When the children flew away, Mr. Darling felt in his bones that all the blame was his for having chained Nana up, and that from first to last she had been wiser than he...and having thought the matter out with anxious care after the flight of the children, he went down on all fours and crawled into [Nana’s] kennel. To all Mrs. Darling’s dear invitations to him to come out he replied sadly but firmly: ‘No, my own one, this is the place for me.’ In the bitterness of his remorse he swore that he would never leave the kennel until his children came back.”

   Now even Barrie admits that staying in the doghouse was a bit “in excess,” but he also concedes, “it was magnificent.” It was magnificent because “the inward meaning of it” was evident: Mr. Darling would not hide from his shame or try to hide it from the world. Instead, he would shoulder it, as painful and embarrassing as it might be.

   The road to success in this life is paved by the overcoming of many painful failures.

   And there is one further point to glean from Mr. Darling’s dramatic act: it was always intended to be only “until his children came back.” Mr. Darling knew that his children were beyond his reach, and though he might have been responsible for driving them away, he was powerless to bring them home. He depended upon something beyond himself to redeem the wrong he’d done. Maybe he was not looking for God, but he was certainly looking for a miracle.

   In the real world—the grown-up world—we do not have the option to be Peter Pan. But we don’t have to be Captain Hook, either. We can choose to be Mr. Darling.

   We can recognize that sin, shame, failure—whatever you want to call it—is a part of life, for whatever the reason. We can recognize, too, that it’s beyond our power to escape. No amount of hiding it from ourselves or from the public will eliminate it, nor will seeking to destroy any who might seem free from it. It is only when we look up that we can realize how far we’ve fallen, and see the Hand outstretched out to save us.

   We must not trade our human hands, fit for serving and creating, for iron hooks, fit only for self-harm and destruction. We do not have to meet the same end as Hook—

“Old. Alone. Done for.”

   *The character of Captain Hook explored above is based primarily on the character from the original novel by J. M. Barrie, as well as the character portrayed by Jason Isaacs in P. J. Hogan’s 2003 film adaptation.

   **For any who would like to read Barrie’s original novel, the book is available online through Project Gutenberg at www.gutenberg.org/files/16/16-h/16-h.htm#link2HCH0015.