Who Has Seen the Wind by W.O. Mitchell
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Book Reviews of Who Has Seen the Wind
Book Review: A wonderful story about life
Summary: 5 Stars
I was required to read this book as a rambunctious 15 year old. I hated the fact I was forced to read it, but loved the story as I had grown up on the prairies. Mitchell captures life on the prairie and the mind of an inquisitive boy like no other.Book Review: "Maybe God was in the bathroom and couldn't come to the door."
Summary: 4 Stars
Brian Sean MacMurray O'Connal comes to his own conclusons when, at age four, he goes to the local church alone and no one answers his knock. After meeting the minister later, however, he thinks he hears the voice of God--"My name is R. W. God, BVD." Brian's search for answers to life's biggest questions takes him through ages four, six, eight, and ten in this 1947 novel set during the Depression on the plains of Saskatchewan. Focusing on the O'Connal family, and especially Brian--their friends, acquaintances, life crises, and search for harmony in nature--the novel glorifies small town life and the local residents' closeness to the soil.
Here Brian expresses the normal curiosity of young children his age as he tries to understand the life cycle of nature--why the baby pigeon died after he plucked it from its nest, how two-headed calves can develop, why his puppy died and what to do afterward, and how to deal with the sudden death of his father and the more predictable death of his grandmother. Each of these major events in his life brings him closer to understanding the ebb and flow of life, further emphasized by the author's choice of repeating imagery and symbols from nature--goshawks, meadowlarks, grass and flowers, an owl, the movement of poplar trees, and, of course, the wind. Biblical imagery permeates the novel, and the poetic language and style--filled with alliteration, internal rhymes, and onomatopoeia--create a lyrical celebration of life on the prairie.
Contrasting characters further illustrate the themes. The two Bens--Old and Young--and St. Sammy, a not-so-crazy man who lives in a piano box and has his own theology, prefer their free, unfettered life on the prairie. These contrast with characters like Miss MacDonald, Brian's cruelly insensitive first grade teacher who is dedicated to crushing the free spirits of her young charges. Other characters see their lives as falling somewhere between unrestricted freedom and social responsibility.
A book full of sweetness and nostalgia for childhood and its discoveries, Who Has Seen the Wind is beautifully constructed, resonant with life's themes conveyed in heady poetic language. It is so saccharine in its depiction of the sweetness of childhood and so removed from present day life, however, that it is difficult to imagine this book appealing to today's young pre-teens and teens. Their issues regarding life and death and their big questions about the value of life are far more complicated than life as seen in this period piece. n Mary Whipple
Book Review: initiation into the mysteries of life
Summary: 4 Stars
If it be a no-brainer adventure or a plot full of relentless debauchery you're looking for, I suggest you avoid this book entirely. However, if you seek a deeply touching novel of intelligence and substance, indeed I urge you to read "Who Has Seen The Wind". It portrays the story of a prairie boy's initiation into the mysteries of life, as he discovers death, God, and the spirit that moves through everything: the wind. The plot details the little things in life that most of the masses overlook, and accurately relates the expressions and deep feelings of a young person growing up during the Great Depression. At the time I read it in school I could relate very easily to the primary character, Brian O'Connal. The novel's greatest strengths lie in its sensitive evocations of Brian's feelings, sometimes associated with his various experiences of death, sometimes with a child's fundamental, inarticulate but insistent curiosity to discover the world within and beyond himself. I was lost in the character's maturation and progression as a person. It is truly a book I will never forget. "Who Has Seen The Wind" definitely has contributed to the way I looked at life in general, as a young person at the time.Book Review: Who Has...Paid Money For This Book?
Summary: 1 Stars
Was forced to read this in highschool. It was the most god-awful boring book I've ever read before.
A young stupid kid playing around in the dirt on a farm while his relatives and pets die off around him. It's like following a young Forrest Gump around asking his mama a whole lot of stupid questions.
Someone in another review mentioned they like to read this to senior citizens. Another reviewer said teens and pre-teens won't like it. So why are teens forced to read this? It's just horrendous.
I'd rather memorize the "begats" in the Old Testament than read even a paragraph of this again. It will always and forever be the worst book I've ever read.
Book Review: boring boring boring
Summary: 1 Stars
This is one of the most boring books i have ever read. There is no story. Nothing happens. Each sentence in this book is a long, drawn out, boring attempt to be profoundly creative. Do yourself a favour and just poke youself in the eye with a stick instead of reading this....