(Note: No actual research went into the writing of this article)
Over the course of close to 20 entries in this here journal I have delved into analysis of many different art forms and types of entertainment. Films, music, television (that is if you consider MTV to be actual television). I have explored and deconstructed celebrities, pop culture icons, and the American political landscape. But there is one area that I realize I have been neglecting. And that is the world of literature. Literature is one of humanity’s oldest and most respected forms of expression and artistry. From the early days of Chaucer and Dante to later figures like Dostoevsky, Jane Austin, and Franz Kafka to modern masters like Joyce, Hemmingway, and Steinbeck, literature has been a constant source of information and insight about the human condition and the greater world it inhabits. It is a subject and a form well worthy of study and examination. So to make amends for my previous neglect to the esteemed world of literature, I hereby present my first subject for literary analysis: “Where’s Waldo”.
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It’s funny what thoughts your mind wanders to when you are almost a week late updating your stupid online journal. But, as is usually the case in such situations, my mind turned to children’s activity books. Specifically the “Where’s Waldo” books. Surely you remember the “Where’s Waldo” series. They were a huge phenomenon when I was in elementary school, 1st or 2nd grade I believe. In case that was before your time or you were raised by wolves in a cave and thereby disconnected from human society, I guess I should explain what these books were. They were quite simple really. There was a little man named Waldo and on each page of the book he would be hidden somewhere in a very complex and detailed picture. You would have to find him before you could move on to the next page (although there were many cheaters who didn’t follow the rules. I imagine most of these people are now incarcerated in a federal penitentiary after several years of lawlessness and vagrancy). You would continue this process until there were no more pages left. You would then either go out and buy the next book, or, if you were poor, would curl up in the corner and cry because your life was now devoid of meaning. As the books progressed more and more items would be added for you to find, including a book, a key, a cane, a scroll, and if I remember correctly, there was even a Mrs. Waldo at some point. It was a pretty simple concept to be sure, but it became a bigger phenomenon than that John Travolta movie. Kids and adults alike dressed up like Waldo for Halloween, the original book made the New York Times Bestseller List, and it even spawned a video game for the original Nintendo Entertainment System and a short lived TV show. I was a huge fan myself, and often took time out of my busy day of memorizing facts about dinosaurs and inventing my flying car to search for Waldo. Looking back though, the whole phenomenon seems rather curious. I mean it was a little kid’s activity book and its main character became a pop culture icon. And for doing what? He didn’t engage in exciting quests or heroic deeds. He didn’t have any magic powers or special skills. In fact he didn’t seem to have any personality at all. So why was Waldo so popular, why did he capture the public attention and imagination, why did people feel the need to dress up like him and watch shows about him? What exactly DID he do?
Well…
He liked to hide.
Now before getting to that, there’s of course the obvious message that’s contained in the popularity of Waldo: Human beings like to look for things. Whether it’s Monty Python and their quest for the Holy Grail (a quest similar to the one Indiana Jones would take many years later) or the sad lonely soul who actually uses My Space as some sort of postmodern dating service we, as a species, seem to really enjoy looking for things. And then once we find them, we don’t really enjoy them, rather we just move on to the next thing we can look for. After all I don’t think anyone really celebrated, in any extended way, actually finding Waldo (well except for the red haired kid with the bowl cut that sat in the back of the classroom in 2nd grade). They just moved on quickly to the next page. The only real joy anyone got in finding Waldo was not from the actual act of finding him, but rather, in then being able to show other people that you had found him, and even by being smug and obnoxious by showing others how to find Waldo themselves. Boy I really hated those kids. Acting all superior because they had found Waldo and I hadn’t. They were a real pain to be around. Always talking about "Waldo this" and "Waldo that" and thinking they were so superior because they had found Waldo and you hadn’t, when all the while you knew Waldo was just going to leave them again on the next page.
But I digress…
It seems like a simple way to explain the Waldo craze was that it gave people a constant source of things to look for. But I think there are deeper truths that Waldo can expose than just that. After all, hidden pictures have long been a staple of children’s entertainment. Even before Mad Libs, there were pictures in which you could search for hidden objects. No, I think why Waldo specifically took off was that he spoke to something in our collective unconscious. We responded to something about this Waldo figure.
About this guy that liked to hide.
It seems clear that Waldo liked to hide, but it also seems pretty clear that he wanted to be found. I mean he was always staring out at you as if waiting for just that. And most importantly he dressed in a red and white striped shirt and wore glasses, not exactly the most camouflaged get up one could attire themselves in. Waldo had a unique and distinct style, but he hid it behind the masses of similar looking people. He was screaming out to be noticed, but then would hide behind another person, afraid to come out into the light alone. Maybe he had body issues. Maybe he just had general insecurities. Maybe he was afraid that when we found him we wouldn’t like him. Maybe he knew that as soon as we did find him we would just move on and starting looking for the shiny gold key or the hidden magic scroll. Maybe he was hiding from Mrs. Waldo. Maybe he was just lost.
Maybe he sounds like someone I know.
Maybe he’s us.
In my favorite book “Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs” Chuck Klosterman says, “I remember taking a course in college and my professor was obsessed by the belief that fairy tales like “Hansel and Gretel” and “Little Red Riding Hood” were part of some latent social code that hoped to suppress women and minorities. At the time I was mildly outraged that my tuition money was supporting this kind of crap; years later I have come to recall those lectures as what I loved about college.”
And it’s precisely this type of “Where’s Waldo”-deconstruction type thinking that I too love about being in college. Whether it’s that we like to search, or that we just want to be found; whether it means that we’re searching for love in all the wrong places, or that we like to hide from those trying to find us, it all CAN mean something if you want it to. If you let it. So whether we’re Waldo, or we’re just people who like to look for him, we’re one of the two. And knowing that makes you now look at something that was plain and familiar in a totally new light. It makes you think. And explore new things. And question the world.
Just like Curious George.
Top 3&1/2 of the Week:
1.) Brian Wilson - SMiLE (Album)
2.) Thanksgiving
3.) Marymount Manhattan's production of The Crucible
3&1/2.) Tea
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