Summery
Chapter 1: Milo
Milo is a young boy who never quite knows what to do with himself. He does not care for school or being out of school, and he thinks everything is a waste of time. No one can tell him why attaining knowledge even matters. He feels unhappy all the time.
Milo comes home from school one day and dejectedly realizes he’s in for another long afternoon. He thinks the things he owns are boring, but then he sees something he has never noticed before – a large package in the corner. It is labeled “FOR MILO, WHO HAS PLENTY OF TIME” (12).
Milo cannot figure out who sent it and why, but reads the envelope that accompanies it. The letter says the package contains a genuine tollbooth, three precautionary signs, coins for paying tolls, and one map and one book of rules and traffic regulations.
Milo sets to building the tollbooth and it is not long before it is completed. He considers it strange and wonders why there is no highway to go with it, but nevertheless sets up the three signs that inform he should “SLOW DOWN APPROACHING TOLLBOOTH,” “PLEASE HAVE YOUR FARE READY,” and “HAVE YOUR DESTINATION IN MIND” (14). The map is lovely but Milo has never heard of any of the places on it. He reads the word “Dictionopolis” and decides he might as well go there.
He dusts off a car of his, takes the map and rulebook, and puts his coin in the tollbooth. All the while he hopes it will not be a dull afternoon.
Chapter 2: Beyond Expectations
Make-believe turns to reality when Milo sees that he is speeding along on an unfamiliar highway. It is a beautiful, clear day and all the flowers and trees seem to shine. A sign welcomes him to EXPECTATIONS, and when Milo honks his horn a little man comes running cheerfully out.
The man introduces himself as the Whether Man, and happily says they do not get too many travelers. Milo asks if this is the road to Dictionopolis and the Whether Man simply says he does not know a wrong way there so this must be the right way. Milo is confused, especially as he thought the man’s name was the Weather Man.
The man explains that Expectations is “the place you must always go to before you get to where you’re going” (18); sometimes people never get beyond it. After Milo states that he will go his own way, the little man sighs with relief that he likes it when people make their own decisions since that is hard for him.
Milo drives away. The road heads to a green valley. While he is driving, Milo tells himself he is glad he is on his way since talking to the man would get him nowhere. Soon his thoughts drift and he accidentally heads to the right when he was supposed to go left.
Before he knows it, things have changed. Everything around him is monotonous, the birds sing grey songs, and the car goes slower and slower. It finally seems to crawl to a stop and Milo yawns prolifically. When the car stops altogether, Milo muses out loud that he does not know where he is.
A faraway voice replies that he is in the Doldrums. Another voice repeats it, but Milo cannot see anyone. The voice is closer now and explains that the Doldrums are “where nothing ever happens and nothing ever changes” (23). The creature announces himself and his friends as the Lethargians. Milo finds it hard to see them because they all blend into their surroundings.
Milo haltingly says he is pleased to meet them and that he thinks he is lost. One creature tells him it is illegal to say “think” in the Doldrums, and points Milo to the place in the rule book. Milo reads it and finds it ridiculous. The creatures are indignant and tell Milo that he was not thinking and that was how he ended up here in the first place.
When Milo laughs at one creature toppling over, another creature informs him that it is also illegal to laugh. Milo asks what they can do, and the creatures list their schedule. It is filled with napping, dawdling, lingering, putting things off, loafing, lounging, and sleeping. There is no time to think or laugh because they barely have time to procrastinate and plod. They do not want to get anything done and sometimes doing nothing is so exhausting they have to take a holiday. They ask Milo if he wants to go along and he shrugs that he might as well.
As he starts to feel sleepy the creatures become agitated and yell that the Watchdog is coming. They scatter as the dog runs up, roaring. Milo is stunned; the dog is a normal dog but his body has a loudly ticking clock in its torso.
When the dog asks Milo what he is doing and Milo responds that he is killing time, the dog becomes irate. The dog says it is a shame to even waste time, let alone kill it. Milo apologizes and asks if he knows how to get to Dictionopolis. The dog tells him he must do it himself, but jumps in and tells Milo he has to think to get out of there.
Milo commences thinking about birds and food and numbers, and the car moves. Finally it leaves the Doldrums.
Chapter 3: Welcome to Dictionopolis
The watchdog apologizes for his gruffness and introduces himself as Tock. When Milo expresses confusion because the dog goes “tickticktick,” Tock sadly tells the story of his brother Tick who only went “tocktocktock” and how his parents gave him the name Tock to preclude another mistake. Sadly, this did not work and his parents were frustrated. His parents had always been watchdogs, he explained. There was once no time and people found it difficult so hours and minutes and days were created. Then, though, people wasted time and gave it away so Tock and his family work to preserve it. It is the most valuable thing there is.
They continue along the road as Tock talks about the importance of time. Finally they espy the sparkling city of Dictionopolis before them. They are met by a gateman, who introduces the happy kingdom, “located in the Foothills of Confusion and caressed by gentle breezes from the Sea of Knowledge” (36). He states that it is market day and asks whether they have come to buy or sell. Milo is confused and the gateman says they must have a reason to enter or he will have to forbid them. He thinks he might have one for them and rummages through his things, finally procuring “WHY NOT?” He calls it useful, albeit perhaps too frequently used, and lets them in.
Milo and Tock drive in and are met by a huge banner proclaiming the Word Market. It is busy and loud and stalls stretch on for a great distance. Before they can explore, though, five very elegantly dressed men approach them swiftly and talk at once. They offer five variations of the same word as they greet the travelers. Milo asks why they do not just use one word instead of five, and they reply that that would be absurd. One word is as good as another, one explains, so they should use them all. They introduce themselves as the Duke of Definition, Minister of Meaning, Earl of Essence, Count of Connotation, and Undersecretary of Understanding. They are the king’s advisers comprising his cabinet.
The minister explains that words are made here in Dictionopolis; they are grown right on trees. Milo is surprised to learn this. The minister tells him once a week the kingdom holds the Word Market where people come to buy words they need and trade ones they don’t. The five advisers’ job is to make sure the words are real. It is important to choose one’s words carefully and say what you want to say, he concludes.
The men bid them adieu and leave for the Royal Banquet preparations. Milo comments that he never knew words could be so confusing, and Tock wisely replies only when you use many to say a little.
Chapter 4: Confusion in the Marketplace
The market is a vibrant, chaotic place full of people yelling. The merchants advertise their “juicy, tempting words for sale” (45). There are so many words and people, all sorting and stuffing and bustling. Milo and Tock wander the aisles and see the simple words and the fancy words, the names and the pronouns, words like “quagmire” and “flabbergast.” Milo cannot afford them even though the merchants try their best.
One wagon has only letters for people to make their own words. The man in charge gives him an A to try and Milo nibbles at it. It is sweet and tasty, and the I is icy and the C is crunchy. Milo says he does not think he is very good at making his own words, and a creature responds to him that perhaps he can help.
Milo is surprised and scared to see a huge bee hovering over him. The bee tells him not to worry – he is the Spelling Bee. He punctuates his speech with spelling out some of the words.
Milo starts to relax a bit and the Bee asks him to name the most difficult word he knows. Milo thinks and chooses the word “vegetable.” The Bee spells it after thinking hard for a moment. Milo admiringly asks if it can spell every word. The Bee says almost every word, and muses on how he was once a regular bee and how one day he realized he would never amount to anything if he was not educated.
Suddenly someone interrupts him with a loud “Balderdash!” It is a large, insect-like creature dressed in a snazzy coat and hat, and carrying a cane. The Bee disdainfully introduces him as the Humbug. The Humbug crows that everyone loves a humbug but the Bee tells Milo not to listen to him. The Humbug boasts that he comes from an honorable and old family that has been present throughout history.
The Bee sneers that he needs to get back to teaching Milo to spell, and the Humbug scoffs that spelling is useless. He adds, “a slavish concern for the composition of words is the sign of a bankrupt intellect” (54). Milo is confused but the Bee becomes mad and flies down at the Humbug.
The two fight, the Bee swooping down and the Humbug waving his cane. Milo warns them to watch out but they crash into one stall, which then proceeds to crash into others. Almost every stall in the marketplace topples over. Tock is buried under words and Milo falls on top of the Bee.
Analysis
The whimsical, wry tone of the Phantom Tollbooth is apparent right away with the description of Milo, a bored child who finds a magic tollbooth and drolly decides he will use it, all the while hoping it will not be a dull afternoon. Juster’s prose is light and simple though the ideas expressed are far more complex than the reader may expect. Indeed, it is good to approach this “children’s” book with a discerning, adult eye in order to fully appreciate Juster’s talent.
From the beginning, Milo is described in a way that might lead modern readers to conclude he has depression, but Juster explained in an interview that Milo is just a typical, dysfunctional kid who has trouble connecting all the things thrown at him. Milo is smart but cannot see how the things he learns in school actually matter; he does not have the tools yet to know why math and geography and words matter. Another thing to realize about Milo is that he is not a very fleshed-out character; in fact, he is a sort of “everyman” (or, “everykid”). He has a personality but not a very defined one. A reader can easily insert themselves into Milo’s shoes and experience the journey for his or herself. Again, Milo has salient characteristics that will reveal themselves – courage, perseverance, kindness – but he is ultimately a stand-in for the reader. Adam Gopnik wrote in The New Yorker, “Milo is the most watchful and passive of classic protagonists, the hero as freshman. An American boy of the late fifties, he is very much an empty vessel… Milo learns to trust the wisdom of others – to admire the truly learned – and to find the marvelous not in the heavens above or in the middle earth below but in the textbooks at hand.”
Milo begins his journey by passing through a tollbooth, a point between two places that Juster remembered fondly from his childhood. Children on the East Coast especially in the first half of the 20th century would certainly know of this transition point. The tollbooth functions in this novel the way the wardrobe functions in the Chronicles of Narnia, the tornado functions in The Wizard of Oz, and the rabbit hole functions in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. It is a portal to another world, an otherwise innocuous item or place that takes the hero or heroine from their mundane circumstances into a world of adventure and excitement.
Speaking of that portal, adult readers may begin to see glimmers of the hero’s journey, a hallmark of literature since Homer’s Odyssey. Joseph Campbell identified this trope of myth, religion, literature, and drama, writing about the stages the hero takes in his archetypal journey. The steps are: the ordinary world; the call to adventure; refusal of the call; meeting with the mentor; crossing the threshold; tests, allies, and enemies; approach; the ordeal; the reward; the road back; the resurrection; return with the elixir.
Milo’s journey in The Phantom Tollbooth actually fits in quite nicely with this list. To begin with, Milo lives in a very ordinary world. He is an ordinary kid who goes to school and comes home to his normal home with his toys and books. He is bored and restless and does not see much point to this ordinary life. Second, he receives a call to adventure when he comes home to find the tollbooth and its accouterments in his bedroom. He reads the note and decides to undertake the trip. He does not refuse the call as some protagonists do, but he does go into the trip with an attitude of ambivalence. Then, he meets Tock who will be his mentor throughout the journey. Tock is older and smarter than Milo, and often has insights that Milo finds valuable. For example, he responds to Milo’s comment about the five advisers making words confusing, “Only when you use a lot to say a little” (44).
Milo also completes step five, which is crossing the threshold. He does this when he arrives in the Land of Expectations and actually leaves to keep going toward Dictionopolis. As the Whether Man comments, “of course, some people never go beyond Expectations” (19).
And finally, Milo and Tock begin to encounter allies and enemies and be put to several tests. In these first few chapters, Milo is able to think his way out of the Doldrums and thus avoid the dull fate of the Lethargians, as well as befriend the Spelling Bee and the Humbug (the Humbug will later become an ally on the official journey to rescue the princesses, although in his introductory scene he is a little portentous).
