From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs Basil E. Frankweiler

by E.L. Konigsburg

Since she intended to return home after everyone had learned a lesson in Claudia appreciation, she had to save money for her return trip, too,

He smiled, and so did she, for she then felt more certain than ever that she had chosen the correct brother for a partner in escape. They complemented each other perfectly. She was cautious (about everything but money) and poor; he was adventurous (about everything but money) and rich.

What happened was: they became a team, a family of two. There had been times before they ran away when they had acted like a team, but those were very different from feeling like a team. Becoming a team didn’t mean the end of their arguments. But it did mean that the arguments became a part of the adventure, became discussions not threats. To an outsider the arguments would appear to be the same because feeling like part of a team is something that happens invisibly. You might call it caring. You could even call it love. And it is very rarely, indeed, that it happens to two people at the same time—especially a brother and a sister who had always spent more time with activities than they had with each other.

We don’t have to skip learning something about everything. We just won’t learn everything about everything. We’ll concentrate on Michelangelo.”

“Claudia, dear, I’m no angel. Statue or otherwise.”

She knew where the answer was—the second paragraph in the right hand column of page 157. In her mind she could actually see where the answer was, but she couldn’t think of what it was.

“Well, Claude, we just traded safety for adventure. Come along, Lady Claudia.”

I could tell that she felt happy. Happiness is excitement that has found a settling down place, but there is always a little corner that keeps flapping around.

Since 1967, the Metropolitan Museum of Art has gotten bigger and busier and has put a new face on Fifth Avenue. Entrance was free then, and it isn’t now. There was a fountain in the restaurant then, and there isn’t now. The bed (picture on page 37) where Claudia and Jamie slept has been dismantled, and just last year they closed the little chapel where Claudia and Jamie said their prayers (page 88). Even so, for thirty-five years, the staff at the museum has been asked so many questions about this book that in the spring of last year, they devoted a whole issue of their publication MuseumKids to it. It is titled The “Mixed-up Files” Issue.

“Angel” became part of Claudia’s story about finding herself, about how the greatest adventure lies not in running away but in looking inside, and the greatest discovery is not in finding out who made a statue but in finding out what makes you.

Tell a little something else—about how you can be a nonconformist and about how you can be an outsider. And tell how you are entitled to a little privacy. But for goodness’ sake, say all that very softly. Let the telling be like fudge-ripple ice cream. You keep licking vanilla, but every now and then you come to something darker and deeper and with a stronger flavor. Let the something-else words be the chocolate.”

When you come across a stand-out sentence.