The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane

by Kate DiCamillo

On clear nights, the stars shone, and their pinprick light comforted Edward in a way that he could not quite understand. Often, he stared at the stars all night until the dark finally gave way to dawn.

‘Farthfigery.’

as bright as the stars on a moonless night, as bright as the stars on a moonless night

At night, they slept on the ground, under the stars. Lucy, after her initial disappointment about Edward being unfit for consumption, took a liking to him and slept curled up beside him; sometimes, she even rested her muzzle on his china stomach, and then the noises she made in her sleep, whimpering and growling and chuffing, resonated inside Edward’s body. To his surprise, he began to feel a deep tenderness for the dog.

Edward knew what it was like to say over and over again the names of those you had left behind. He knew what it was like to miss someone. And so he listened. And in his listening, his heart opened wide and then wider still.

Edward didn’t care what she said. The terrible ache he had felt the night before had gone away and had been replaced with a different feeling, one of hollowness and despair. Pick me up or don’t pick me up, the rabbit thought. It makes no difference to me.

have been loved, Edward told the stars. So? said the stars. What difference does that make when you are all alone now? Edward could think of no answer to that question.

Perhaps, he thought, it is not too late, after all, for me to be saved.

It was a singular sensation to be held so gently and yet so fiercely, to be stared down at with so much love. Edward felt the whole of his china body flood with warmth.

EXCEEDINGLY WELL MADE,” SAID the man who was running a warm cloth over Edward’s face, “a work of art, I would say — a surpassingly, unbelievably dirty work of art, but art nonetheless. And dirt can be dealt with. Just as your broken head has been dealt with.” Edward looked into the eyes of the man.

“I have already been loved,” said Edward. “I have been loved by a girl named Abilene. I have been loved by a fisherman and his wife and a hobo and his dog. I have been loved by a boy who played the harmonica and by a girl who died. Don’t talk to me about love,” he said. “I have known love.”

Edward was the lone contrarian. He prided himself on not hoping, on not allowing his heart to lift inside of him. He prided himself on keeping his heart silent, immobile, closed tight. I am done with hope, thought Edward Tulane. And then one day at dusk, right before he closed the shop, Lucius Clarke placed another doll on the shelf next to Edward.

“I have lived one hundred years. And in that time, I have been in places that were heavenly and others that were horrid. After a time, you learn that each place is different. And you become a different doll in each place, too. Quite different.”

You must be filled with expectancy. You must be awash in hope. You must wonder who will love you, whom you will love next.” “I am done with being loved,” Edward told her. “I’m done with loving. It’s too painful.”

Once, oh marvelous once, there was a rabbit who found his way home.