43 pages • 1 hour read
Adam GidwitzIn A Glass Grimmly
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2012A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
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What We Seek Is Inside Us
The characters of In a Glass Grimmly embark on a quest to find the lost Seeing Glass, believing doing so will get them everything they’ve ever wanted. However, while on this quest, they learn that everything they want has been inside them all along, showing how the ultimate quest is internal rather than external. Through the character arcs of Jack, Jill, and the frog, the novel explores how we will find what we seek only when we look inside ourselves.
Jill’s arc shows that true beauty comes from within. Sitting alongside her mother day after day while the woman applies makeup and obsesses over her appearance has led Jill to believe she will be respected only if others see her as beautiful. Jill’s perception that the people love her mother reinforces this belief, but Jill does not see that their love is superficial until the goblins show her a similar type of “love” in Chapter 8. When the goblins tie her to the throne and compliment her appearance, Jill enjoys it at first, believing she is finally appreciated for her beauty. As the goblins continue, however, their compliments become boring and trite, and “by the twenty-eighth goblin, Jill did not care what they thought of her” (186). The compliments the goblins offer sound nice, but they are superficial, like the love the people show Jill’s mother. After a time, the compliments lose meaning because Jill realizes the goblins only say these things out of habit, not because they mean them. Thus, Jill concludes that how she appears to others doesn’t matter and that her opinion of herself carries more weight than the opinions of others.
Jack’s desire to be admired shows that others only respect people who respect themselves. At the story’s opening, Jack follows the village boys around, believing they will bring him into their group if he spends time around them. Jack’s desperation to be part of the crowd keeps him from seeing that the boys want nothing to do with him, even as the boys make up songs and poke fun at Jack. Jack’s encounter with the giants fuels Jack’s desperation. The giants are a larger version of the village boys, and Jack thinks that by winning the respect of the giants, he can return home and automatically have the admiration of the boys. It isn’t until the Goblin Market that Jack realizes the opinions of others have no power over his self-esteem. When tempted by the magic sword, Jack finally sees that it is not worth sacrificing part of who he is (in this case, his hand) to become what others will accept. Instead, Jack realizes that he is enough as he is and does not need a sword or anything else to have self-respect. At the end of the book, Jack definitively walks away from the village boys because he understands he no longer needs their approval. Jack learns that understanding his self-worth stops him from seeking the approval of others.
The frog’s journey illustrates that we are always where we belong no matter how far we travel. At the story’s opening, the frog spends his days in his well, hating his surroundings and wishing for his circumstances to change. When he ventures to the castle to befriend Jill’s mother, the frog learns that even though things may look better elsewhere, often they are not. Later, when the frog accompanies Jack and Jill on their adventure, he misses the safety of his well, showing that distance or experience can grant new perspectives. The encounter with Eddie helps the frog understand that the challenges at his well could appear anywhere. The frog disliked his inane conversations with the salamanders in his well, only to get caught in such a conversation with a giant salamander with the power to help the group find the Seeing Glass. The frog’s location has changed, but his circumstances have not, meaning he has always been where he was meant to be and doing what he was meant to do. At the end of the book, the frog goes to live with Jack and Jill in the forest because going on the quest with them has made the children’s home the new place he belongs. Though he is no longer at his well, he feels like he is in the right place, showing how his sense of belonging changes as he grows.
Jack and Jill’s character arcs focus on internal transformations that bring them closer to their true selves; external influences can’t change who they are unless they let them. The frog’s external journey brings him back to where he belongs, and together, the three illustrate how the ultimate destination lies within rather than without.
The Importance of Self-Trust
Through both protagonists and the narrator, In a Glass Grimmly touches on the importance of organizing the information we receive. Listening to others gives perspective, but ultimately, the inner voice is the one the characters must listen to and that the narrator promotes to the reader. Through the narrator’s insistence that the reader draw their own conclusions, Jack and Jill’s experiences of adversity when they trust others above themselves, and the ways both children backslide in the book’s final chapter, the novel explores how trusting ourselves is key.
Throughout the novel, the narrator offers insight into the story's events, always telling the reader to think for themselves and not let either their perspective or the characters’ thoughts sway them. The narrator also insists that the reader read fairy tales if they want to understand how and why the novel's characters end up in the situations they do. By doing so, the narrator emphasizes the importance of trusting ourselves. Gidwitz’s message is for the reader to listen to what others say and verify that information instead of simply believing what others tell them. In this way, the narrator is the embodiment of this theme. When Jack and Jill make decisions the narrator doesn’t agree with, the narrator tells the reader as much, showing the importance of multiple perspectives. Jack and Jill make poor choices, such as accepting the giants’ challenge and believing the mermaid. While the narrator points out their mistakes, they also ask the reader for their opinion, forcing the reader to evaluate their feelings and trust in their thoughts about each situation. Thus, by engaging with the novel, readers learn the importance of trusting their judgment.
Jack and Jill make their best choices when they listen to themselves rather than others. When they arrive at the giant kingdom in the clouds, Jack is swayed to participate in the giants’ challenge because the terms of the challenge seem to offer everything he wants—namely, a chance to be recognized for his greatness. However, once Jack faces the impossible tasks, he realizes that listening to what the challenge could give him has led him astray. Later, when Jack finds Jill imprisoned by the goblins, he can outsmart the marriage test because he trusts in his ability to assess the situation and emerge victorious with some planning. Similarly, Jill offers the goblins her trust when they tell her she’s beautiful because she wants to believe their words. Soon, though, Jill realizes that their words only hold her captive, both physically and mentally. By contrast, Jill can defeat the giants in an eating contest because she trusts in her cleverness to get herself and Jack out of a bad situation. For both children, listening to the promises of others gets them in trouble while trusting in their strengths saves them, showing how believing in ourselves is the ultimate form of trust.
Both Jack and Jill backslide when they return home after their quest because trust is fragile and must be constantly cultivated. The children realize their quest has changed them. They are eager to see their old worlds through their new eyes, believing that others will also see how they’ve changed and accept them, no questions asked. The narrator cautions the reader to be careful of new wisdom because “wisdom is hard to come by, and once achieved, it is very easily lost” (252). This approach may also be applied to self-trust. While they are away from the places that made them lose trust in themselves, Jack and Jill find it easy to cultivate trust because no one tells them not to. Back in the lives they knew, Jack and Jill fall into old patterns, letting their self-trust fall aside in favor of hoping others will have changed. Both children realize that they are the ones who have changed and that if they want others to view them differently, they must show others that they are not the same. Consequently, they both seek a new life that helps them regain trust in themselves. At the end of the book, Jack and Jill integrate their new and old selves, showing how self-trust leads to confidence and acceptance.
Whether through actions or new understanding, the trust cultivated by the characters of In a Glass Grimmly shows how believing in ourselves is key to finding who we want to be. The lessons Jack and Jill learn are repeated by the narrator, who feeds them to the reader so they, too, can learn to trust their judgment and make decisions based on what is best for them, not on what others think is best.
The Difference Between Wish and Want
Throughout In a Glass Grimmly, the characters grapple with what they want versus what they wish. At first, these seem like the same thing, but as the story progresses, it becomes clear that wants are things they are willing to pursue while wishes are things they hope someone else will bestow. Through the Others, as well as how the Others interact with Jack and Jill, the novel shows that it’s up to each person to take what they want.
The Others themselves represent what happens when we only wish for things. From the moment the old woman sends Jack and Jill on their quest, the novel sets up the Others as characters who rely on external forces to bring about the consequences they want rather than relying on themselves. When the children bring the Seeing Glass to the Others, the Others become obsessed with its supposed mythical ability to give wisdom to anyone who asks it a question. The Others repeatedly ask the glass to tell them how wonderful they are but are always disappointed by the response, showing how relying on external sources of validation is never satisfying. The Others wish to be great; that is, they are not great but hope others will think they are. They do not want to be great because if they did, they would do what is needed to become so. At the end of the book, they believe the glass when it tells them they will be great if they turn themselves in for their crimes because this solution offers wish fulfillment without them having to put effort toward greatness. Thus, they get the fate coming to them, showing the problem with letting empty wishes direct decisions.
Jill’s encounter with the clothier and his invisible silk illustrates how wishes keep us from seeing the truth. Jill wishes to be as beautiful as her mother because she believes it will win her mother’s affection. When the clothier offers to make Jill a gown out of silk, she can’t see it, but still, Jill eagerly accepts, convincing herself that the silk’s apparent nonexistence only means she is lacking. Jill fears admitting to her mother that she can’t see the silk because doing so disrupts the attention she wishes for. Later, Jill finally sees the silk because she gives fully into her wish, meaning she is completely committed to the silk as an answer to her problems. The revelation that the silk isn’t real breaks Jill’s wishes. She realizes she has tricked herself into hoping for something she knows she’ll never get—for her mother to love her as much as the woman loves herself. After this, Jill starts her journey toward wanting things, which is where she discovers her hidden cleverness and inner beauty. Breaking her mother’s mirror in Chapter 12 is the moment Jill stops wishing. She finally understands that wishes won’t get her what she wants because wishes only come true if she wants them enough to pursue them.
Jack’s incident with the salesman and the village boys shows the danger of believing wishes have been granted when there’s no such evidence. Jack doesn’t want to sell his cow, so when the salesman offers the single bean in exchange for the animal, Jack is tempted by the idea of magic and by the knowledge he won’t have to go to the market—something he fears. Jack’s wish not to do these things feels answered when the village boys encourage him to make the trade. Not only do the boys tell Jack what he wants to hear, but Jack also believes they are finally seeing him as an equal. Thus, Jack is willing to believe that the trade is good because the boys say it is, so, feeling confident, he trades the cow for the bean. When the boys reveal that they tricked him, Jack’s wishes shatter because everything he thought he had gained was a lie. In the final chapter, Jack returns to following the boys around like he used to, wishing they would like him. Suddenly, he realizes, “I wish I could be friends with these boys. But I do not want to be” (287). By giving up his wish, Jack can pursue what he wants, showing how belief in wishes holds us back from desires that matter.
The Others represent the fallacy of wishes, both for themselves and for the other characters. Wishes offer the characters something that seems good on the surface but don’t give them anything. By contrast, wants are things that Jack and Jill can take action to get, so they’re more meaningful because the characters are willing to do the work to get them.
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