Nickel-Old-Eon: Examining the Deeper Messages in Our Childhood Cartoons, Pt. 2

Arthur the aardvark and his friends made their television debut in 1996, the same year that most current freshmen were born. Side by side, the PBS cartoon animals and members of the Class of 2018 learned how to read, make friends and tackle more difficult issues, including dealing with bullies and reaching for personal success. Indeed, countless stories in The Crimson over the past few years have pinpointed the “type A” personalities, high stress levels and need for perfection ingrained in many college students today.

While “Arthur” originated as a book series by author/illustrator Marc Brown, the television platform was critical in enabling the characters to explore their identities through movement, monologues and, most significantly, music. In fact, two musical interludes presented in “Arthur” give insight into the workaholic, ambition-driven tendencies of many students of this generation. The first, “Library Card,” features jazzy beats and a catchy refrain that will stick in one’s head for weeks (or even months). “Having fun isn't hard, / When you've got a library card,” Arthur and his classmates—a motley crew of bunnies, mice and other shrews/rodents/people—chant loudly and infectiously more than a dozen times throughout the song. This line becomes a mantra, one that viewers not only internalize via its incessant, upbeat repetition, but also bring to the outside by acquiring library cards of their own.

In this way, “Library Card” conditions the viewer to accept the library as a space for reading (fun!), perusing books for leisure (fun!) and general fun (fun!). Throughout the song, the show’s characters name drop authors including Jules Verne, H.G. Wells, and Ray Bradbury and stories including “The Giving Tree," "Jumanji," and "Where the Wild Things Are" to encourage the viewer to reach beyond his or her reading level, try new genres and always keep reading. As one character sings, “I could stay in this place / For hours and hours.” The library, introduced as “the” place to be, remains the place to stay for as long as possible, as work and play collide.

Now that the show has taught its audience that work always equates with fun, it goes a step further and transforms how the audience member should view her workload as a means for personal achievement. In a reggae-laced song, “Lucky Pencil,” protagonist Arthur details the discovery of said writing utensil and the subsequent neuroses he develops for fear of losing the magic graphite wand. Since using the pencil, Arthur’s success in school has skyrocketed. “I used it once, / And got an A in math, /
 Then I got an A in history,” he gloat-sings over the relaxed and bouncy brass background music, which feels too low key for Arthur’s tightly-wound desire for accomplishment. In fact, Arthur feels so linked to the me-culture of ambition that he simply forbids his friends to use the pencil. When they intone, “Can we use it?” he replies immediately, “No. No. No.” This exchange occurs twice and is interspersed throughout, as Arthur focuses on his goal of “not one single mistake” and the fear that “my luck will run out / 
When that pencil is gone,”
 anxieties that hit close to home for many students. Members of our generation, perhaps, developed personal needs for academic perfection and some sort of “lucky” token object or pre-exam ritual as a consequence of watching Arthur do the same.

By the end of “Lucky Pencil,” however, Arthur has whittled down the pencil to “a nub” and can no longer use it for his tests. Though Arthur’s internal tension and compulsive behavior to write with the pencil only when absolutely necessary has been rising with this realization, the background music continues its stress-free and almost tropical patter—the resultant dissonance makes Arthur seem all the more crazed, as the upbeat melody belies his tightly-wound nature. Arthur ultimately faces his demons when the pencil is unusable and he must take a test without it.  “I took a test without it, / 
And the very next day, / Found out with no lucky pencil, /
 I still got an A
 / It was me and not the pencil, / Without doubt
 / I feel so lucky /
 To have found this out,” he, once again, brags. Arthur, your serious A-mania—ambition, As, aardvarkness—has influenced a generation of students, pencil or no.

In terms of IQ learning, children will find a way to the library with or without “Arthur,” but “Arthur” was effective in introducing the library through both drama and music, elements which supplemented what the library would be like when a child gets there and which reinforced that it is a great place to be.

What “Arthur” touched upon more successfully in “Lucky Pencil” was the emotional intelligence side of learning. The dramatization and music, which showed how nothing bad happened to Arthur without his lucky pencil, enabled children to see for themselves that  Arthur still could get an A without a totem. It would have been very difficult for words alone, either from an adult’s talking or from just a song, to convince a child that it would be okay to let go of obsessive compulsive behavior.

Most people agree that the rise of digital entertainment has shortened our attention spans. And most people agree that there is nothing wrong with educational entertainment in moderation. What we cannot overlook, however, is that music can convince both young and old to follow a strict agenda. Let’s just hope that “Lucky Pencil” is helping our generation balance emotional intelligence and more wrote success.