The Cay by Theodore Taylor
SUMMARY:
In February 1942 the Germans attack an oil refinery on Aruba, neighboring , Dutch island off the Venezuelan coast. Young Phillip is living in Willemstad, Curacao, with his parents, but after the attack his mother wants to return to America. Phillip and Father are against the plan, but eventually Mother gets her way.
Just days out to sea, the Germans torpedo the Dutch freighter Phillip and his mother have boarded to flee Curacao. The ship breaks up and sinks; mother and son are separated. Mrs. Enright's fate is unknown, but Phillip is hauled onto a lifeboat by a very old black West Indian who'd been a crewmember on board the "Hato." The only other occupant of the lifeboat is an old cat named Stew Cat; the three are adrift on the open sea for days with only a keg of water, some matches and a few crackers.
Phillip was struck on the head when the "Hato" was sunk, and he has a splitting headache and concussion. After two days on the raft with Timothy and Stew Cat, he goes completely blind. On the third day at sea a plane flies overhead and Timothy signals for help with a torch, but they are not seen.
Timothy, Phillip and the cat make it to a small island that the old Negro, an old sea-hand, figures must be in the Devil's Mouth. Phillips initial reaction to Timothy is one of revulsion; he finds the big black man ugly and frightening. His mother's prejudice against blacks is a factor in his attitude, but Phillip eventually overcomes it and they truly become friends.
When they first land on the island, Phillip feigns helplessness, refusing all labor. Timothy encourages the boy and teaches him to make things they'll need. When the boy gathers the courage to climb a coconut palm, he stops feeling sorry for himself and decides to do as much as he can. He is no longer a helpless blind boy. Timothy begins teaching Phillip survival skills--without telling the boy that he is preparing him for survival on the island after the old man dies.
In July with a terrible hurricane brewing, Timothy makes preparations for it, including lashing their water tank, matches and knife high on the trunk of a palm tree. They survive the first part of the storm and rest while the hurricane's eye is over them. Then they again lash themselves to the tree again to wait out the storm. After the hurricane, Phillip finds that Timothy has borne the brunt of the storm to protect him; the big West Indian's back is flayed open by sand and things driven by the high winds, and Phillip can't stop Timothy's bleeding. The old man dies. Stew Cat, who was missing after the fierce storm, reappears.
Initially the boy feels anger in response to the man's death, but gradually realizes how much Timothy did to prepare him for life alone. In addition to teaching Phillip to get around the cay without assistance, Timothy left a dozen fishing poles lashed to another palm trunk and had taught Phillip as much as he himself knew about survival.
Phillip has to bury Timothy, construct a new hut, prepare another signal fire on the beach and a "HELP" message of stones, build a new rainwater catchment, clean the camp of debris, restart his campfire, and search for anything useful the hurricane might have deposited on the cay. At first the amount of work to be done seems overwhelming, but Phillip approaches the situation calmly, rationally, and with intensity.
Phillip's first signal fire goes unnoticed, so he determines something oily will make a black smoke visible from a distance. On August 20, 1942 what he thinks is thunder is really a destroyer, so he throws oily sea grape leaves on the signal fire, which emits black smoke visible to rescuers.
The deeply-suntanned boy could've been mistaken for a native fisherman, but the captain of an American destroyer hunting German submarines has the boy and Stew Cat picked up. The captain can't believe Phillip could've drifted so far from where the "Hato" was sunk, and he's most astonished to have found a naked blind boy and a cat on a deserted island in the Caribbean.
Phillip's put ashore in Panama for medical treatment and his parents are flown in from Curacao. They can't absorb all that their son has to tell them of his time on the cay. Four months after his rescue Phillip has three surgeries to restore his eyesight. The following April, a year after the shipwreck, he returns to Willemstad with his parents.
Plot:
The Cay is the story of Phillip, a boy living on the island of Curacao off the island of Venezuela during World War II. As he and his mother are trying to escape the war and head back to their home in Virginia. The ship they are riding on sinks. Phillip survives the boat accident only to be trapped on an island with a black man and a cat. The accident leaves Phillip blind. Not only does he have to learn adjust to his blindness, but he must learn to survive on the barren island in the Caribbean Sea.Phillip overcomes his racist upbringing and Timothy trains the boy to be self-reliant. When a hurricane strikes, Timothy is killed while protecting his friend. After Phillip survives for another month, he is rescued and carries with him the legacy of Timothy's survival skills, wisdom, and friendship
Theme:Learning from Different Cultures and Races
The Cay has a clear message that friendship is colorblind; it is also a terrific adventure story of a young, newly blinded boy learning to survive on an uninhabited island
Beyond the obvious but meaningful theme of overcoming racial prejudices, this is a powerful story about growing up, becoming independent despite physical disability, and about strength and self-reliance beyond the levels required of most human beings--let alone a child
Phillip holds a lot of prejudice against black people because his mother does. However, Phillip must overcome his prejudices in order to survive.
The Cay is a heartwarming story of survival, friendship and sacrifice. The author dedicates this children's book to Dr. Martin Luther King's dream of racial equality
Character list:
Phillip Enright
Phillip Enright, 11, American citizen living with his parents on Curacao.He is a typical, carefree and careless eleven-year-old boy when the story begins. In the year that passes, he gains more wisdom and maturity than many adults display. This transformation comes about through the life-threatening adventures he experiences on the cay. Phillip's amazing friend Timothy is the one who teaches Phillip his remarkable wisdom, but Phillip deserves a great deal of credit for being open to this knowledge. At first, Phillip is not open to learning anything from Timothy. Reeling from having been blinded and stranded at sea, Phillip blames anyone he can think of for his predicament, including Timothy. To be fair, few adults would react any better in the heat of the moment. Yet once Phillip is safely on the island with Timothy, he begins to accept his situation.
Timothy
Timothy is a loving, dignified, and wise old West Indian man who is Phillip’s only companion (besides Stew the cat) on the raft and island. Timothy prepares young Phillip to survive ob the Island before he dies.
Stew Cat
Stew Cat is a tomcat shipwrecked along with them.
Author Information:
Theodore Taylor (June 24, 1921, Statesville, North Carolina, USA – October 26, 2006, Laguna Beach, California, USA) was an American author of more than 50 fiction and non-fiction books for young adult readers, including The Cay, The Weirdo (winner of the 1992 Edgar Award for Best Young Adult Mystery), Ice Drift, Timothy of the Cay, The Bomb, Sniper, and Rogue Wave.[1] The Cay, winner of 11 literary awards, including the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award, "...of which I’m the proudest, since the book was deemed worthy of being on a shelf with Alice In Wonderland...", was a Universal film presentation starring James Earl Jones. Now in print in 14 foreign countries, the story of young "Phe-leep" and old "Timothy" has passed 4,000,000 copies in publication, worldwide. Born June 23, 1921, in Statesville, NC, Taylor migrated with his family to nearby Craddock, NC, at ten years old. With writing in his blood from a markedly early age, Taylor landed a job in 1934, as the author of a high-school sports column in a local paper, at a salary of 50 cents per week. Later, he dropped out of high school -- unable to pass a mathematics examination -- opting instead to pursue writing full-time. Taylor enlisted in the merchant marines during WWII, received a commission, and returned to the Navy for the duration of the Korean War, biding his time, in the interim, as a Tinseltown press agent and a freelance writer. He authored several nonfiction books throughout the 1950s and '60s, but did not turn to young-adult fiction until 1968, when he decided to flesh out a haunting WWII anecdote into a novel. The resultant work, entitled The Cay (1969), spun the tale of an 11-year-old Dutch boy, shipwrecked on a South Seas island with an African-American man, and the friendship that evolves between the two. The Cay became a contemporary classic, and required reading for many years in the public-school curricula of 38 states. In 1974, scenarist Russell Thatcher and director Patrick Garland brought the novel to the small screen for NBC, in a critically acclaimed, hour-long version that stars Alfred Lutter III and James Earl Jones as the two leads. The Cay took only three weeks to complete. Taylor based the character of the boy in his book on a childhood playmate. The novel was published in 1969 and dedicated to Martin Luther King, Jr.
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