The Dead Boy Detectives—lessons for the living
The Dead Boy Detectives might not be alive, but they have some insights about how to live.
Life has a way to taking over. We made some New Year’s resolutions and bought a gym membership. But once we got back to work, returned to college, there just wasn’t time. Life took over.
So how about thinking further ahead and taking some advice on what is important about life from a couple of characters who haven’t got it anymore?
When the Dead Boy Detectives first appeared in Sandman #25 (April 1991), neither of them were detectives and only one of them were dead. In fact, it wasn’t actually a Dead Boy Detectives story. There was no mention of the Dead Boy Detectives until they appeared in The Children’s Crusade crossover in December 1993.
The initial story was about Charles Rowland and Edwin Paine surviving and escaping.
During Christmas break, Charles has been deserted by his father. Given no choice, he remains at St Hilarion’s with the headmaster and matron. As the weeks progress, the school is taken over by ghosts. Students are forced back into lessons and Charles along with them.
Unfortunately for the still alive Charles, ghost don’t need food and can’t feel anything. There is no food and Charles is subjected to conditions on the dead can tolerate.
As Charles looks for food, he is attacked by three bullies who torture him. Suffering from mistreatment and neglect, Charles is taken by Edwin to the attic.
Edwin is a ghost who has returned from sixty years in hell to St Hilarion’s. Edwin takes Charles to the attic because there is where the same three bullies who attacked Charles performed a satanic ritual on Edwin to raise demons. When the ritual doesn’t work, the bullies hide Edwin’s remains in a truck in an attic.
Edwin is powerless to help Charles and he dies in the attic with Edwin at his side.
Death comes to collect Charles, she is in a hurry. Charles asks what is going to happen to Edwin and Death tells him she has only come for Charles. Unwilling to leave his friend, Charles won’t go with Death who tell him, “I’ll catch up with you later” and leaves.
Lesson One: Time is limited
Charles and Edwin are functioning with the knowledge that death is coming for them. There is a time limit to their existence, even if they are already dead.
That’s not to suggest they are motivated by fear. In the final pages of the story, it is not fear that drives Charles and Edwin, it is the awareness of limited time and the importance of making a choice.
Sitting in the attic trying to figure out what to do next, Charles says “I can tell you what we’re not going to do We’re not staying here any longer.”
Sure, being in one place for a while is important, but you need to get up and go somewhere else sooner or later. Charles and Edwin are in an attic with their decaying remains, so there is a little more motivation, but it is important to get and do something.
Lesson Two: Leave it behind you
Edwin is initially unsure about leaving the attic. He says he thinks he should stay because that’s where his bones are. His origins lie in the attic. It is the place where he died. It is an important place, but it isn’t forever. It only takes one question from Charles to change Edwin’s mind.
Charles asks “Do you want to be a ghost in an attic all your life?” Edwin doesn’t need much to come to the conclusion himself when he says, “You always have to leave something behind”.
It doesn’t matter how important a moment is in your life, sooner or later you have to leave it behind you. That doesn’t mean you can’t take some of the important elements with you. When Edwin leaves the attic, he leaves with Charles and together they move on.
Lesson Three: You create your own hell
As Charles and Edwin leave St Hilarion’s, they have a conversation about Hell. In the background, a number of characters (the headmaster, the bullies and other students) struggle with difficult situations.
Charles tells Edwin that “Hell’s something you carry around with you” and that the ghosts they are living behind are forces of their own oppression.
“They’re doing the same things they always did,” Charles says, “They’re doing it to themselves. That’s hell.”
Edwin who has actually been to Hell doesn’t exactly agree. After he was collected by Death, Edwin spent sixty years in Hell. For Edwin, Hell was walking down a long corridor with the sense that people are chasing him, but he could never see the people chasing him or any exit from the corridor.
Edwin was able to escape from Hell and as a consequence he says, “you don’t have to stay anywhere forever”.
Make a change
Charles and Edwin suffer during their lives. They are unable to stand up to the bullies that murder them, but they manage to move past their own suffering.
They might be dead and they might only be boys, but Charles and Edwin have a lot to teach us about living.
Their story is about escaping from oppression and embracing life. Both oppression and embracing life comes in a variety of forms and it’s up to us to figure out what it means to us.
