Tom's Midnight Garden

Tom’s Midnight Garden is the story of twelve-year-old Tom who, while staying with his aunt and uncle, discovers a magical, mysterious garden where he befriends a young girl named Hatty. Written by Philippa Pearce, the novel has been in print continuously since it was first published in 1958. Now considered a classic children’s book, Tom’s Midnight Garden explores the timeless themes of friendship, loss, aging, and time.

When Tom Long’s younger brother, Peter, gets the measles, the boys’ much-anticipated plans to spend summer vacation tree-climbing are derailed. Peter must remain in bed, and Tom, much to his chagrin, is sent away from his quarantined brother to stay several weeks with Uncle Alan and Aunt Gwen.

Childless and, even worse, garden-less, Tom’s aunt and uncle live in one of several modest flats in what was once a large manor home. The expansive lawns of the manor house have been sold off, and newer buildings now crowd around it. When Tom first enters the old building, he sees laundry baskets lining the hallway and, most striking, an old grandfather clock with a winged creature on its face. Uncle Alan cautions Tom not to touch the clock, as it belongs to their cantankerous landlady, Mrs. Bartholomew, who lives on the top floor.



Tom is immediately miserable. The bedroom he is given has bars on the windows, as it was formerly a nursery. There are no other children in the building, but as he may be infected with measles, he couldn’t play with anyone, anyway. Uncle Alan is stern, while Aunt Gwen tries to comfort Tom with rich foods. Tom’s only amusement is jigsaw puzzles.

The combination of heavy meals and no exercise makes Tom sleepless, but Uncle Alan insists he stay in bed for ten hours every night. Lying awake at midnight, Tom hears the old clock chiming. While Mrs. Bartholomew regularly winds the clock, and it keeps accurate time, its chimes never match the hour. Curiously, Tom counts thirteen chimes at midnight. This extra hour, he argues to himself, permits him to leave bed without violating his uncle’s ten-hour rule.

Tom sneaks down the stairs to scrutinize the strange clock. Because he can’t see well in the dark hallway, he opens the back door to let in moonlight and is stunned. Outside is a magnificent, sunlit lawn with flower beds, yew trees, an enormous greenhouse, and numerous pathways  “that twisted away to some other depths of garden with other trees.” This is not the rubbish-bin-filled courtyard his uncle claimed was behind the house; Tom resents the lie.



At breakfast the next morning, Tom insinuates that his uncle thinks lying is acceptable in certain situations. Outraged at the suggestion, Uncle Alan storms off to work. Determined to prove his uncle deceived him, Tom pulls open the back door only to see a yard full of rubbish-bins.

When the clock strikes thirteen again that night, Tom slips to the back door and finds the lush, vast garden has returned. He ventures out and explores the many pathways, discovering that he leaves no footprints and casts no shadow. Moreover, upon trying to open the greenhouse door, he watches his hand go right through it. Mindful of the time, Tom hurries back into the house. The time on the hallway clock, however, has only advanced a couple of minutes past midnight.

So it is that Tom visits the garden every night, and no matter how long he stays there, the time on the clock is essentially the same when he returns. He sees “the garden at many times of its day, and at different seasons,” but “its favorite season was summer […].” He also sees a gardener named Abel, a maid, and three boys. Hatty, a little girl, tags along with the boys, who unkindly tease her. Lonely, Tom hopes to play with the boys, but he soon realizes they can’t see or hear him.



Hatty notices Tom, however, and speaks to him. She tells him she is a princess. As her parents are busy ruling their kingdom, she is staying with her aunt and three cousins. Dubious, Tom accepts her story. The two lonely children become friends. They explore the garden and river, climb trees, and chase geese. Inside Hatty’s stately house, they study the biblical inscription on the clock (which matches Mrs. Bartholomew’s clock): “Time No More.” After each night in the garden, Tom writes a letter to Peter chronicling his adventures with Hatty.

Time passes differently for Tom than for Hatty. Quickly aging, she becomes older than him. Moreover, although he goes to the garden every night, she complains that he has been away for months. Yet, during a few of his garden visits, Tom finds time has jumped backward. On one such occasion, he sees Hatty as a very little girl, dressed in black and sobbing. This is when he learns her parents are actually dead, and her wealthy aunt has taken her in, very resentfully, as a “charity-child.”

Hatty suggests Tom is a ghost, as he has no shadow and can walk through doors. Indignant at the idea, Tom spends a day searching the encyclopedia to identify the strange clothing that Hatty and the others in the garden wear. He discovers it is Victorian attire and realizes the manor house where Hatty lives is the same one he lives in, separated by nearly a hundred years.



After Hatty falls from a tree house she and Tom are building, she ages even more rapidly. Preoccupied with her suitor, Barty, Hatty notices Tom less. Now it is winter in the garden, and Hatty wants to skate on the river to Ely Cathedral. As Tom has no skates, he tells Hatty to hide hers under the floorboards in her bedroom, which, in the present, is Tom’s room. The next day, he finds the skates under his floorboards, and that night they skate to the cathedral. Surprisingly, Peter joins them there.

The garden is gone the following night. Tom stumbles on the rubbish-bins, calling Hatty’s name. Having heard Tom’s shouts, Mrs. Bartholomew calls Tom up to her flat. He learns that she is Hatty, and lately, she has frequently dreamed of her lonely childhood. Lonely himself, Tom crossed into her dreams. Like old friends, they embrace.

Tom’s Midnight Garden belongs to a fantasy subgenre called “time-slip” stories. Distinct from “time-travel” fiction, which features a machine or device, time-slip tales present the power to transcend time as inherent in the mind. Pearce’s novel won the Carnegie Medal in 1958 and has been adapted for the stage, radio, and screen.