Bubbles: a space of self preservation

In Solomon J. in the village of the Pepileni, bubbles appear at moments when emotional experience becomes more intense than the words available to describe it.

The fairy tale thus chooses a concrete image to represent something difficult to observe from outside: that inner time during which a child feels, gathers information, connects memories and searches for meaning.

Solomon J. enters his bubbles. The reader sees them form, change texture, take on different qualities. Their meaning becomes clear gradually, together with the protagonist.

Explaining much more would reduce the space for discovery.

During childhood, emotional regulation goes through a long process of maturation. Language, attention, memory, the ability to interpret bodily sensations and the understanding of mental states develop gradually and interact with one another.

For this reason, an experience can be felt before it can be described precisely.

The body can stiffen. The gaze can drift. Attention can turn elsewhere. There can be a wish to withdraw for a few minutes, or a need to concentrate intensely on something familiar.

The metaphor of the bubble gives narrative form to that interval.

Inside the bubble, something keeps happening. The mind searches for connections. Emotions search for a shape. Memory offers images. The child looks for a way to find a workable position within what they are living through.

The bubbles in the fairy tale have different qualities. Colour, transparency, movement and mood change together with Solomon J.'s experience.

This narrative choice makes it possible to represent an interesting psychological reality: a space of withdrawal can take on different functions depending on the context, the emotional state and the presence of a relationship able to offer security.

At some moments confusion may prevail. At others, a greater ability to observe what is happening may emerge.

The visual transformation of the bubble thus becomes a form of language. The reader understands Solomon J.'s state also through what surrounds his body.

Donald W. Winnicott devoted an important part of his work to the space in which the inner world and shared reality can meet.

In his concept of potential space, play, imagination, creativity and relationship allow the child to process experience through symbolic forms.

Pepilandia's bubbles can be read from this perspective. They belong to the fantastical geography of the story and, at the same time, make an inner process visible. They are narrative places in which what is felt can take on images, movement and meaning.

The fairy tale thus uses the fantastical as a tool of psychological representation. A sensation becomes space. An emotion becomes matter. An inner process becomes something the reader can observe.

Research on emotional development places great importance on processes of shared regulation. During childhood, the presence of a figure perceived as reliable can help modulate emotional arousal. Voice, closeness, predictability, contact and the quality of the relationship all take part in the gradual building of self regulation skills.

Solomon J.'s bubbles are also affected by the quality of the relationships that reach into them. Their transformation accompanies the protagonist's journey and suggests that inner experience also changes in the presence of someone able to stay close in the right way.

The book leaves it to the reader to discover who manages to enter that space and what effect their presence has.

The metaphor also has an educational reading.

In a classroom, certain behaviours may signal a moment of intense inner processing. A child may fall silent, lower their eyes, focus on an activity that seems unrelated, slow down, or briefly seek some distance from the group.

The meaning depends on the child's individual history, the situation and how often the behaviour appears.

Lev Vygotsky showed how much language and relationship contribute to the building of thought. The words offered by an adult can help a child gradually organise their experience.

The moment when those words arrive matters too. A question asked during strong emotional arousal may find little room. The same question, asked later, may open up a story.

Bubbles occupy a particular place in the architecture of Solomon J. in the village of the Pepileni. They change together with the protagonist and gain meaning through the journey.

They represent fear, processing, protection, relationship and transformation in different proportions depending on the narrative moment.

Their function stays open enough to allow several levels of reading. A child may recognise in them the feeling of wanting to gather themselves inside something. A parent may wonder about the moments when their own child seems to drift away. A teacher may recognise those minutes when a pupil appears present in body and occupied elsewhere in thought.

The fairy tale turns this experience into a simple image: a bubble. To understand what it holds, though, one has to step into Pepilandia.

Anusha Bhama Gukhool is the author of Solomon J. in the village of the Pepileni.