It is pointless to live in constant fear of the law of cause and effect. We should not be hampered by the vanishing traces of the past. Rather we should continue to live brightly and confidently in the present with the firm belief that when those past causes have disappeared, things will definitely get better and brighter. She retreats into herself and as she gets older, stops noticing the stars and the sea, which she had previously delighted in. She puts her heart away in a bottle, where it can never be hurt again.

As parents we should teach our children that death and loss is that ubiquitous albatross which is as real as life and happiness; sooner or later it will come. The only thing we can do is live in the present and not whine about the past or anticipate much of the future. The little girl stands in front of an empty chair, the chair where the father daughter duo used to drift into the surreal and enthralling world of their books. She is holding a picture she has drawn illustrating one of her animal stories she had read with her father. The picture turns from day to night yet the chair is still empty and the girl is still waiting. Her sole companion in all her fantasy worlds is no longer there. Oliver Jeffers writes very grown-up picture books, the kind that kids love and that can make adults cry. Okay, so he can make this adult cry - especially with The Heart and the Bottle.The story is about what many of us do with emotional pain at some point in time or another, how we sometimes attempt to find relief from the pain by doing our best to seal the pain—or even our whole hearts that contain the pain—into something akin to a glass bottle. We try, one way or another, to stuff the pain into a jar and to put on a lid. Some of the illustrations have speech bubbles that show pictures instead of words. Can you think of the words that the characters might be using? Life and death are part of life; much like day and night. Without one the other is not possible; it’s like The Cause And Effect Theory of Philosophy which focusses on light-oriented thinking. Use the first line of the book (‘Once there was a girl, much like any other’) to start your own story. How will it be similar / different to this one? We witness the duo’s blissful explorations until, one day, we realize that the father is gone — the little girl finds herself facing the empty chair.

Beautifully produced and profoundly moving… It made me cry, and I’m pretty sure I won’t be the only one.” The Irish Times The book, The Heart and the Bottle, written and illustrated by Oliver Jeffers (2010), wisely begins, “Once there was a girl much like any other…”. The story is about someone and something common—someone and something understandable, relatable. One day she meets a little girl whose own curiosity and zest for life reminds her of the child she once was and her heart is released and her sense of wonder restored.

The story is about a young girl who is curious about her world, engaged, creative, dreamy, joyful, and who has a loving bond with an older person (someone who appears to be akin to a grandparent based on the book’s illustrations). The story is also about the girl’s experience of loss when the older person is no longer there, of the emotional pain she feels, and of how she copes with that pain, of what follows. She puts her heart in a glass bottle so it can't be hurt, and grows up into a young woman who has no curiosity about the world at all. But her heart is safe. Then one day she encounters a little girl, a girl just like she had been, full of questions about the world. the little girl who is now a grown woman finds her light; light which finally opens the Pandora Box, the bottle, and sets the girl free from the dungeon of captivity and re-find ‘Happiness’ once more. What different types of punctuation has the author used? Are there any types of punctuation that he did not use? Why?