In the book The Phantom Tollbooth Why si the Valley silent and how do people communicate?

Answer 1

A very bored little boy named Milo comes home one day to find an unusual gift waiting for him in his room: a strange purple tollbooth, the documentation for which promises to take him to the "Lands Beyond". When he drives past the assembled structure in his small car, he is suddenly transported to the Kingdom of Wisdom, where he chooses to visit one of the divided country's two capitals, Dictionopolis. En route he gets lost in the Doldrums, but is found and rescued by the steadfast (and literal) watchdog Tock, who joins him on his journey. They arrive in Dictionopolis, which is where all the world's letters are grown in orchards and then sold in a vast marketplace. During a very brief incarceration in the city's dungeon, Milo talks to Faintly Macabre, the not-so-wicked Which (sic), who tells him about Wisdom's two rulers, King Azaz and the Mathamagician, and their adopted sisters, Rhyme and Reason. The two princesses were extremely clever but they were unable to settle the argument between their brothers over whether letters or numbers were better and were consequently banished to the Castle in the Air, which is located high in the Mountains of Ignorance. Milo then meets Azaz, who sadly admits that it had been a mistake on his part to banish the pair. He agrees to allow the princesses to be rescued, providing his brother also agrees--a remote event, as they have not agreed on anything for years. Milo and Tock leave Dictionopolis with a new companion, the blustering Humbug, whom Azaz has sent along as a guide. The three head toward Wisdom's other capital, Digitopolis, where they hope to persuade the Mathemagician to agree to allow the princesses to be rescued.

On their way to Digitopolis, Milo, Tock and the Humbug encounter all sorts of unusual people and places. Passing through the Forest of Sight, they stop at Point of View, where they meet Alec Bings, a little boy who floats above the ground because he has not grown down to it yet. In his family, everyone's head stays at exactly the same height their entire lives and their legs grow down until they touch the earth. The travelers then proceed past the twin cities of Reality and Illusions and come upon Chroma and his symphony of color. Milo watches in wonder as Chroma conducts the orchestra through the colors of the sunset and, once Chroma has gone off to bed, decides to try to conduct the sunrise himself. This proves to be more difficult than Milo thought, and soon he has made a complete mess of the colors, which he manages to fix just moments before anyone wakes up.

Milo then leads his friends towards the Valley of Sound, where they meet Dr. Dischord, who dispenses only unpleasant noises, and his sidekick the Awful Dynne, a bipedal creature made of smoke. Once the travelers escape the doctor and his horrible racket, they find themselves in the valley proper, which, while inhabited, turns out to be completely silent. Milo meets the Soundkeeper, creator and cataloguer of all sounds, who has withheld the sounds of the Valley because the inhabitants had stopped appreciating them and instead gave their business to Dischord and his Dynne. Milo steals a sound from the Soundkeeper's palace, which the people of the valley use to break open the palace's sound vault. A sadder but wiser Soundkeeper repents her actions.

Milo and his friends continue on their way to Digitopolis after taking a short detour to the Island of Conclusions, to which they magically jump after making assumptions about their trip. They swim back to shore through the Sea of Knowledge and find themselves on the outskirts of Digitopolis. There they meet the Dodecahedron, a man with twelve faces, each of which expresses a different emotion. The Dodecahedron takes the travelers to see the Mathemagician, who gives them a tour through the Numbers Mine, where digits are pulled from the earth like jewels. Milo manages to trick the Mathemagician into agreeing with his brother to release the princesses, and the ruler takes them to the edge of Mountains of Ignorance.

Milo, Tock, and the Humbug head into the gloomy Mountains. The first creature they meet is the Everpresent Wordsnatcher, a dirty bird who twists their sentences into his own meanings, but who also sadly admits that rather than being a demon, is merely a nuisance. Far more dangerous are the Terrible Trivium, a man with no features on his face who stalls the travelers with meaningless busywork, the Demon of Insincerity, who tricks them into falling into a pit, and the ever-hungry Gelatinous Giant. Fortunately, many of the people Milo has met during his travels through Wisdom have given him useful gifts which help the trio to escape each of these demons and make their way to the unbelievably tall staircase which leads to the Castle in the Air. At the foot of the stairs, the three travelers encounter a final demon, the Senses Taker, who demands all sorts of trivial information and bogs them down in meaningless questions before taking their senses. The one thing he can't take is their sense of humor, as revealed by the gift of laughter from the Soundkeeper.

They climb the stairs to the Castle, where the two princesses welcome Milo, and congratulate him on his achievement. The enraged demons chop off the base of the staircase, causing the Castle to begin to float away. Fortunately, Time sometimes flies, and Tock is able to carry the others back to earth, landing just ahead of the hoarde of demons. The heroes flee down from the Mountains, but are closely pursued. Just when it seems that all hope is lost, the combined armies of Wisdom, led by Azaz and the Mathemagician, appear and drive back the demons. The two leaders welcome the princesses home and begin a celebration to mark their return.

Milo himself must also return home and says his goodbyes to all the friends he made in the Lands Beyond. He returns through the tollbooth to find that only an hour has passed, showing how much he can do in such a short time. The next day, he hurries home from school with dreams of further adventures only to find the tollbooth has vanished. All that remains is a note that tells him that other people need the tollbooth, and that he can now find his own way back to Wisdom. Milo's sadness is brief, as he realizes that there are a million fantastic and profitable adventures to be had in his own town, or even right there in his room.