She found the tag: To Hilde on her 15th birthday from Dad.
She sat on the bed and carefully untied the red silk ribbon. Then she undid the blue paper.
It was a large ring binder.
Was this her present? Was this the fifteenth-birthday present that there had been so much fuss about? The present that grew bigger and bigger and could be shared with other people?
A quick glance showed that the ring binder was rilled with typewritten pages. Hilde recognized them as being from her father's typewriter, the one he had taken with him to Lebanon.
Had he written a whole book for her?
On the first page, in large handwritten letters, was the title, SOPHIE'S WORLD.
Farther down the page there were two typewritten lines of poetry:
TRUE ENLIGHTENMENT IS TO MAN LIKE SUNLIGHT TO THE SOIL
--N.F.S. Grundtvig
Hilde turned to the next page, to the beginning of the first chapter. It was entitled "The Garden of Eden." She got into bed, sat up comfortably, resting the ring binder against her knees, and began to read.
Sophie Amundsen was on her way home from school. She had walked the first part of the way with Joanna. They had been discussing robots. Joanna thought the human brain was like an advanced computer. Sophie was not certain she agreed. Surely a person was more than a piece of hardware?
Hilde read on, oblivious of all else, even forgetting that it was her birthday. From time to time a brief thought crept in between the lines as she read: Had Dad written a book? Had he finally begun on the significant novel and completed it in Lebanon? He had often complained that time hung heavily on one's hands in that part of the world.
Sophie's father was far from home, too. She was probably the girl Hilde would be getting to know ...
Only by conjuring up an intense feeling of one day being dead could she appreciate how terribly good life was... . Where does the world come from? ... At some point something must have come from nothing. But was that possible? Wasn't that just as impossible as the idea that the world had always existed?
Hilde read on and on. With surprise, she read about Sophie Amundsen receiving a postcard from Lebanon: "Hilde Moller Knag, c/o Sophie Amundsen, 3 Clover Close..."
Dear Hilde, Happy 15th birthday. As I'm sure you'll understand, I want to give you a present that will help you grow. Forgive me for sending the card c/o Sophie. It was the easiest way. Love from Dad.
The joker! Hilde knew her father had always been a sly one, but today he had really taken her by surprise! Instead of tying the card on the package, he had written it into the book.
But poor Sophie! She must have been totally confused!
Why would a father send a birthday card to Sophie's address when it was quite obviously intended to go somewhere else? What kind of father would cheat his own daughter of a birthday card by purposely sending it astray? How could it be "the easiest way"? And above all, how was she supposed to trace this Hilde person?
No, how could she?
Hilde turned a couple of pages and began to read the second chapter, "The Top Hat." She soon came to the long letter which a mysterious person had written to Sophie.
Being interested in why we are here is not a "casual" interest like collecting stamps. People who ask such questions are taking part in a debate that has gone on as long as man has lived on this planet.
"Sophie was completely exhausted." So was Hilde. Not only had Dad written a book for her fifteenth birthday, he had written a strange and wonderful book.
To summarize briefly: A white rabbit is pulled out of a top hat. Because it is an extremely large rabbit, the trick takes many billions of years. All mortals are born at the very tip of the rabbit's fine hairs, where they are in a position to wonder at the impossibility of the trick. But as they grow older they work themselves ever deeper into the fur. And there they stay . . .
Sophie was not the only one who felt she had been on the point of finding herself a comfortable place deep down in the rabbit's fur. Today was Hilde's fifteenth birthday, and she had the feeling it was time to decide which way she would choose to crawl.
She read about the Greek natural philosophers. Hilde knew that her father was interested in philosophy. He had written an article in the newspaper proposing that philosophy should be a regular school subject. It was called "Why should philosophy be part of the school curriculum?"