Customer Reviews

Gormenghast

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is a review of Gormenghast, that is, the second part of the Gormenghast trilogy (after Titus Groan, and before Titus Alone).

After a somewhat slow beginning, in which Mervyn Peake first briefly summarizes Titus Grown by drawing up a list of which characters have died or gone missing, then introduces the reader with the plethora of new characters that are the teachers of Titus, the now seven-year-old seventy-seventh Earl of Gormenghast, the pace hopefully picks up again. And as the pages turn, the story becomes more and more exciting.

Irma Prunesquallor's party, and then her romance and the way the whole affair eventually backfires on Wellgrove, although it does not push the plot further, were fun to read. Titus's growing love for his sister Fuchsia, and at the same time his attempts at shunning both the physical prison that is Gormenghast castle and the mental cage that is its sacrosanct ritual, attempts that lead him into the mysterious forest where lurks the Thing, and to the grotto where Flay has taken shelter, were passionating. Finally, Steerpike's mischievious, murderous ambition, and the others' suspicions that gradually turn into evidences, and the memorable chases in the shadowy maze of the fortress that ensue, were purely mind-boggling.

Mervyn Peake's characters are so complex that in the end you like the ones you despised and hate the ones you loved in the first book. His words give life to such an amazing imagery, it vibrates and dazzles, it's intoxicating. This is magic.

This is easily one of the best books I've read.

[NO SPOILERS]

KEY THEMES: As the title of my review implies, "Man vs. Castle" sums up GORMENGHAST quite well. However, there are actually TWO men fighting the castle, in different ways and for different reasons. First there is Steerpike, an ambitious youth who is fighting for the chance to rule the whole castle and all those in it. Then there is Titus Groan--the youth who is not-yet-but-almost of age to rule the castle like his father before him--who is fighting the very traditions that are part of everyday castle life.

Where Nineteen Eighty-Four, Brave New World (P.S.) and We (Modern Library Classics) are dystopias of the future, GORMENGHAST could be viewed as a dystopia of the past--a world where the masses are--supposedly--happy but where there is at least one who thinks that a better life can be found.

SETTINGS: Although most of the story takes place in Gormenghast Castle, many new parts of it are explored and described in detail. In addition, there are also several trips to the claw-shaped Gormenghast Mountain.

CHARACTERS: Due to the events in the first book, Titus Groan, some of my favorite characters were not present. However, within a dozen pages or so, the author introduces us to a good handful of characters that, if not better than the older ones, certainly are on a par with them. Of this new cast, one of my favorites was Deadyawn, the school Headmaster who rolls around in a chair-and-table contraption like Stephen Hawking. Then there is Bellgrove, a professor and sometime mentor of Titus, the main character.

PLOT: Without spoiling anything, this second volume deals with Titus Groan, heir of Gormenghast, as he goes from boy to man (the book covers a span of about a decade). Almost equal to this plotline are the schemes and wicked plans of Steerpike. Finally, there is the legendary party that is about to be hosted by Irma Prunesqualler, a flat-chested hag who is desperately in need of a husband.

OVERALL: I liked this book much better than TITUS GROAN and even though Mervyn Peake maintains his general formula of 2/3 description/detail and 1/3 plot, I still felt that what plot there was certainly engaged my mind and encouraged me to finish this book all the faster. The climax is a bit long, but certainly a nail-biter and definitely satisfying. Even better, although this book hints at the sequel that is Titus Alone, I feel that GORMENGHAST ends quite perfectly. For that reason, unless I can be convinced otherwise, I am more than satisfied with ending the series here.

Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast trilogy (or more accurately, the Titus series) is an obvious influence on several different genres of dark fantasy and modern gothic literature. In this book's predecessor, Titus Groan, Peake introduced the dark and oppressive Gormenghast castle, a monstrosity of ancient origins, so vast that one could get lost in its catacombs for months. This megalithic castle is populated by a moribund royal court that is obsessed with archaic rituals, locked into Machiavellian schemes, and completely oblivious to the outside world. This second novel follows the coming of age of young Titus, the restless heir to the throne, as he rebels against both the tyrannical architecture of Gormenghast and the stunted rituals that will soon define his existence.

Like the first book of the series, Peake displays an astonishing gift for language and description, with a nearly overwhelming sense of style that really reflects Gormenghast's oppressive decay and the related psychoses of the many characters. There is a bone-chilling sense of darkness and madness here, built with subtle description of a skill level that goth horror writers could only dream about. But Peake's skillful verbiage is so meticulous in its descriptions of setting and mood that the reader nearly misses all the action and character developments. There are certainly more of those than in the first novel, especially surrounding the scheming machinations of the corrupt Steerpike and the inner conflicts faced by young Titus as he comes of age. But these developments tend to be buried by descriptions of the surrounding architecture and ambience that are so detailed as to verge on distraction.

Readers who appreciate both literary fiction and mastery of language will find that Peake's brilliance rises far above the stereotypes of the several sub-genres he has influenced. But his many outstanding plot and character developments are often buried beneath wave after wave of prose that describes mood and setting a little too well, nearly to the point of exasperation for the reader. The result is a very slow-moving story with an imposing torrent of skillful prose, which may prevent many readers from fully appreciating the excitement and intrigue of Peake's masterful story. [~doomsdayer520~]

Mervyn Peake's "Gormenghast" books are a difficult series to categorize in terms of genre, as they really are in a league of their own. Whenever the subject of Peake has arisen in conversation and I've been called upon to describe them to the uninitiated, my efforts are always rewarded with baffled looks. The books defy most attempts at classification; and although they're usually put in the "fantasy" section of libraries and bookstores, the trilogy is bereft of the usual Tolkienesque fantasy trappings (mystical creatures, heroic quests, magical quests). There are however, a few throwbacks to fairytales: a youthful hero who grows into manhood, a distressed - and sexually frustrated - damsel, a series of helpful or hindering secondary characters, and an insidious villain who will stop at nothing to achieve his goals.

But ultimately the books have more in common with the likes of Charles Dickens and Emily Bronte, what with their grotesque, shrewd characterizations of weird and horrible people, and the way in which these characters go about their lives (which is basically making themselves and everyone around them miserable). They are a rich, dark, Gothic rendering of a world without any discernable reference point in terms of the time period; and it's all told in dense prose that's simply exhaustive to read. They're crammed full of detail (all of it beautiful, most of it superfluous) in a style that makes it feel as though you're wading through words, and which often meanders off to visit places and stage dialogues that have no bearing on the central plot at all.

And yet somehow Peake makes all of this fascinating. "Gormenghast" has a hypnotic effect on a patient reader, and I was utterly intoxicated throughout my reading. As I'm sure is the case with most people, overlong descriptions irritate me, but I'm willing too put up with a lot as long as there's eventually payoff to such ramblings. And in Peake's case: there is. In droves! In fact, the time he takes in setting a scene has the advantage of racketing up and drawing out the anticipation in the climactic moments. When Titus, Flay and Prunesquallor track Steerpike through an abandoned wing of the castle to regions unknown, or when a frightened Fuchsia tiptoes through the darkened halls to a secret rendezvous, Peake's slow pacing lends the book an excruciating, nail-biting tension.

The title refers to the stronghold of Gormenghast, the setting of both this and the previous book, Titus Groan. It is a sprawling household that is large enough to act as a self-sustaining city, and in turn, it is the entire world of those who live there. The inhabitants live and die within its walls, with no interest whatsoever in what might lie beyond the peak of Gormenghast Mountain and the surrounding forests. Described in minute detail, the rooftops and quadrangles, corridors and secret passageways are gloomy, claustrophobic and labyrinthine. Here is where readers might get frustrated at the excessive detail that Peake pours into his rendering of Gormenghast, and yet this too serves a purpose in the narrative, for the physical clutter of the place is matched only by its spiritual despondency, as the house is ruled by custom and ritual, so ancient that they have lost all meaning. Alongside the longing to leave such a stifling environment is the desire to stay and delve deeper into its depths.

Into this world is born Titus Groan, the seventy-seventh Earl of Gormenghast. The previous novel, named after this infant protagonist, recounted his birth, childhood and unfolding destiny. Obviously the fact that he was a baby for the length of the novel meant that the action focused on other characters: his morose father Sepulchrave, his mother Gertrude (a force of nature which sleeps most of the time, but is devastating when it wakes), his loveless, scatter-brained sister Fuchsia, and a plethora of servants. Predominantly amongst these servants is Steerpike, who along with Titus himself, is an element of change in this static world. The most engaging character in the book, Steerpike has dragged himself up from his life as a kitchen boy, and is still steadily climbing the social ladder with only his cunning, wits, and sheer ambition to drive him on. In comparison to this tour de force, Titus is a much more sedate character; not uninteresting, but certainly not *as* interesting as the malevolent Steerpike. The plot, such as it is, revolves around these two polar opposites: the young Earl who rejects his power, and the displaced kitchen boy who craves it and will do anything to get it: spying, arson, manipulation, blackmail, and murder of the most Machiavellian kind.

In many ways the trilogy is a coming of age story, in which Titus, dreading his own life as the overseer of dreary ritual, begins to rebel against the destiny laid out before him and attempt to understand the world beyond Gormenghast's borders. Likewise, it is an exploration of class relations and the dissolution of social structures that was occurring at the time of publication (the loyal Flay is superseded by the fluctuating Steerpike; the family dynasty of the Groans is undermined by the freedom of an outcast) and the journey of evil which by the story's end has taken on Biblical proportions. From an abusive and pitying childhood, Steerpike is the embodiment of pride, arrogance, vanity and viciousness, leading inevitably to isolation, madness and depravity. Peake describes the height (or should I say the depth) of Steerpike's evil thus:

"He no longer wanted to kill his foe in darkness and in silence. His lust was to stand naked upon the moonlit stage, with his arms stretched high, and his fingers spread, and with the warm blood that soaked them sliding down his wrists, spiraling his arms and steaming in the cold night air - to suddenly drop his hands like talons to his breast and tear it open to expose a heart like a black vegetable - and then, upon the crest of self-exposure, and the sweet glory of wickedness, to create some gesture of supreme defiance, lewd and rare, and then with the towers of Gormenghast around him, cheat the castle of its jealous right and die of his own evil in the moonbeams."

Wow. They don't write `em like that anymore.

Surrounding Steerpike and Titus are a range of characters such as Doctor Prunesquallor (my own favourite!) and his spinster sister Irma, a range of school professors led by the self-important Bellgrove, and a range of servants such as the exiled Flay and the long-suffering Nannie Slagg, some of which only act on the periphery of the action. However, they are given *plenty* of attention, particularly concerning Irma's extensive search for a husband amongst the professors. And yet, at the height of his power Peake is a undisputed master of storytelling: there's an Old Testament-like flood that forces the inhabitants into higher and higher levels of the castle; schoolboys that play a daring game which involves flinging themselves out of a high window, flipping on a branch and diving back in through the window and onto a wax-covered floorboard; and Titus's hours-long crawl through a secret passage into the frightening freedom of the countryside beyond Gormenghast's walls. All these things strike a chord in the imagination, and will stay with you for a very long time.

The "trilogy" is only one by default considering that Peake had planned a seven-book series that chronicled Titus's entire lifespan, a project that was sadly cut short by his death. It's difficult for fans not to long for what could have been, but for those that have yet to discover Gormenghast, the premature ending of the series shouldn't deter them from reading the first two installments. I have yet to read the third book: Titus Alone (Book three of Gormenghast Trilogy), but the combined "Titus Groan" and "Gormenghast" make a satisfying, self-contained novel. Although it ends on a promise for more stories to come, it beings Steerpike's tale to a satisfying conclusion and provides a fitting, though open-ended finish for the protagonist.

Book arrived quickly and exactly as it was described. I would definitely buy from this seller again.