Customer Reviews

Land of Unreason

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"Land of Unreason" first saw the light of day in 1941, in a shorter form, in "Unknown" magazine; it was later expanded to novel length. Just as there is a genre of science fiction known as "hard" sci-fi, as typified by the works of Hal Clement and Larry Niven, this novel impresses me as a "hard" fantasy novel. Not only do authors deCamp and Pratt usher us into Fairyland, and show us the court of Oberon and Titania, but we are also shown all manner of elves, sprites, nymphs, fairies, ogres, kobolds and the like; even a leprechaun and a unicorn are thrown into the mix.
This journey into the fantastic begins when Fred Barber--an American vice-consul in Spain who has been injured during World War II and who is convalescing on the Yorkshire moors--impulsively drinks the milk that his hostess has superstitiously left for the fairies on St. John's Eve. He is kidnapped by a fairy named Sneckett and brought to Oberon's palace, where he is given the task of going to the Kobold Hills and preventing the kobolds from making metallic swords (a substance that no fairy can touch). Thus, Barber begins his picaresque wanderings, and the reader is propelled into a very strange world indeed. Fairyland has been going through a series of so-called "shapings"; even the normally bizarre physical laws of the realm don't apply anymore. In his travels, Barber encounters a talking whirlwind, an apple-tree sprite, a monster from a plum tree, and two-headed eagles. He resides for a while with a marooned, 19th century farmer from New England, and is transformed into a frog and, later, a batlike creature, all leading to his ultimate transformation. The reader will never be able to guess where the story is going next; it's one darn thing after another for poor Fred Barber, as he tries to find his way back home.
Perhaps I have not adequately suggested, in this capsule description, what a very strange book "Land of Unreason" is. At times I was reminded of Lewis Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland"; at others, of David Lindsay's weird-in-the-extreme "A Voyage to Arcturus." All feature crazy worlds where the physical laws of our reality are in abeyance; all feature strange characters and even stranger events. "Land of Unreason" even pays homage to Carroll's work, in making Titania's footmen liveried frogs. This is one very bizarre book indeed.
I should also point out to prospective readers of "Land of Unreason" that both deCamp and Pratt were history buffs, and that perhaps the most impressive single aspect of this novel is the seemingly authentic medieval manner in which the characters converse. The authors have obviously done their homework, to say the least. Readers of this book will run into many obscure Scottish words and archaic language, as well as loads of unusual English. This reader is a professional copy editor, and even I had to resort to an UNabridged dictionary repeatedly to look up words such as "nympholept," "strappado," "rounce," "jobbernowl," "equerry," "yataghan," "lambrequin," "armet," "thill," "armigerous," "anlace," "cousin-german," "alate," "oriflamme," "crapulous," "catenary," "pule," "thrip," "gramercy," "widdershins," "adossed," "barry-wavy," "stirk," "wight," "springald," "bedad" and "metic," among others. The book is a challenge in this respect, but, as always, a little research on the part of the reader will be repaid with a deeper appreciation. On the down side, "Land of Unreason" contains many plot points that lead nowhere, and the denouement--for me, anyway--is something of a letdown. This reader was thoroughly entertained while reading the book, but was ultimately left with the feeling that he'd read a piece of well-crafted piffle. I should perhaps also mention that this novel has been included in James Cawthorn and Michael Moorcock's overview volume "Fantasy: The 100 Best Books." I'm not sure that it deserves inclusion, but it certainly does make for one strange ride.

Fred Barber is an American diplomat posted to the U.S. embassy in Spain at the beginning of World War 2. Although the U.S. is still a neutral country Barber is wounded in an explosion and sent to the British countryside to recuperate. From his temporary billet in Yorkshire, at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Gurton, Barber can hear the German bombs shattering the near-by city of Leeds. At nighttime the sky glows red in the distance where the city burns. Unable to relax or sleep easily Barber uses sleeping pills to nurse himself into a calmer state. Then on St John's Eve Barber finds himself in the house alone, except for the Gurton's baby who sleeps in his room peacefully. Determined not to resort to pills again Barber reaches instead for the scotch bottle. Wandering around the house Barber comes upon a saucer of milk, which Mrs. Gurton has left on the front doorstep. Intrigued Barber remembers that he has read in The Golden Bough that superstitious people believe that on certain nights of the year a tribute of milk should be left out for the fairies. Not to do so will result in the child of the household being stolen away and a changeling left in its place. In a slightly tipsy state Barber is amused by his find. He decides to drink the milk and leave his scotch in its place. The milk has a soporific effect and Barber happily goes to bed. In the middle of the night Barber thinks he dreams of a strange creature, with a huge smile, entering his room. Later in the night Barber awakes and finds himself out of doors in a very strange land surrounded by a crowd of very strange beings. Much to his surprise Barber finds that he has been transported to Fairyland, to the court of King Oberon and Queen Titania. Just how did he get here, Barber wonders, and how is he going to get back to Yorkshire?

The Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung taught that we should play more attention to dreams, myths, folktales and stories of the extraordinary. These fantastic narrations are often dismissed as 'mere fancy', of no value except to entertain children and the weak-minded. But according to Jung the fantastic appeals to the unconscious. It provides an outlet for the less logical, more intuitive, side of ourselves. The unconscious is often neglected and suppressed in our ultra-logical, materialist, conscious world. If ignored for too long our unconscious will break out in rebellion, resulting in psychological disturbance. So if you find the stress of modern life too much De Camp and Pratt's book may be just what the doctor ordered. The authors have drawn heavily on folklore to create a strange, dream-like world that is entertaining, intriguing and sure to make you smile. The book is called <The Land of Unreason> and this is indeed a place where worker-day logic does not hold. The unconscious can find plenty of events here that don't obey conscious reason, but none-the-less have an intuitive rightness, a hidden order of their own. This is certainly not a book for children. The hero is an adult who has a cynical, tempestuous girlfriend back in Spain. King Oberon dallies with a beautiful, winged sprite, his lover, who he hides from his wife. The pleasures and pains of adult life are clearly depicted. This is a book to delight the adult unconscious mind.

The plot of the novel moves along very nicely and is never dull. We meet a great array of characters most of who are disconcerting in their unreasonableness. As Barber travels through Fairyland he looses some of his conscious up-tightness and enters into the spirit of the intuitive unconscious. This is certainly not a book of Nobel Prize winning themes, inspiring symbolism or astounding structure, but it is very successful in what it sets out to do.

Of course most books have their source in earlier works and this tale is clearly inspired in part by Lewis Carroll's Alice In Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking-Glass (1872) and Charles Kingsley's The Water-Babies (a Fairy Tale for a Land-Baby) (1863). De Camp and Pratt clearly declare their indebtedness to these earlier books in the text of their own work.

I have always loved the work of L. Sprague deCamp, and I was very pleased with the condition of this book, as well.