Customer Reviews

The Talisman

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

 

 

I read this when I was a kid and reread it recently and it's an absolute pleasure! The book deals with the period of the Crusades. It's set in the deserts around Syria/Palestine. The armies of the Crusaders have set up camp after a temporary truce. King Richard the Lion-Heart lies ill and members of the European nobility are scheming to make a profit at the expense of the Crusade. Around all this, a knight (the main character) is sent on a mission to negotiate a potential peace with Saladin.

This book has the classic images of the Crusades: duels, secret convents hidden in the harsh, craggy rocks of the desert, hermits, sultans, kings, dukes, Nubian slaves, conspiracies, Arab doctors and the like. It makes fascinating reading and reveals a lot about the imagination of Scott and his time.

This book is one of Scott's less famous works but very undeservedly so. I think it's as good as Ivanhoe.

In novel and poem after novel and poem, Sir Walter Scott argues that the past never completely dies. He suggests that what is better (e.g. Reformation and Protestantism, rationalism and peaceful behavior) generally replace what is less good e.g. European Catholicism, superstition, cattle raiding and clan wars). But even "the bad old days" had good things not so apparent today: intense personal loyalties, unquestioning courage, chivalry and unselfish idealism. There are elements deep inside human nature in never ending war with their opposites.

This philosophy of history is nowhere more apparent than in Scott's 1825 historical novel, THE TALISMAN, which can be regarded as the second in a trilogy of King Richard I novels, of which the first is THE BETROTHED and the third is IVANHOE. Richard is not the designated hero in any of the three, but this most popular of England's kings dominates any scene in which he appears.

Because he is their best warrior, other European Kings and Princes on the Third Crusade to recapture Jerusalem from the great Muslim leader Saladin grudgingly acknowledge Richard the Lion Heart first among equals. But they know that he generally regards them as self-seeking, cowardly and always ready to cut a deal with Saladin and run back home to Austria, France, Italy and elsewhere. Richard's haughty personality inevitably undermines his best intentions to hold a shaky coalition together.

The King is accompanied by his recent bride, the young, beautiful, frivolous Berengaria of Navarre. Richard's cousin, Edith Plantagenet, heads the ladies attending the Queen. Edith cannot disguise her growing love for an ostensibly poor Scottish knight, Sir Kenneth of the Couchant Leopard. The Queen teases her for this and succeeds in luring Kenneth away from a post of high honor personally assigned by the Lion Heart.

Before this, Kenneth, on a mission from the High Council of the Crusade (Richard lying ill of a devastating fever) rides to the wilds near the Dead Sea to consult with a mysterious Carmelite Priest. En route he meets the disguised Saladin and, after an indecisive combat, the two become friends. Saladin is later introduced in another disguise as El Hakim (the healer) to Richard whose fever he cures with a mysterious talisman. Only the disguised Sultan's intercession prevents the enraged but grateful Richard from executing Sir Kenneth after the latter allows the standard of England to be stolen by the Head of the Knights Templar and the almost equally evil Conrade of Montserrat. Returned in disguise as a black mute, a gift from Saladin, Sir Kenneth saves Richard from assassination and, with the help of his great Scottish deer hound, unravels the plot of the Templar and Conrade.

Sir Kenneth is revealed as Prince David of Scotland and thus high enough in rank to marry the King's cousin. Saladin, who had wanted to marry Edith Plantagenet himelf as part of an overall peace treaty, graciously yields to his friend Kenneth/David and gives the young couple the talisman as a wedding present.

Where is the philosophy? In his first encounter with Kenneth, Saladin, a Kurd, reveals his traditional belief that Kurds descend from a mixture of demons and beautiful mortal women, from evil and good, that these qualities war in Kurds forever and that even conversion to Islam does not make Kurds honor their demon ancestors the less. Islam allows Kurds to hope the demons will be converted to light in the end. There is much of the dualism of Iranian Zoroastrianism in the novel, a variant of Scott's often repeated view that in every turning point of history, good wars with and defeats evil, but never utterly, never completely-- and rightly so. -OOO-

Scott's classic tale of the Crusade is a product of his Victorian times with endless hidden relationships and disguises reminiscent of Dickens' Pickwick Papers. No one is who you think they are and if they are, they aren't on the side you expected. Also, there are no battles, this is a Crusade of philosophical discussions, mystery, scientific discovery, romance, crime, and mistaken identity.

Richard of England has tenuous leadership of a band of Templars, Scotsmen, French, German, and assorted mercenaries in a Holy Crusade to recover Jerusalem from the Infidels. During the time of this story, a truce is in place and Richard is near death with a mysterious fever. As this was a time of great patriotic fervor, trouble breaks out in the allied camps when various national flags are desecrated. All part of a plan for the other allied leaders to become supreme over the near-dead Richard.

Fortunately, Richard recovers with the help of an Infidel medical man. To really liven things up, the Royal women then join the camp, including Richard's charming young consort. Various alliances are contemplated, all including marriage proposals as their contractual binder. A very brave young Scotsman turns out to be a person of greater standing than advertised.

All in all, a very enjoyable novel. Dont expect to learn any actual history from Scott. It is not true that Richard and Saladin were allied, however briefly, against the Templars and the Austrians. It is true that all held Richard in great respect and that the Infidels were very advance in the scientific and medical arts.

An excellent book! Very informative historical fiction, gripping plot, lofty descriptions. It deserves it's name of classic, and I am thrilled that it is back in print!

Reading Walter Scott is a bittersweet experience, as we admire his adroit and nimble use of our English language, even as we mourn our modern-day loss of appreciation for such skill. His characters, as always, are credible and rich. His vivid depiction of the stormy King Richard stands among his best. Richard's Muslim healing sage ever speaks with quiet, fiery wisdom. Predictably, Kenneth the Scot is the true hero -- humble, strong, and bravehearted. Considering that the story is burdened with battles that almost happen, love affairs that never quite consummate, and mystical scenes that never truly resolve, this classic book nevertheless holds the reader captive throughout, and delivers a satisfying ending.

I really enjoyed The Talisman by Sir Walter Scott. I really like Scott's style of writing,and his characters are interesting and humorous. Richard the Lionhearted, and his wife Berengaria, another famous person, along with Soldan Saladin, ruler of the Arabs at the time, are characters. the talisman takes place during a the Third Crusade at a time of brief piece between the Christians and the Saracens. So even though there are no great battles in the story, the book is still full of action and humor. One thing that some of the less philosophically minded readers might object to is that at the beginning of the book the main character and a Saracen warrior get into a long, long, long discussion about the differences between the Christian and Saracen cultures. I found the discussion very interesting, but some people might be bored by it. Just a warning. Stick to it, though--The Talisman is a great book.

This is one of Scott's best novels, (my favorite being "The Antiquary"). Set in the 12th century, two men meet in the desert, an armored crusader and a brilliant arabian-mounted bow-weilding horseman. They do battle, only to become friends. The Catholic and the Moslem come to respect each other. Sir Kenneth, the crusader goes on to join the camp of Richard the Lionhearted, and his mysterious desert friend comes, time after time to his aid. In the end, well, I don't want to give away all the surpises. Usually I read the end first, but this was so good I didn't take the time to, and was quite surprised in the end. Scott's novels don't all have a happy ending, so this one gets an extra gold star. ;)

Heroes and cowards, loyalty and deceit, Europeans and Arabs, knights and dwarfs; Sir Walter Scott covers it all in The Talisman. If you're looking for an intricate plot with strange twists and turns; this isn't the book for you. The story starts with the classic duel of mortal combat between two extremely different foes that, of course, ends with each opponent realizing that he cannot destroy the other. In the end, the outcome of this battle turns out to be more significant than the reader knows. Centered around an unknown Scottish knight during the 3rd crusade and his hunt for glory, the plot is simple and predictible. It isn't until the end when every identity is revealed that you realize the depth of the plot. Somehow, Scott uses the unique setting, odd small events, poetic dialog, and conflicting cultures to keep the readers attention. Most of the characters in the book turn out not to be as they seem and the plot follows suit. The moral of the story is not to judge a book by its cover and the point is driven home by the sappy, flowery picture on the front that has nothing to do with the book.

I had looked for this title for years before ordering it through Amazon; I'm so glad that it's back in print. This is historical fiction at its best: the action is fast-paced, the authorial voice is constantly garnishing the narrative with little observations and commentaries, and one can sense that Scott has a profound respect for Saladin, despite the execration in which Infidels were held, both at the time of the Crusades, and even in the early Nineteenth Century when the book was written. I recommend this book, especially for connoisseurs of Sir Walter Scott. I'm sorry to say that his only other novel I've read is *Ivanhoe*, but this one certainly stands with *Ivanhoe* as a true classic.