Titus Alone (Book three of Gormenghast Trilogy) [Paperback]

Mervyn Peake (Author), David Louis Edelman (Introduction)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 25, 2008

With Overlook's new single-volume republication of Mervyn Peake's timeless Gormenghast novels in individual volumes, readers everywhere have embraced Titus Groan all over again. Peake's trilogy is an undisputed classic of epic fantasy, and finally Titus Alone, the final volume in the series, is available again.

As the novel opens, Titus, lord of Castle Gormenghast, has abdicated his throne. Born and brought to the edge of manhood in the huge, rotting castle, Titus rebels against the age-old ritual of which he is both lord and prisoner and rushes headlong into the world. From that moment forward, he is thrust into a stormy land of a dark imagination, where figures and landscapes loom up with force and vividness of a dream--or a nightmare.

This final installment in the Gormenghast trilogy is a fantastic triumph--a conquest awash in imagination, terror, and charm.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Mervyn Peake was born in 1911 in Kuling, Central Southern China, where his father was a medical missionary. His education began in China and then continued at Eltham College in South East London, followed by the Croydon School of Art and the Royal Academy Schools. Subsequently he became an artist, married the painter Maeve Gilmore in 1937 and had three children. During the Second World War he established a reputation as a gifted book illustrator for Ride a Cock Horse (1940), The Hunting of the Snark (1941), and The Rime of The Ancient Mariner (1943). Other books include Alice's Adventure's in Wonderland and Grimm's Household Tales (both 1946) and Treasure Island (1949). Titus Groan was published in 1946, followed in 1950 by Gormenghast. Among his other works are Shapes and Sounds (1941), Rhymes Without Reason (1944), Letters from a Lost Uncle (1948) and Mr Pye (1953). He also wrote a number of plays including The Wit to Woo (1957), which was met by critical failure. Titus Alone was published in 1959. Mervyn Peake died in 1968. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  
• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Overlook TP (March 25, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1585679925
• ISBN-13: 978-1585679928
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.4 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #875,185 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Last but by no means the least., August 26, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Titus Alone (Gormenghast Trilogy) (Hardcover)

It is a serious mistake to discount Titus Alone as merely the weakest of Peake's magnificent trilogy. It is an expansion and development of his earlier themes, and considering the circumstances under which it was written (Peake was suffering from premature senility that eventually lead to his death, he could barely lift a pencil.) it is an extraordinary and painful novel. Leaving Gormenghast and its (surviving) inhabitants behind, the novel centres on the character of Titus, and crucially puts the earlier novels in context. Despite his mother's warnings at the end of Gormenghast, there is indeed a world beyond the walls, and a world which has progressed beyond the ritual and claustrophobia of the castle itself. There is technology here. And - most extraordinary of all - no one has ever heard of Gormenghast itself. Suddenly Titus is accused of insanity (among other things) and even begins to doubt the existence of his home himself. As disturbing and beautiful as anything that went before, Titus Alone was never meant to be the end of the series. Peake was planning to take Titus even further afield, but as merely a glimpse of the outside world, the novel is an essential part of an extraordinary work of literature.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Frustrating., June 7, 2004

By 

Stephanie Noverraz "crooty" (Lausanne, Switzerland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Titus Alone (Paperback)

This is the third and last volume of the Gormenghast trilogy (after Titus Groan, and Gormenghast).

In this book, we follow Titus, now almost twenty, as he escapes from the Castle, flees its oppressive Ritual, and becomes lost in a sandstorm. Helped by the owner of a travelling zoo, Muzzlehatch, and his ex-lover Juno, he ends up in a big city. Of course, no one there has ever heard of Gormenghast, and the general opinion is that the boy is deranged, and with no paper, he's soon arrested for vagrancy.

Hopefully, there are a few people who believe in his story, or at least who are intrigued by it, and they try to help him. And now Titus, the deserter, the traitor, longs for his home, and looks for it all the time to prove, if only to himself, that Gormenghast is truly real.

I don't know how closely Titus Alone actually follows Mervyn Peake's intentions before mental illness struck him, but this final volume is indeed chaotic. Its characters and style, its setting and atmosphere have little to do with both previous books. Or maybe it's just me who didn't understand anything, but nevertheless, all I felt was bitter frustration.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A new beginning rather than an ending, October 29, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Titus Alone (Gormenghast Trilogy) (Paperback)

I enjoyed this book very much but it IS rather different from the preceding novels (Titus Groan, Gormenghast), which are really complete as a pair. Though related it is not necessary to have read them in order to follow the action of this story.

Young Titus Groan, Lord of Gormenghast after his Father's assassination and the death of the villainous Steerforth, decides to set out to see something of the world beyond the eccentric traditions of his decayed and moribund realm. He finds a decaying and eccentric city, where he makes some allies as he becomes a nine-days wonder.

Peake excelled at depiction of a monstrous and decaying world filled with wierd eccentrics. If you like that kind of thing, you'll love this book!