Equal Rites by Terry Pratchett

To become a wizard on the Discworld one has to be the eighth son of an eighth son.  Gordo Smith is an eighth son.  His eighth child had just been born and has been bequeathed the staff of a dying (then dead) wizard. There's one little problem the wizard did not foresee: Gordo's eighth son, Esk, turns out to be a girl. 

Esk, now a little girl, and the staff are given over to the care of Granny Weatherwax, the village's resident witch and magic user. Esk starts to learn witches' magic from Granny; but there is dangerous wizards' magic on the loose, and Granny is at a loss to know how to contain it safely.  There is only one solution: Esk must go to the male-only preserve of Unseen University and become the first female wizard (with Granny tagging along as chaperone).

Equal Rites has equality of opportunity for females as its major theme. Granny and Esk come up against the Lore - there is no precedent for female wizards - and the tradition-bound attitudes of the University wizards.  Lots of historical inertia there.  Will talent prevail over prejudice in the end?  If so, how and at what cost?

Pratchett also deals with power and how humans interact with the world.  He does this through the exploration of the nature of magic use.  Witches tend to nudge the world with their magic to make it a better - or, at least, a less dangerous - place.  They borrow rather than own.  Wizards, on the other hand, use their magic to dominate and harness the world and its energies.  By the end of the book, however, a third and greater kind of magic is discovered.

Equal Rites is the first Discworld novel to feature Granny Weatherwax.  Back in 1987, when it was first published, we weren't to know what a deep and intriguing character Granny was to become, but Pratchett had certainly put in the solid foundations on which to build her future character. The book also expands our knowledge of Discworld by filling us in on some of the culture and geography.  We are introduced to Headology, the Discworld witches' brand of psychology.  Ankh-Morpork is there, albeit with a significantly less perilous complexion, and the river Ankh is yet to come into its full, noisome glory.

On a sadder note, I came across a passage that on hindsight and with knowledge of Terry Pratchett's final illness is quite poignant.  Something happens to Esk, and she finds that:

... something was wrong.  Her thoughts seemed to be chasing around beyond her control, and disappearing ... Memories dwindled away on the wind.  As fast as she could latch on to a thought it evaporated, leaving nothing behind.  She was losing chunks of herself, and she couldn't remember what she was losing.

All up, Equal Rites is a nifty little fantasy novel in itself.  It can be read without reference to the rest of the amazing Discworld series and not suffer too much harm.  Of course, it is that little bit better for being part of the series.  And the best is yet to come.  Oh, yes!

A Connecticut Yankee at King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain

What a disturbing book!

Friedrich Nietzsche once wrote:

Somebody remarked: 'I can tell by my own reaction to it that this book is harmful.' But let him only wait and perhaps one day he will admit to himself that this same book has done him a great service by bringing out the hidden sickness of his heart and making it visible. - Assorted Opinions and Maxims

Nietzsche may be right.  If I wait, I may find the fault lies with me and not with the book.  On the other hand, A Connecticut Yankee at King Arthur's Court may be the outward expression of the hidden sickness of Mark Twain's heart.

Mark Twain, living in poverty in San Francisco, once put a revolver to his head with the view of ending it all.  Luckily for him and the rest of the world, he decided to stay alive, because he went on to write 

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the latter being one of the great novels of all time. Twain established himself as a best-selling author and humourist, and he became a rich man in the process.  Not only this, he married a wealthy woman.  

Things were looking good for Twain until he invested his money in the development of a mechanical typesetting machine.  It ruined him and he had to declare bankruptcy. It was under this cloud of impending doom and then final insolvency that Twain wrote A Connecticut Yankee at King Arthur's Court.  It shows.

The book was an intended satire on the works of Sir Walter Scott, who had romanticised the ideals of mediaeval court chivalry, and the Catholic Church and its conservative and controlling influence.  Against these, Twain sets the ideals of rational control through scientific knowledge, the benefits of 19th century technology and capitalist endeavour, and a more open, presbyterian style of worship.

N.B.  The following paragraphs make explicit the outcome of the plot.

Henry (Hank) Morgan (the Connecticut Yankee and engineer) is knocked out by a blow on the head and awakens in England in the year 528.  He finds a land ruled by a vain, prejudiced and violent aristocracy, and with its common folk thoroughly cowed.  Whether they be aristocrats or commoners, the hallmark of these people is that they are superstitious and prone to believe whatever they hear.  Hank - first in order to survive, then to control - is not above lying to those he meets.  Through these lies and the use of 19th century knowledge and technology, Hank rises to a position of power, which he uses to introduce modern schooling and infrastructure to the kingdom.  In so doing, he undermines the power of the aristocracy and the Church.  Inevitably, a backlash occurs, war breaks out and there is lots of bloodshed.

In the end, it is modern technology that causes the deaths of thousands at the hands of the few.  In the end, it seems the rational of application of scientific knowledge to power is no better than the social systems that predated it.  Worse still, the power it delivers to Hank Morgan degrades him until he becomes a cold-blooded mass murderer.  Nobody wins.

It is hard to believe that this nihilistic assessment of humanity was Twain's intention when he started the book, but it is certainly the outcome - a sunny beginning eclipsed by a dark ending.  I wonder if it is more than a coincidence that Hank orders the execution of the court's only humourist.  Is Twain saying something about himself as well as the economic system and ethos that first made his fortune and then took it away?  Whatever the case may be, A Connecticut Yankee at King Arthur's Court  is disturbing and challenging to read.  To paraphrase Nietzsche this time: if reading it does not kill you, it will make you stronger.

Vale, Terry Pratchett

(Photo © Luigi Novi / Wikimedia Commons)

Like me, many of you will have been saddened to hear that Terry Pratchett passed away on 12 March 2015.

Normally, the entries in this blog contain my thoughts on books and films I have recently read or viewed.  If I also reviewed books I read in the past, then there would be entries for almost all of Terry Pratchett's Discworld novels.  Today I will make an exception and put down a few thoughts about the works of one of my favourite authors.

Before Terry Pratchett came into my life there was Tolkien and Fritz Leiber.  I happily spent many hours in Middle-Earth and Lankhmar.  I came across the first Discworld novel, The Colour of Magic, in the early Eighties, just prior to the publication of its sequel The Light Fantastic.  I enjoyed Pratchett's gentle parodying of Tolkien and Leiber in those books.

Parody is a fine thing, but it is unsustainable in the long run.  The next two Discworld books, Equal Rites and Mort, were well-written, tightly plotted and mildly comic.  The parody had been abandoned, thankfully, but was yet to be replaced by something more substantial.  These two novels expanded our knowledge of the Discworld and its inhabitants, especially Granny Weatherwax and Death (the former in a very nascent conception).

In Sourcery, the fifth book in the sequence, something very perplexing happened.  Pratchett basically flattened his world (pun intended) and tore apart what he had built up.  Why would he do such a thing?  The answer can be found in the subsequent novels, starting with The Wyrd Sisters, and it is that substantial something I mentioned earlier: satire -  razor-sharp satire combined with a genius comedic touch, levity and gravity mixed in perfect proportions.  What had gone before simply would not support the scope of his new literary project, and fresh ground was needed.

How thankful we can be for this great leap forward.  Pratchett's Discworld became a foundry for creating dozens of memorable characters, comparable to Dickens at his finest.  In the series we see Granny Weatherwax turned from a prudish, vain woman into an iron-hard force of nature, joined by Magrat Garlick and the ebullient and naughty Nanny Ogg.  Ridcully, his fellow wizards and the Librarian cause magical mayhem at Unseen University.  Death has inter-dimensional adventures.  The City Watch is created, and Sam Vimes spars with Havelock Vetinari, the Patrician of Ankh-Morpork.  Dwarfs, Trolls, Golems and the Undead are added to the increasingly inclusive and cosmopolitan city.  Rincewind and The Luggage, C.M.O.T Dibbler, Fred Colon and Nobby Nobbs, Cohen the Barbarian, The Duck Man, Bloody Stupid Johnson, Wee Mad Arthur - the list goes on and on. And during all of their fantastical, comical and improbable doings, Pratchett holds up the mirror of satire so we can see ourselves all the more clearly.

I have been fortunate enough to have spent the last 30 years looking forward to the next Terry Pratchett Discworld novel. There have been 40 novels in the series released in that time, with another due out this year.  Very fortunate, indeed.  

My favourite of the books is The Truth - have you ever wondered who writes the stuff in gossip columns?  And my favourite line comes from Hogfather.  Mr Teatime is in a standoff with Death.  The stakes are cosmologically high.  "No last minute stuff!" Teatime demands.  And Death replies ... well, you'll just have to read the book to find out what he says.

Vale, Terry Pratchett.  It has been both a joy and a privilege to have discovered and followed your work for all these years. 

Mr Midshipman Easy by Captain Marryat

Mr Midshipman Easy is a very enjoyable book of high adventure and sheer dumb luck set during the Napoleonic Wars.  First published in 1836, it is also a critique - albeit a highly caricatured one - of some of the progressive social philosophers of the day.

Nicodemus Easy is a man of independent means, and looking for something to do, he decides on philosophy.  Marryat says philosophy is:

... the very best profession a man can take up, when he is fit for nothing else; he must be a very incapable person indeed who cannot talk nonsense ...  For some time, Mr Easy could not decide upon what description his nonsense should consist of, at last he fixed upon the rights of man, equality, and all that ...

Mr Easy steeps his son, Jack, in his philosophy, unwittingly turning him into a headstrong and spoiled child.  Later, when Jack starts attending school, he has great trouble being amenable to his teacher's authority.

At age seventeen, Jack decides to join the Royal Navy, naively thinking that if equality exists anywhere, it will be in the armed forces. Through the patronage of his father, Jack enlists as a midshipman and promptly sets his philosophy of equality against the entire chain of command of the navy.  Jack's easy-going and disarming manner allows him to get away with much of his insubordination, which also leads him into some hare-brained exploits.  A quick mind and a generous helping of luck sees Jack out of many a tight scrape, and success piles up around him.

Captain Marryat, himself a veteran of the Napoleonic Wars, has created a fine comic novel in Mr Midshipman Easy.  There is a lot in it to amuse the reader, especially the naive charm of the Teflon-coated Jack Easy and the practical wisdom of his friend Mesty, a runaway African slave.  Their hijinks on the high seas is the cause for many a smile or raised eyebrows.  But this is not to say that there is no room for danger, violence and tragedy.  There is plenty of that too - many die along the way, sometimes callously - and Jack's homecoming has particularly tragic consequences.

Of course, this book was written nearly 180 years ago and sentiments have changed in that time.  The reader may find the Captain's portrayal of Mesty the former slave problematic.  On the positive side, we can say that Mesty is a fully-fleshed and subjective character with his own unique thoughts and feelings, and not a mere cipher or an object in the white man's field of view.

When the denunciation of old Mr Easy's philosophy arrives towards the end of the book, it is mostly couched in theological terms.  Even so, the Captain seriously challenges us about the nature of equality and inequality.  To what extent is equality possible?  Are there economic advantages to be derived from inequality, or deleterious social consequences to be derived from equality?  Can the wolf live with the lamb?  These questions are still pertinent today.

The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro

The Remains of the Day is the story of a reserved man who gets cracked open, and a tender evocation of world long since gone.  It is also a road trip and a fictional memoir.  The road trip takes place in the 1950s, while the memoir covers the interwar period.  Ishiguro has done a masterly job of exploring  issues of social class, deportment, service, emotions, loyalty and remembrance.   

Stevens, the protagonist, was a servant and then head butler to Lord Darlington between the two world wars.  After the Second World War ended, Lord Darlington passed away and his estate was sold to an American business man, Mr Farraday, who retains Stevens as his butler.  One day, Mr Farraday tells Stevens to have a week off, take the car and get out to see the English countryside.  

Stevens decides to drive to the West Country.  He does this for several reasons, one of them being to visit Mrs Benn, from whom he has recently received some personal letters. Twenty years earlier, Mrs Benn (then Miss Kenton) had been the head house-keeper in Darlington Hall. Stevens suspects Mrs Benn may want to return to her former employment.

The book, then, is split into two narratives: one detailing the trip to the West Country; the other being a memoir of Stevens' time serving Lord Darlington.  The narratives contrast in several ways.  The former recounts the present day experiences of an aging Stevens and his encounters with people of his own class; the latter mainly concerns Stevens as a younger man and his service to Lord Darlington, a self-appointed amateur diplomat, and his distinguished guests (including Winston Churchill and Joachim von Ribbentrop, the German Nazi Foreign minister).

In telling his memoir, Stevens puts forward his thoughts on what makes a great butler.  He tells us it consists of dignity and reserve, of being able to subordinate one's personal feelings to the greater purpose of service.  Through his recollections, Stevens makes it clear (perhaps unintentionally) that he had all but dehumanised himself by the unflinching application of his philosophy.

The road trip, however, works changes upon Stevens.  The change is almost imperceptible for most of the novel - Stevens still clings to dignity and reserve as the best methods for dealing with the world; but the world has changed, and Stevens is venturing into new territory, both literally and figuratively.  All of this works upon him, and eventually something occurs that cracks him open.  Even this late in his life, Stevens realises the possibility of changing, and changing for the better.

Stevens unwittingly presages the need for change very early in the novel when he accepts the necessity of the alterations Mr Farraday makes in the affairs of Darlington Hall.  He tells us:

Now naturally, like many of us, I have a reluctance to change too much of the old ways. But there is no virtue at all in clinging as some do to tradition merely for its own sake.

Near the end of the story, Stevens says:

... I should cease looking back so much, that I should adopt a more positive outlook and try to make the best of what remains of my day ... particularly if it is the case that in ********* lies the key to human warmth.

If you want to find out ********* is, you will have to read the book.