The Gormenghast Trilogy, by Mervyn Peake
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I first had a go at reading the Gormenghast trilogy about 24 years ago, at the age of 19, when I was reading a lot of science and fantasy fiction. I gave up less than 100 pages in: my memory was that I found it too slow moving and hard work to read. It’s part of the Big Read 100, so this time I was committed to finishing it. I’m not sure I would have finished it this time otherwise… |
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I made slow and steady progress through the first half of book 1 (Titus Groan). It didn’t grab me, and felt like a bit of a chore to stick with it. But from there until the middle of book 2 (Gormenghast) I really bogged down. I took a break a couple of times and polished off several books, because I just didn’t fancy slogging through this. Why spend a paragraph describing something when you could spend several pages? The writing is very dense, and feels dated, though it may just be Peake’s writing style, rather than a style of the period.
The pace really picked up for the second half of Gormenghast though. I was hooked into the story, and found myself wanting to read just one more chapter. A lot of what had gone before had definitely set the scene, and gave everything a context. I’m deliberately avoiding talking about the plot, but everything builds towards the dénouement at the end of book 2.
Book 3 (Titus Alone) is a very different book: a different genre, and a very different writing style. The first two books were written closely together, but Titus Alone was published nearly 10 years after Gormenghast. All through the first two books, I had a certain image of Gormenghast, and its period. I saw it either in the late middle ages, or in a setting not wildly different from Lord of the Rings. And then on page 5 of Titus Alone we come across a car, and then a bit later planes and helicopters. Does everyone have the same “huh?!” moment I had?
I read Titus Alone fairly quickly. Partly this was down to the different writing style, I think. It’s almost a collection of sound bites, most chapters are shorter than 2 pages. It wasn’t really satisfying, and for me detracted from the rhythm I’d built up on the second half of Gormenghast.
I can imagine it’s hard for people to classify Gormenghast: dark Gothic fantasy? Considering just the first two books, it most reminded me of Dickens: nearly every character is a caricature, the way most characters are in Dickens. It’s what Dickens might have written for fantasy fiction, though Peake’s not as good a writer as Dickens.
Before the Gormenghast Trilogy, Middlemarch was the book from the Big Read 100 that had taken me the longest to read so far. Gormenghast has knocked it into second place: it took about 10 weeks, which is very unusual for me.
Book Review: Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie
I finally finished reading Midnight’s Children. It had been on my reading list for a while, as it’s on the Big Read Top 100 (just, it’s at #100), plus it’s on my list of 100 books you should read. I’d put off reading it, because
- It’s a Booker winner. Three times: originally in 1981, and twice it’s been nominated the best of Booker. Booker is often a sign that a book will be hard work, and often also that I won’t enjoy it. And also:
- I don’t know anyone who’s finished it, but had comments from a number of people who’d given up on it.
I felt like giving up a few times, particularly in the middle third of the book, but it was on my list so I stuck with it, and ended up kinda glad that I did.
It tells the story of Saleem Sinai, an Indian boy born at midnight 15th August 1947, exactly the same time as the partition of India and Pakistan. All children born in India in that hour (the midnight’s children of the title) have strange abilities, and the closer to midnight they were born, the stronger their powers. The book is written as the autobiography of Saleem, looking back at the age of 32 on both his life, and the first 32 years of India, taking in Pakistan and Bangladesh.
Saleem’s life parallels India’s, and many of India’s major events are also major events in Saleem’s life (in a way that reminded me of Forrest Gump). It’s almost like a history lesson about India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, with the surreal tale of Saleem woven through and around it.
I can imagine some reviewers describing the writing as dense and rich, and while Rushdie is skilled wordcrafter, at times I thought it pretentious. His writing reminded me of John Irving: a similar quirky style; but it also reminded me of Irving’s later books, which I find similarly hard work.
I’m glad that I read it, but is it one of the best 100 novels of all time? Personally, I don’t think so. One of the key questions for me, on my first reading of an author is “does it make me want to read more by this author?”. And for Salman Rushdie, no, it doesn’t.
Big Read Top 21 – Filling in the Gaps
Of the Top 21 books in the BBC’s Big Read I had only read 11 at the time. I read a lot, but to that date hadn’t read many classics; so I decided to read the other 10. Here’s what I thought of them.
I thought Pride and Prejudice was excellent: crisp, efficient writing, sparkling humour, good observational descriptions of life and mores of the period; and a surprisingly good read. Jane Eyre wasn’t as good as P&P, but a deserving classic nonetheless. I’d already seen a number of film and TV adaptations of Rebecca, so I was very familiar with the story. It was enjoyable enough, and clearly a classic, but it just didn’t fire me up; apparently it particularly appeals to teenage girls. I’d previously dismissed Little Women as a girl’s book; it was an easy read, and I got into it more than expected. It read like it was aimed at a younger audience than the other books above. These four are all deserving to be in a “best novels” list, I think.
One of the classifications I’d use for books on this kind of list is whether it ever feels like hard work reading them. Catch-22 was the first one that felt a bit like work. I just don’t get why people rate it so highly. It was ok, but I wouldn’t put it in my top 21. Gone with the Wind was never hard work, but read more like a holiday read, or romantic / historical pulp fiction. Most of the books I’ve kept, but once I’d finished with Gone with the Wind it went straight to a charity shop.
Birdsong was one of the books I enjoyed the most: well written and a gripping story. I haven’t really read much about the first World War, just picked stuff up from TV and films. The descriptions of trench warfare, tunnelling, and bodies trampled into muddy battlefields were eye opening – making me think beyond my cliched sound-bite view of WWI. I know some people think the love interest detracts from the book, but I think it’s better for having the human interest interwoven.
I hadn’t read any Dickens prior to this list, and had a expectation of dry prose that would probably make my “hard work” list. Great Expectations was none of those things. A good story, very well written; most of these books are well written, but Dickens reads like he really crafted his sentences. One thing with all Dickens that I’ve read so far: most of the characters feel like caricatures. Maybe that’s a result of the initial serialisation in periodicals?
I was up to date on my Harry Potter, but hadn’t read any of the His Dark Materials trilogy; the two series seemed in some sense to be competing at the time. I was sucked into the world of HDM, and thought the writing was better than Harry Potter; it feels more literary, and better suited to an older age range. I got bogged down for a patch in the third book (The Amber Spyglass). Overall I thought this was good, but I wouldn’t score it as highly (it came 3rd in the Big Read).
I bought all of the books I had to read well ahead of reading them, and had them all sitting on the shelf. War and Peace was intimidating, partly just down to the size of it (approx 1500 pages), but also because of the comments I’d get from people when I told them W&P was in my reading queue. So this ended up being the last book I read from the Top 21. I really enjoyed it, and it never felt hard work, apart from perhaps when trying to keep track of the who’s who. It felt deserving of the epic epithet, and a true literary classic. I could imagine Tolstoy really working hard on this book.
Here’s a quick classification of the ones I read in this batch:
| Better than expected | Good | Didn’t Care For |
|---|---|---|
| War and Peace | Jane Eyre | Catch-22 |
| Pride and Prejudice | His Dark Materials | Gone with the Wind |
| Great Expectations | Little Women | |
| Birdsong | Rebecca |
Many of the books I had already ticked off were read when I was a teenager or younger. At some point I’ll go back and re-read them.
