A Dream of John Ball

Written by William Morris, A Dream of John Ball delves into the fantasy of simpler days, days gone by, when the world was beautiful (more or less). In this book, we’re transported back in time to green English meadows and pastures, swordsmen and bowmen, and deep spiritual questions about time, life, and death. 

After falling into deep slumber, a dreamer awakes within his dream in the Medieval English countryside. As he wanders towards a town, he marvels at the beauty of the environment, the architecture, the simplicity of life. He’s soon within the company of burly and strong townsfolk, listening to the sermons of one John Ball, preaching and preparing the men for battle against the villains overland. When that battle has been and the fallen are laid to rest, the dreamer and John Ball spend the night together in conversation asking and answering question about times that have past and times that are to come. 

This is a very easy to book to read. Large print and a mere hundred pages in length, you can pretty much power through it, as I did (that and I had to read it for uni). A dream narrative in the first person, what I found interesting about the book was the story’s pace and flow. Everything happens naturally and seemingly with minimal effort, and there is not a lot of exposition or big build up to climactic events (such as the battle). I’m sort of in two minds as to how I feel about this because on the one hand, it means that there aren’t really any dreadfully dull chunks of narrative to plough through and on the other hand, the really exciting bits of the story lose their power and excitement. I mean, the battle sort of just happens, is described well (there’s even some humour in it), but doesn’t really get the adrenaline pumping or the blood rushing. Morris’ writing works well in creating this image of the world he’s in as well as the feelings of the protagonist towards the reality in the dream and his reality when awake. 

There’s also a sneaky and intriguing change in direction when the idea is put forward that the dreamer is a figment of John Ball’s dreaming state whilst simultaneously being a figment of the dreamer’s dreaming state. Ok, I seriously need to stop saying ‘dream’ related words now right? 

Filled with action, spiritual discussion, drama, and comedy, A Dream of John Ball is an easy little read and a cute little dream narrative, but nothing really special in the ways of literature. Being so short and cramming a lot of stuff into it, removes the potential for attachment to the characters and envelopment within the folds of the story, but at the same time it’s not a bad piece of work in that its written nicely and has a fair stab at passing for Medieval text.