Witches Abroad

Image credit: wiki.Ispace.org

The human experience is a weird, sometimes woeful, and wondrous thing. While a lot of it is made up of suffering, anxiety, hardships, and bad luck, a substantial portion of it is filled with lovely things such as fairytales: gifts that keep on giving for years and years and years.

I have just closed the cover on Witches Abroad, the 12^th book in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series in which he very cleverly creates another hilarious adventure by taking two aspects of human existence and reshaping them for better and worse. The first is travel and the absolute nightmare that it can be, and the second is fairytales and how dangerously limeless they are.

Ensuring that a young servant girl does not marry a prince should be a pretty easy task – you would think. But for the witches Granny Weatherwax, Nanny Ogg, and Magrat Garlick, it could not be more difficult. When Magrat inherits a magic wand and becomes a Fairy Godmother, she discovers that she must travel to Genua, a place where fairytales are running rampant and Happy Endings are making everyone miserable. With the ‘help’ of Granny and Nanny, she must stop a servant girl from marrying a prince and free the citizens of Genua from fairytale tyranny. That is if they can ever get there – between the language barrier, transport troubles, and questionable cuisine, it’s going to be a long trip.

Our favourite trio of witches is back and getting up to and into even more trouble than they have done before. Between Granny Weatherwax outconning conmen and Magrat solving world hunger with pumpkins, Witches Abroad is another fun and hilarious romp into an area of the Discworld that we have never seen before. Reminiscent of the bayous of Louisianna mixed with a swamp-tropical jungle, Genua seems like the last place in which to find fairytales. Pratchett overtly references practically every classic take you can imagine from The Wizard of Oz to The Frog Prince to Cinderella.

Image credit: Penguin Books Australia

As well as a laugh-out-loud trek through swamps and familiar plotlines, the book is a commentary on the woes of travelling as well as an exploration into how it can affect relationships. While happy endings are the Big Bad in this book, in a similar way to Moving Pictures and even Soul Music, it’s the strain that travel can put on relationships that keeps us flipping pages. Travelling unearths another layer of personality and I have seen what could have been lifelong friendships fall apart because the parties went travelling together. Of course this is not always the case, but it happens and it’s another layer to this book that makes it a well-rounded and compelling read.

‘There’s no place like home’ is definitely a message that comes out to play in this story, working wonderfully with Pratchett’s signature wit and dismantling of beloved stories. Witches Abroad is another delightful read in the Discworld series!

Author: Terry Pratchett, 1991

Published: First published in Great Britain by Gollancz in 1991. Pictured Corgi edition published 1992.

Witches Abroad is the 12^th book in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series.

Gould's Book of Fish

Image credit: Penguin.com.au

We often think of history as that which has already happened. An event, a person, a time period that has been and gone. Of course, with humanity’s habit of chronicling and revisiting history through the artistic means of art, film, and literature, history is certainly something that is gone but not forgotten. Made up of great and memorable characters, daring and disastrous adventures, lessons, mistakes, triumph and regret, history is a self-replenishing wellspring of inspiration for the artist.

This is certainly the case with the most recent book that I have just closed the cover on: Gould’s Book of Fish by Richard Flanagan.

Rotting away in a flooded cell in the penal colony on Sarah Island, William Buelow Gould – forger, liar, murderer, and artist – chronicles his new life in Australia. Brought as a convict to suffer and slave, his modicum of artistic talent provides him the hope of avoiding life in a chain gang: he is commissioned to illustrate a book of fish. Thus begins the final days of silly Billy Gould who discovers beauty, love, and mirth anew as well as the dark side of ambition and the true horror of irony.

Richard Flanagan is a celebrated Australian author, and rightly so. This is the first book of his that I have read and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Crisp and lyrical prose that is both poetic and ‘artistic’ and horrendously crass and filthy – much like the stories it describes- fills the pages of Gould’s Book of Fish, creating a fictitious historical account of Tasmania in 1826 that at times feels a little For Whom the Bell Tolls and at others The Master and Margarita.

Told in the most part from the perspective of Billy Gould, the book recounts a particularly horrific and disgusting part of Australia’s history while at the same time inserting some ridiculous characters and stories that bring a level of hilarity and oddness to the landscape. Amidst the madness of the Surgeon who speaks to severed heads, the Commandant who dreams of building Europe on the untameable landscape of Van Diemen’s Land, and Castlereagh the pig who is the Devil incarnate, William Gould experiences the miracles of a change in perspectives, a change in life goals, and a change in physical form.

Image credit: Penguin Books Aus

I found this to be a beautiful and engaging read that was also rather challenging. A black comedy that also features some scenes fit for any horror film set against the terrible Australian outback, this fictional memoir is a remarkable piece of work from one of Australia’s most celebrated writers and is definitely worth the read if you are looking for something different.

Author: Richard Flanagan, 2001

Published: Picador, an imprint of Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Limited, 2001. Pictured edition published by Penguin Random House Australia, 2018

Circe

Image credit: Sulphurbooks.com

The word ‘classic’ is a wonderful word that is used to describe everything from characters to colours. It refers to things that are considered timeless, still holding their clout after thousands of years. Like the Greek myths of the Titans and Olympians. Like hundreds of other people, I have a love for Greek mythology and this week I decided to indulge that little pleasure with a book that explores the adventures and misadventures of a lesser-known goddess, Circe.

Born an unexceptional daughter of the Titan Helios and the nymph Perse, Circe lives a lonely childhood being neglected and shunned by her family, and then a lonely eternity when she is exiled from her home and sent to live on an isolated island where she becomes the Witch of Aiaia. But a great many things can happen when you have an eternity to work your magic and discover your true self.

Written by Madeleine Miller, Circe cleverly retells a bunch of classic Greek myths with the fresh spin of being told from the perspective of one of the bystanders. Circe as a character in Greek mythology is always on the fringes or tied in in some subtle way to a heap of great stories and Miller does a very clever thing here in which she alludes to these stories, but not necessarily retell them and it is that that keeps readers compelled to turn pages. Over the course of Circe’s lifetime, which spans just over three-hundred pages, we get to relive gripping tales such as that of Theseus and the Minotaur, Jason and the Golden Fleece, Odysseus and the Cyclops, and the Trojan War.

It's funny, I absolutely powered through this book but it kind of reminded me a little of my reading experience of The Slap. Most, if not all the characters in Circe are not particularly likable people and while some are overtly awful that they inspire hatred towards them on the part of the reader, all the others are subtly and inwardly awful and I found, personally, that it was no love of characters that kept me reading into the small hours of the morning. It was the familiarity of the setting and the classic narratives that were the driving force in this book. Of course this is for me, I can’t speak for anyone else. But I think that is what made this book clever in my mind: it’s not so much the fleshing out of a character that we’ve seen minutely and heard about briefly, but a piggyback novel that promises epic tales by constantly alluding to them and getting you excited. And I guess in a way you get them, but it’s a diluted sort of satisfaction, a bit like the watered-down wine people would have with breakfast back then.

Image credit: ualr.edu

Miller’s prose is both blunt and flowery. It reads with a dramatic tone that absolutely works for the story and its setting, but also harbours some clever little tidbits that indicate just how much time has passed and language has changed. Initially, it’s a little jarring and discombobulating when you first encounter it, finding a weirdly modern-sounding phrase come out of the mouth of some character, but it’s actually a very clever way in which Miller shows us the passing of time. Keep in mind that we only follow Circe, an immortal goddess who lives alone on an island.

Circe is a fresh and clever dive into the classic world of Greek mythology and makes for a very good lunchtime, afternoon, and bedtime read. Stories within a story that’s filled with hope, yearning, drama, comedy, and of course, hubris. I quite enjoyed it.

Author: Madeleine Miller, 2018

Published: Little, Brown, & Company, USA, 2018.

Reaper Man

Image credit: martinus.sk

So, after the bedtime story fun of Tolkien, I decided to dive back into my habit of Pratchett before bed, continuing on with book 11 in the Discworld series: Reaper Man.

The Powers That Be have decided that Death has become too much of a character and have thus enforced an early retirement. What they hadn’t counted on was Death deciding to spend their final days trying to get a life. As can be expected when there is no one to coral the deceased, a great bout of chaos ensues including newly deceased wizards returning as zombies, ghosts overpopulating the spirit world and getting on each other’s nerves, and inanimate objects taking on a life of their own. Meanwhile on a farm far away, a tall stranger appears looking for a job. Turns out he’s really good with a scythe.

What I’m slowly starting to realise about the weird and wonderful work of Terry Pratchett, is that you can always expect the unexpected. What I mean is you always know that you’re in for a story that starts travelling in one direction and veers right off the road entirely. You never know if you’re going to end up in the surrounding woodland or at the bottom of the sea, but you do have enough foresight to put on your seatbelt.

Reaper Man, like many of its predecessors, is a book made up of two to several stories that run parallel to each other, seem to have some sort of relationship, but never really meet. On the one hand, we have the story of Death going missing and trying their bony had at a mortal job. Their disappearance sparks the strange story of newly deceased wizard Windle Poons and the strange snow-globes that seem to be appearing all over Ankh-Morpork. And then, of course, there is the social and philosophical commentary of the author that makes you think about the nature and quirks of your very existence by positing very serious questions such as, what does the' life of the city’ really mean? and, should the undead really have to hold meetings to discuss their rights?

Image credit: Penguin Books Australia

Pratchett delivers a delightful cast of zany characters from the bumbling and incomprehensible wizards of Unseen University to the Fresh Starters: a group of undead activists. The humour and imagery of all the chaos that pads out the pages is riotous fun, making Reaper Man another compelling tale in an already tumultuous series.

Author: Terry Pratchett, 1991

Published: First published in Great Britain by Victor Gollancz Ltd, 1991. Pictured Corgi edition published, 1992.

Reaper Man is the 11^th book in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series.

Tales From the Perilous Realm

Image credit: tolkienlibrary.com

It’s been a week of very real experiences, growth, and adult functionality and I honestly don’t think I could have made it through in tact without the aid of my chosen read. When the realities of the world are banging at your door, sometimes the best method of relaxing after dealing with them is going into a very unreal world. Yay voyeurism! So this week, I conversed with dragons, travelled to Faery, watched a painter pain his afterlife, and followed a dog to the moon. This week’s book was Tales From the Perilous Realm by J.R.R. Tolkien.

Made up of five separate works, Tales From the Perilous Realm is a gorgeous array of bedtime stories filled with beauty, adventure, magic, and meaning. In Roverandom, a poor little dog gets made littler by a wizard and goes on all sorts of adventures in the hope of eventually getting back to his proper size. In Farmer Giles of Ham a simple farmer becomes a folk hero when he rids his town of a giant and then, later, a dragon. We get to travel all over Middle Earth with the poems that make up The Adventures of Tom Bombadil. In Smith of Wootton Major a child gets blessed with visits to Faery via the magic ingredients of a giant cake. And in Leaf by Niggle a kind-hearted painter gets put through his paces as he tries to paint the most magnificent tree, while also trying to aid his ‘friends and neighbours’.

Image credit: npg.org.uk

Tolkien’s simple prose is always a treat: accessible and digestible to a varying range of ages from eight to eighty. His stories are simple, sweet, and wholly immersive; the perfect thing for a spot of bedtime reading. The mixture of narrative and poetry is a particularly lovely part of this reading experience, as The Adventures of Tom Bombadil efficiently breaks up the strict, structural delight of narrative prose and covers a great expanse of ground in so short a space of time.

There’s not much more that can be said about a work of Tolkien’s that hasn’t been said already. Tales From the Perilous Realm is an enchanting and compelling bedtime read, perfect for any age and personality.

Author: J.R.R Tolkien

Published: Pictured edition published by HarperCollinsPublishers, Great Britain, 1997. Farmer Giles of Ham first published in 1949. The Adventures of Tom Bombadil first published in 1961. Leaf By Niggle first published in 1964. Smith of Wootton Major first published in 1967. Roverandom first published in 1998.

Illustrations by Alan Lee.

The Master and Margarita

Image credit: libertybooks.com

Continuing on with my mission to read my way through my entire personal library as well as broaden my literary horizons, this week I have taken a trip to Soviet Moscow and witnessed some delightful mayhem at the hands of the Devil himself. This week the book of choice was Mikhail Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita.

On a warm summer day, the Devil turns up in Moscow. He strikes up a conversation with two artists that ends with one being decapitated by a train and the other in the asylum. This seemingly innocuous occurrence sets the city abuzz with strange happenings: people disappearing, money turning into champagne labels, and people being turned into witches and flying pigs. At the centre of it all is Woland, an eccentric magician of the black arts and his entourage of various curious characters including a naked woman and a giant black cat. But while the law buckles underneath the weight of the chaos and the asylum becomes in danger of being packed to capacity, it seems that some people are immune to the destructive powers of the Devil: a despondent writer known as The Master and his adulterous lover Margarita.

Time for a little history. The Master and Margarita was originally digested and circulated underground, having been written during Stalin’s reign of Soviet totalitarianism. Despite Bulgakov being praised as one of Stalin’s favourite playwrights, the book didn’t come into public consciousness until after his death when, in 1966 (almost thirty years after Bulgakov’s death), the first part was published in the Moskva journal. Since then, it has endured, gone from strength to strength, with many of its poignant phrases becoming modern Russian proverbs and even having reach in the West – apparently the Rolling Stones’ song Sympathy For the Devil was inspired by Woland.

The book is made up of two stories that become interconnected. The first being set in modern Moscow where the Devil turns up to wreak a little havoc, and the second in ancient Jerusalem starring Pontius Pilate. The entire story is a cheeky and mischievous satire of Soviet life mixed with religious allegory: the joke being that only the morally- fluid (to just the right degree) can come through a visit from the Devil unscathed.

Image credit: fanpop

Bulgakov’s cast of colourful and charismatic characters, described with a nonchalant omniscient narrator’s voice, reminds us of the chaos of Carrol’s Alice In Wonderland – but with more nudity and decapitation. What’s really delightful about the whole thing is that there is no targeted character to hate or properly vilify. While Woland and his entourage are definitely the cause of the chaos and destruction of social law, they are not painted as villains: indeed, when the Master and Margarita encounter them, they are perfectly pleasant and gracious hosts. The mayhem that ensues after their little party tricks highlights the flaws of a rigid social structure and a binary belief system. Neither the Master nor Margarita are saints, but they are rewarded for their moral ambiguity, committing sins which are textbook-wrong but do not badly hurt or inhibit other parties, thanks to the way they approach and handle them.

The Master and Margarita is an out-of-control carnival of magic, flesh, vodka, madness, drama, and comedy. It’s a story with many layers, each one a very tasty treat.

Author: Mikhail Bulgakov

Published: Moskva Journal, 1966. First published in Great Britain by Collins and the Harvill Press, 1967. Pictured Vintage edition published 2003.

Labyrinths

Image credit: wob.com

There is something fascinating and enthralling in reading anthologies or collected works of authors – especially when done in a continuous bout. I find it very intriguing to pick out the niche nuances, unique tricks or quirks of the author, and spot the recurring theme of the works. I just finished enjoying such an experience, having just closed the cover of Labyrinths by Jorge Luis Borges.

Labyrinths is a collection of short fictional stories, essays, and parables that explore the compelling and contrasting methods of thinking in which mankind tries to understand the world, their selves, and their gods. The ‘labyrinths’ of the title refers to everything and nothing in the human experience; the literal labyrinths of a house, the labyrinths of one’s mind, the endless labyrinths of theology, philosophy, mythology, and idealism.

 I found it fascinating and provocative; an enjoyable challenge that raises more questions than it answers and almost metafictively becomes a comment or an examination of itself. Borges’ doomed and dispirited cast of characters reflect a self-deprecating – almost loathing – omniscient narrator and author who in turns takes an almost fiendish delight in torturing both characters and readers alike with questions and scenarios that are both unanswerable and the simplest of things to fathom.

Image credit: 65ymas.com

Citing renown and celebrated works such as The Divine Comedy and Don Quixote, as well as featuring cameos from Pascal, Judas, Kafka, and Bernard Shaw, Borges explores these conflicting ideologies that humanity has invented to refute, recast, disassemble, and reinvent literary tropes, traditions, behaviours of the fictional heroes, and the world theories put forward by other literary giants. Thus, turning the entire collected work into another step that keeps the paved road of literature going: ever winding forwards and backwards without an end in sight – a twisted labyrinth.

It's a fascinating read and indeed a challenge, the reward being a widened sense of perception and ability to question what is and what is not.

Author: Jorge Luis Borges, 1962

Published: First published in the USA by New Directions, 1964. Pictured edition published by Penguin Books, 1970.