I’m unlikely to be the first to wonder about this, but I’m starting to suspect that a not unsubstantial part of the enjoyment readers derive from long series of doorstopper Fantasy novels might lie in the mere fact of having made it through the massive of printed paper – maybe indeed not unlike mountain climbing (a pastime I do not indulge in, so just speculating here) a feat of endurance with its main reward the consciousness of having surmounted a huge obstacle.
Janny Wurts
Book Diary: Janny Wurts – Traitor’s Knot
There is a lot of music in The Wars of Light and Shadow – not only is the series’ main protagonist a preternaturally gifted masterbard, whose music is capable of working something very close to magic and is a recurring important plot element through all of the novels, not only does Janny Wurts make constant use of musical imagery and occasionally even structure (like at the end of Peril’s Gate where Elaira’s repeated “Cry, Mercy” serves as a kind of pedal point to Arithon’s ordeal) – but in a sense, the novels are music, in so far as they are very aware of the tonal quality of language, their sentences composed with an ear for prose rhythm and melody.
In addition, there are the larger-than-life characters with their tendency to grand, sweeping gestures, the high-strung feelings and the even more high-strung language – all of which combine to give the series an operatic feel. In its best moments, Janny Wurts’ prose grips the reader with the emotional impact and powerful intensity of an aria. The musical work it is most reminiscent of, though, (and which, although it is operatic does not strictly speaking have arias) due to its grand scope, the way it entwines the mythical with the intimate and its use of leitmotifs is Richard Wagners Ring des Nibelungen. The War of Light and Shadow is not (unlike Stephen Donaldson who tried tries for the science fiction genre with his Gap Cycle) an adaption of Wagner’s work, but it does seem to share some features with it – and considering how Janny Wurts not only wrote it, but also did the covers for some editions, there maybe even be some ambition towards a Gesamtkunstwerk (and one can’t help but wonder whether some of Arithon’s tunes have actually been set to music…).
After the focused perspective of Peril’s Gate, the view widens into a broad panorama again in Traitor’s Knot, we find out what it was Davien wanted from Arithon, and we get one of the rare instances of pure, unmitigated evil in the series. There is only a brief breathing pause at the start of the novel, then things start moving again, events retaining the momentum they have gathered in the previous volumes of this arc and leading into what promises to be a grand finale.
Book Diary: Janny Wurts – Peril’s Gate
Peril’s Gate is the third book in the Alliance of Light arc and the sixth in the whole series, making it the central volume not just for this particular arc but The Wars of Light and Shadow as a whole – so, from its structural position as a lynchpin alone one can expect significant things to occur here. It also stands out from the other volumes in the series in that intrigue and political machinations are almost completely absent and it generally is unusually sketchy on the bigger picture; instead, it strongly focuses on exploring character, following the straight narrative path of a chase story. But, much like a Maze that plays an important part in this novel and that for the greater part appears as nothing more than a straight tunnel, there is more to Peril’s Gate than meets the eye.
And it is, once again, not on the level of plot where things are happening – in fact the narrative comes to a grinding standstill in places, to give way to long, mostly dialogue-free passages describing a solitary flight across a barren landscape locked in winter. I can not think of another book that depicts with equal intensity just what it means to be hunted – the sheer misery of it, the toll it takes on mind and body, the utter weariness and the seemingly never-ending struggle against exhaustion and despair. Peril’s Gate has everything other chase scenes like to gloss over and Janny Wurts’ command of language is such that the impact of her descriptions becomes almost physical. Which also means that this is not a pleasant read – anyone looking for fast action is likely to be bored out of their mind before they make it even halfway through the novel, but anyone able to stick with it will be rewarded with one of the most intense reading experiences to be had in fantasy literature.
Things get even more harrowing in the finale of the book when Arithon passes through Kewar’s Maze and is forced to relive all his past mistakes, experiencing every single death he caused. As hard to bear (and to read) as this is, it marks a pivotal point for his character development and the series in general, as now he finally gains full self-knowledge and comes to terms with himself (and hopefully sheds his at times very annoying tendency towards wallowing in self-pity).
What I’m Reading: Janny Wurts – Grand Conspiracy
There are a couple of traits Janny Wurts’ The Wars of Light and Shadow series shares with with the current trend of New Grit in fantasy literature: her characters have a plausible psychology, she is willing to have bad things happen to good people if the story requires it, her world is populated not just with nobility, but with middle and lower classes who are more than just decoration and have an active role to play. But in Wurts’ novels, unlike those of, say, George R.R. Martin or K.J Parker, those elements do not serve to achieve a greater degree of realism. Instead, she is aiming for something quite different, namely the grand scope of the truly Epic, and that is nowhere as pronounced as in her use of language.
Book Diary: Janny Wurts – Fugitive Prince
Janny Wurts is as far as I know unique among contemporary fantasy writers in so far as she deviates from the standard High Fantasy model in the opposite direction from the authors of the “New Grit” – while Martin, Abercrombie et al. do their best to make their protagonists appear less heroic and cut them down to a more human size, Janny Wurts, in her massive series The War of Light and Shadow, makes her characters even more Epic, painting them larger than life.
Which is not to say that her characters are in any way one-dimensional, quite to the contrary – all of her primary and many of her secondary characters are nuanced and multi-faceted and are capable of surprising the reader, occasionally even providing moments of genuine psychological insight (when for example one character does not show the expected gratitude when he is saved by another, but instead resents his saviour – a reaction that is very much true to life, given this particular character in his particular situation). But Janny Wurts paints things on a very large canvas, and often her characters appear as more than human – in their strengths as well their weaknesses, their vices as well as their virtues.
Fugitive Prince (which could almost be the title of the whole series, seeing how Arithon, the prince referred to, seems to be on the run through all of it) is the fourth novel in the series, and kicks off the Alliance of Light arc which runs over five substantial volumes (which I’m going to read – or at least plan to – back to back in the next few weeks). In consequence, there is a lot of set-up here, and things move rather slowly at first, gathering some momentum only in the second half. But then, one does not read Epic Fantasy for breakneck action (well, I don’t, in any case) but for inventive world building, deep characters and compelling language, all of which Janny Wurts provides here (as in the rest of the series) in ample measure.
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