![]() ![]() The imagery and poetry of the Gormenghast books are profound. I wasn’t surprised, when I read all the various introductions and critical assessments in this volume, to learn that Peake was an illustrator and a poet. Gormenghast is more than just a castle or a place it’s a world suspended in a water droplet. Titus Groan will be the 77th Earl of Gormenghast, and one day too he will live to perform the endless rituals set out in the ancient books and prescribed by their Master of Rituals. The eponymous castle is a grand affair in its own right, but it is the locus of a much grander, older tradition that involves and enslaves the entire castle. This is but one of the many tensions that arises in Mervyn Peake’s Gormenghast (or Titus) books. ![]() ![]() Even as we celebrate the freedoms made possible through democracy, we revel in escapism to an inherently oppressive setting, where hereditary titles are standard-issue and the plot often involves helping a rightful heir regain the throne. One of the more pernicious aspects of epic fantasy is medieval stasis. ![]()
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