Storm's A Comin'

[darkelf105]

 So there is supposedly a massive, massive winter storm system scheduled to hit my part of Ohio today around this afternoon. It's supposed to dump snow and ice until Monday afternoon. In preparation for this, I went to the grocery store and bought much needed cat food in fear that if I didn't and I got stuck in the house with two cats and no food for three days, I most assuredly would be eaten. So I braved the pre-Ohio storm grocery store (which is a unique sort of hell, as everyone and their mother decides that there is absolutely something they must have before the storm hits, thus ensuing that for those few hours, most of North Eastern Ohio's population can be found at a grocery store) and I also bought some other stuff, you know, in preparation for this gigantic snow storm. I also have a whole stack of books waiting. And, now that I am fully prepared for this onslaught of wintery chaos, we will get a dusting. Whatev, I still have my mac 'n cheese and a stack of slashy paperbacks. Speaking of books, I finished Douglas Clegg's Mordred, Bastard Son. 

So, I liked it. Quite a bit in fact. This is a pretty unique take on the Arthur Legend and it was pleasing. Mordred isn't a bad guy, just horribly unlucky in life and love, and also gay. But, his gay identity is not really the center of the story (although his personal sexuality, i.e. the sexuality that straight people assume is their domain and no one else's is. We assume at times, I think ,that we are the only ones that feel desire and the need to be loved in a certain way and if you're not straight it's all about your different identity and not about sexuality as a universal human need), which is cool. I mean, it affects the story but the story is not about being gay, it's about being Mordred and I think that takes a monumental amount of skill to differentiate, especially to a straight reader.  However, that being said, there were some major flaws. There were about twenty typos and a few sentences where I knew exactly what Clegg meant but there were extra words that made the sentence clumsy. This probably isn't Mr. Clegg's fault, but his editor or copy editors, but still, it was jarring as Mr. Clegg's phenomenal short stories are usually flawless. And that was also my problem, I suppose. I'd only read Clegg as a short story writer and this was the first of his novels that I have read. His pacing was off a bit. There were huge swathes of the story that, um, were dialog. And not just any dialog. I suspect, although am not sure, that his stilted awkward dialog was because he hasn't hit his stride in this new Arthurian world he is making and that's why it was so, I must say this, painful as it is, awful at times.  I mean whole tracts of introspective, New Age laced stuff that jarred me out of the story. Now, Mr. Clegg's notions of religion and life, I agree with, however his execution made the themes he tackled with spirituality and religion, life and love, loss and death, good and evil, seem flaky. His rendition of pagan religion came off as highly New Age and Wiccan (and not that there is anything wrong with those movements) but those philosophies are wholly modern, created in the later half of the twentieth century for the most part and thus jar with his pseudo-historical setting. He comes dangerously close to the Romantics' notion of the noble savage, which is easy to do, but a fallacy of culture, history and sociology. He also doesn't quite divest his pagan religions with enough, I don't know, realism to make them have the punch they need to help create a complete world. He sets up the typical pre-Christian Brittany against the church and Rome, but because he pagans' (I use pagan here loosely because the religions Clegg writes about are localized and not organized and uniform in the way moderns think of religion)  lack a certain authenticity (which I admit would be really hard to do because not much is known about pagan religions in Brittany, and what we do know has been filtered through Christian writiers who definitly had an agenda or the Romans, who also had an agenda) and although it seems that Mr. Clegg really tried(there were after all some nice bits of mythos recreated and re-imagined, especially pertaining to the Lady of the Lake and Arawn) it still fell flat. And was more a vehicle to move the story of Mordred foward and make him, pagan priest, Briton tribesmen, mythic user of the ancient arts, the exact oppositional force of his Christian courting, world conquering father.  But I suspect that most of this is because Mr. Clegg is totally re-inventing the legend and the world of Arthur and most of this flatness will go away in the rest of the trilogy, I hope.

Now, all that being said, the characters are magnificent, despite their overly flowery (and not in a good way) dialog and lack of action. Mordred is amazing and so were Morgause and Morgan Le Fay (I won't spoil anything for any one who wants read about her new re-imagining by Clegg, but I think it's totally cool). Merlin is awesome and Lancelot, gasp, well, I didn't hate him and neither did I hate Guinevere. I usually avoid Arthurian stuff like the plague because I can't stand the characters of Guinevere, Lancelot and Arthur. To me they are just ancient Gary Stus fighting for a Mary Sue.  Clegg's versions are so much more real and interesting.  So, all in all, a good start. Like I said, since Clegg put a disclaimer at the beginning of his novel that his world wasn't a historical world but the mythic setting of the legends, I can't say too much about the weird flatness of his non-Christian religions, but I can say that his characters' philosophy, religious views and language could use some work because they also don't feel mythic. However, I think that this is a problem that will work itself out. I am really looking forward to the next installment of the trilogy!

 

Comments

[athousandwinds.livejournal.com]

I liked the book as well, but I definitely see where your criticisms are coming from. I thought the pacing was dreadful, though part of that might have been me not expecting a trilogy. A couple of the original characters fell very flat - Mordred's friends, for example - but Morgan and Lancelot were excellent. And I liked the perspective he took on Arthur, because I've never liked him, but that's a very personal reaction.

[darkelf105.livejournal.com]

I can't stand the Arthur character either. I find Arthurian legends so much interesting without him. That being said, I also agree with your observation about Lukat. It seemed more plot point to move Mordred forward and give him time to mope philosophically and not like a real relationship. I do think that this is more because Clegg's working on a trilogy and still trying to differentiate his Arthurian world from others'. I hope because I really do like his rendition of Mordred, Morgan and Lancelot.