Puanım 4/5 (%79/100)

Genel olarak beğendim ama kitabın uzunluğu ve epik fantezi oluşu beni okurken yordu. Kitap ilk 1922 çıkmış ve Eddison İskandinav mitolojisi başta olmak üzere (kitabın isminden belli) birçok şeyden esinlenmiş. Epik fantezi türünde ve bazı yönleriyle Odysseia'yı da hatırlatıyor kitap. Ama şiirsel oluşu aynı zamanda Shakespeare'e de bir gönderme olmuş. Tolkien başta olmak üzere birçok yazarı etkileyen bir kitap ve yazar. İskandinav mitolojisine ilgi duyan ve bilgili olduğunu düşünen birisi olarak ufak tefek mitolojik göndermeleri yakalamak güzeldi. Ourobos yılanı sonsuz döngüyü temsil ediyor ve kitabın başından sonuna aslında bu gözlemlenebiliyor. Kitabın sonu bu döngü temasını çok güzel işlemiş, o yüzden oldukça hoşuma gitti.

Ben bulamadım ama yazarın Merkür'ü mekan olarak seçmesini de ilginç buldum. Gezegenle bir alakası yok, tamamen fantastik bir mekan ama neden Merkür? Belki Roma tanrısı Merkür (Yunan mitolojisinde Hermes) hoşuna gittiği içindir çünkü mitolojiden etkilendiği bariz belli. Son olarak böyle detaylı bir fantastik dünya görmeyeli baya olmuştu. Kitabın sonunda tarihçe bile bulunuyor. Eddison gerçekten detaylı ve etkileyici bir dünya yaratmış ve özellikle fantastik edebiyata ilgi duyanlar ondan sonra gelenlerde Eddison'ın etkisini görecektir (bknz. Tolkien, Le Guin). Öneriyorum kesinlikle!

This is billed as the book that inspired J.R.R. Tolkien, & I get that. It also deserves to be mentioned in the same breath as E.R. Burroughs, with the Planetary Romance angle-- it's sort of like the lovechild of A Princess of Mars & the Silmarillion. Needless to say, I adored it. --MK

I loved this when I read it 20 years ago, and I loved it all over again with knobs on when I re-read it last year to record it as a free audiobook for librivox (listen here). It's a magnificent fantasy, peopled by larger-than-larger-than-life characters who engage in impossible deeds, tumultuous wars and high adventure. It's written in prose of opulent splendour and it's a soaring, glorious and wildly original work.

On the other hand:

* The apparent protagonist is simply abandoned by the author about 50 pages in.

* It's set, oddly, on Mercury, but its habitat and peoples are perfectly Earth-like.

* The nations are eccentrically named (Demonland, Impland, Witchland, etc) even thought they're essentially all populated by humans.

* The wonderful prose style will be off-putting to those seeking a lighter read.

These little foibles do not impact significantly on this reader. It's a classic and a masterpiece. (And if you read it and agree, seek out his tragically incomplete Zimiamvia trilogy. Woof!)

Originally published on my blog here in February 2001.

Often touted as a rival to The Lord of the Rings, Eddison's epic fantasy has more in common with the large scale of The Silmarillion. Eddison wrote four loosely linked novels while working as a civil servant, of which The Worm Ouroboros is the first and best known. Its subject is a war between the Demons and Witches, the latter aided by a willingness to act dishonourably and by the dread sorcery of their king, Gorice XII.

The flaws in The Worm Ouroboros are fairly obvious, particularly at the beginning of the novel. The strangest is a narrator, who is very dull and who is even forgotten by Eddison after a couple of chapters. It is symptomatic of a more general fault, which is a lack of revision. Unlike Tolkien's writing, The Worm Ouroboros is clearly not the product of years of obsessive rewriting, background notes and singleminded vision. It reads far more as though it were written down in one sitting. There are problems with details of the background. Like Tolkien, Eddison uses familiar names from folklore for his peoples; there are Demons, Witches, Imps and so on. However, with the exception of the Ghouls, these all appear to be nations of human beings, and the result is that the reader is torn between the traditional ideas conjured up by these names and the way in which Eddison portrays them. Tolkien's dwarves and elves are far more like their traditional namesakes, and this is a lead which has been followed by just about every fantasy writer since.

The whole story of the novel, we are told, is set on the planet Mercury, and this also gives a bizarre feeling; a magical realm works much metter in a mythical setting like Middle Earth.

There is one aspect of the way in which Eddison uses pieces of the real world which works extremely well. In most fantasy novels, when poetry occurs, it is usually a poor imitation of some sort of heroic sage, derived via models like William Morris and Tolkien from medieval sources. What Eddison does is to find poetry which fits with the style of his writing and the situation; this means that it is written by poets like Shakespeare and Spenser and is a pleasure to read rather than something to skip.

The Worm Ouroboros has many excellent qualities; once you get into to it, it is quite compelling. It is imaginative and literary, if a bit lacking in planning and structure. However, it did not grip the world's imagination as the less poetic Tolkien did, and so did not provide the inspiration to hundreds of imitators that The Lord of the Rings has, with the result that it remains something of a curiousity in a forgotten corner of the fantasy genre.

The prose is positively ultraviolet, there are plot holes big enough to march an army through, the author has an exceedingly poor grasp on the concept that women are people, and occasionally a nasty racist stereotype hits you over the head. At a bare minimum it desperately needed another pass by a good editor. It had a certain propulsive energy that kept me reading to the end, but I don't recommend the experience.

The Worm Ouroboros is a fanciful, frilly and extravagant fairy tale written in an elaborate baroque style… And it is a real gold placer of the archaic and rare bookish words…
One night the romantic narrator of the saga boards a chariot driven by hippogriffs and departs to the dream world of Mercury… Straight into the castle of Lord Juss, the mighty sovereign of Demonland… And a tiny martlet – a mythical heraldic birdie – is his guide…

…and the first low beams of the sun smote javelinlike through the eastern windows, and the freshness of morning breathed and shimmered in that lofty chamber, chasing the blue and dusky shades of departed night to the corners and recesses, and to the rafters of the vaulted roof. Surely no potentate of earth, not Croesus, not the great King, not Minos in his royal palace in Crete, not all the Pharaohs, not Queen Semiramis, nor all the Kings of Babylon and Nineveh had ever a throne room to compare in glory with that high presence chamber of the lords of Demonland.

Demons are valorous and noble warriors… But there is a powerful enemy… The greatest villain – the sinister king of Witchland – perfidious and heartless… And he craves to rule the entire dream world…

A furnace glowing in the big hearth threw fitful gleams into the recesses of the chamber, lighting up strange shapes of glass and earthenware, flasks and retorts, balances, hour-glasses, crucibles and astrolabes, a monstrous three-necked alembic of phosphorescent glass supported on a bain-marie, and other instruments of doubtful and unlawful aspect. Under the northern window over against the doorway was a massive table blackened with age, whereon lay great books bound in black leather with iron guards and heavy padlocks. And in a mighty chair beside this table was King Gorice XII, robed in his conjuring robe of black and gold, resting his cheek on his hand that was lean as an eagle’s claw. The low light, mother of shade and secrecy, that hovered in that chamber moved about the still figure of the King, his nose hooked as the eagle’s beak, his cropped hair, his thick close-cut beard and shaven upper lip, his high cheek-bones and cruel heavy jaw, and the dark eaves of his brows whence the glint of green eyes showed as no friendly lamp to them without.

Villainy… Machinations… Collusions… Treachery… Carnage… The tale is a chronicle of war… The merciless war with all its horrors, sorrows, ravaging and harrying…
While the timeless and mysterious wyrm Ouroboros holds the whole dream world in mystical thrall…

“This is a great wonder thou tellest me; whereof some little part I guessed aforetime, but the main I knew not. Rightfully, having such a timeless life, this King weareth on his thumb that worm Ouroboros which doctors have from of old made for an ensample of eternity, whereof the end is ever at the beginning and the beginning at the end for ever more.”

The eternal battle of good and evil continues even in dreams.

This book has the best ending ever. Well, one of my favourites, at least.

It's only when one gets to the end of The Worm Ouroboros that one learns what the story is really all about and can glean some kind of understand thing that there are some thoughtful underpinnings to Eddison's otherwise brashly heroic tale, that's brashly modelled on a range of sources with it's overtly ornate mock-Jacobean prose, snippets of classic poetry and larger than life but strangely one-dimensional heroes and villains.

The clue is in the title, but there's a wonderful red-herring, since Eddison leads the reader to believe that the Ouroboros - the one that will be continually reborn - is King Gorice and that his evil will perhaps never be thwarted. That's partially true, but Eddison's smarter conceit is that the heroes wish for him to be reborn and that they want the fight to continue forever since without they are lost. It's only when we understand this is it possible to appreciate how the book links in with storytelling and traditional narrative and even why the Lessingham framing device is important. As readers of fantasy stories we are all wannabee heroes, like Juss, Brandoch and Goldry, desiring to read about and take part in heroic exploits over and over to the extent that, once the story is over, we wish it reborn. If what happens in the real-world is finite, what happens in stories and the imagination is potentially infinite.

There's also, of course, a less romantic reading of the ending that gives it a harsher, more cynical edge that speaks to humanities insatiable appetite for war and sees these heroes as encompassing both the best and worst aspects of our humanity. If one puts this idea alongside the other, then it muddies the concept of reading heroic narrative in a quite brilliant way.

On another level, this book is just awesome because it has fantastic prose, great scenarios, characters and battles. It's nonstop excitement that doesn't really falter from page one, with the action taken to levels beyond most - later - fantasy works through the power of Eddison's amazingly colourful descriptions that I simply never tire of reading. The book is at its height when Juss and Brandoch head out to Koshtra Pivrarcha and Koshtra Belorn to rescue Juss's brother Goldry, the narrative taking on a dreamlike, magical quality (almost hallucinogenic at one point) whioch really recalled the Arthurian quest for the holy grail to my mind. If nothing else in the story could top this, the continual descriptions of battles or in-court feuding or general sense of wonder, regardless, never ceases.

This is often described as a flawed masterpiece. That may be true, but I love it regardless and it remains one of my favourite books after re-reading it for the first time in 10+ years. The Worm Ouroboros is one of the first modern day ambitious fantasy epics - even though it has an old-school heart - and, beyond being highly influential, it's still one of the most readable and one of the best.

Had to put it down after 150 pages. I was thrilled in the beginning with the langorous prose style and similarities to the Icelandic Sagas. That thrill wore off as Eddison spent more and more time describing physical locations and the characters took on an odd similarity to each other. There was only one engaging character and he was seen only sporadically after the first 50 pages, totally unlike the one Icelandic Saga I read (Egil's Saga) which was stuffed with unique and vibrant personalities.

Despite its troubles, Eddison was able to throw down some amazing paragraphs that really burn the brain with their brilliance. Unfortunately these scenes were surrounded by tedium.

Video review here!
Despite some flaws, The Worm Ouroboros is currently my favourite fantasy novel set in Middle Earth. ER Eddison, like JRR Tolkien 15 years later, pulled from the Scandinavian Eddas to inspire his own high-fantasy world, but each work stands quite on its own in spite of that! Eddison’s world avoids the good-vs-evil tropes of other fantasy novels. While heavily romanticized on the surface, full of characters who are all about bluster, bravado, and martial virtues, there’s a strong underscore of irony that’s surprisingly deconstructive for a medieval throwback fantasy written in the 1920s! I adored the moments when the female characters would openly criticize the vain endeavors of the men, or when Lord Gro would show his existentialist side in open contradiction of the vainly heroic narratives spun by everyone around him.

Speaking of the characters, I’d compare them to the simplistic heroes in ancient tales like Homer’s epic poems. They usually have a single character trait, and the conflicts that come about are caused or solved by that trait. Pride, ego, and a constant jostling for power behind the scenes are recurring themes, along with the idea that war is perpetual—an inexorable aspect of our nature that we can’t—or won’t—progress beyond. Grudge begets grudge, dominant powers rise, fall, and eclipse one another in an ongoing cycle that Eddison compares to the cycle of seasons, the waning and waxing of the moon, and the movement of stars. The struggle for power is a force of nature that we’re forever beholden to, repeating our mistakes as we try to learn from them. All this is encompassed in the sigil of the Worm Ouroboros—a serpent forever eating its own tail. The ending is a subversive culmination of this theme, which pokes fun at the whole fantasy genre up to the point it was written. In that way, The Worm Ouroboros is like a transition point between the fantasy that came before and the fantasy that came afterwards.

The few faults come from a few too many plot threads that went underdeveloped or ended with simplistic resolutions, when things seem to be building towards a more complex payoff. Much of the covert manipulation of events from the side characters was wrapped up a bit too cleanly. There were also some drawn-out sequences of travelling from point A to point B, where pedantic descriptions that were supposed to immerse me would instead make me all too aware that I was staring at words on a page (the mountain-climbing chapter being the main example).

Though the Elizabethan writing style is challenging, it was a really rewarding nut to crack. I’d been warned about the letters and other documents being almost unreadable, since they’re written in late Middle-English using archaic spellings and unfamiliar words, but a bit of patience and re-reading, and I was able to understand just about every line! This novel really expanded my diction and satisfied my appetite for challenging, unfamiliar prose styles. Once I got used to the antiquated way that Worm Ouroboros is written, I was taken aback by how beautiful many passages are. After reading this, I’m less intimidated about trying some earlier English writing, like the Green Knight, or the works of Milton and Shakespeare. If you wanna master old, flowery English for your D&D campaigns or renaissance fairs, this is the book for you!

In the current canon of fantasy, I think it’s a real shame that E.R. Eddison’s unique work, which inspired later writers such as Tolkien, Lewis and Moorcock, has fallen into relative obscurity. Because of that, and since it’s about to turn 100 years old, I think it deserves to be re-evaluated by the many fantasy readers that have come about in part because of this novel and its influence. Overall I'm wavering between 3 and 4 stars, so my rating might fluctuate!

Visionary, if demanding, fantasy classic. Most importantly, the reader must be prepared for the novel's Elizabethan language. If you've read a lot of Shakespeare, you'll probably be sufficiently prepared, but it's a good idea to have a dictionary handy just in case.

It would also help for the reader to be quite familiar with gemstones, since every surface in this novel seems to be either carved from one or inlaid with one or more, and if you can't readily match pictures to names for a lot of these, as I can't, it's a bit annoying. It would also help to have some familiarity with the terms used to describe mountains, because there's a good deal of mountaineering in the book.

In general, the novel makes unusual demands upon the reader's powers of visualization. I almost felt as though I needed to refuel my imagination periodically in order to be able to supply the book the raw materials it needed to evoke its exotic settings. I know this will make one wonder why anyone should bother reading it, but the point is that I felt this effort to be worth it.

Сетингът на романа беше любопитен, героите - достатъчно интересни и "сиви" в хубавия смисъл на понятието, а краят - изключително хитроумен и нестандартен, за да разбера защо влиятелни фентъзи творци (любимият ми Муркок, например) сочат Е. Р. Едисън за свой вдъхновител и учител. Но в противовес на споменатото, не харесах особено литературното изпълнение. Твърде мудно, твърде накъсано от пространни описания на облекла и помещения, твърде много изреждане на имена на личности и географски понятия, без особено отношение към действието, просто в стил "телефонен указател". В тоя ред на мисли една карта на света, приложена в началото на изданието, въобще не би била излишна.

Въведението ми се стори абсолютно ненужно (даже не го и разбрах), а "спойлерите", мяркащи се в описанията към някои от главите яко ме издразниха. Давам пример (условен): "Глава еди-си-коя: За битката на тоя с оня и как тоя/или оня я загуби"... Кое му е интересното да узнаеш изхода на дадено събитие, още преди да си започнал да четеш за него?

Разбира се, вземам предвид стоте и кусур години, минали от написването на текста - време, през което жанрът се е развил експлозивно и критериите ни разбираемо са се променили. Държа да уточня и друго - аз не съм особен почитател нито на Толкин, нито на К. С. Луис, нито на Ле Гуин, чиито суперлативи са изтипосани на кориците на родното издание (без по никакъв начин да отричам значимостта им за фентъзито), та впечатленията ми твърде вероятно не са най-меродавни за техните фенове. В заключение, не съжалявам, че се запознах със "Змията Уроборос", романът безспорно е наваторски за годината на написването му, но към днешна дата не мога да дам по-висока оценка от Среден 3.

(My old review, reposted from blog at https://mikemonaco.wordpress.com/2011...)

Lately I’ve been trying to read as much ‘classic’ fantasy as I can. My main criteria for counting a work as a classic has been (1) the work or author is prominent in Gygax’s Appendix N [http://www.digital-eel.com/blog/ADnD_... or (2) it was written before the resurgence of epic fantasy in the early 1980s (which I, rightly or wrongly, attribute largely to the success of D&D and the renewed interest in the Lord of the Rings due to the film, television specials, and general fantasy revival of the period), or (3) it is mentioned in the wargame Hordes of the Things.

The Worm Ouroboros by E.R. Eddison certainly meets criteria (2), and for some reason I thought I’d seen it listed in BOTH the Dungeon Masters Guide and Hordes Of The Things, but somehow neither mention it. I must have just run into repeated references to it in other sources…otherwise I’m not sure why I held it in such esteem, sight unseen. I suppose I’ve seen it mentioned positively in various blogs and surveys of fantasy literature, but however I first heard of it, I’m glad I did. It is magnificent. I agree with a lot of other readers who comment that the ‘induction,’ which introduces the story as taking place on the planet Mercury, visited by an Earthling after a dream-like journey, is very odd; the more so because the Earthling disappears from the story around chapter two, without ever being of any import to the plot. Odd but not a fatal flaw by any means.

You can download a reading of it here [http://librivox.org/the-worm-ouroboro...], or get a text version here [http://www.sacred-texts.com/ring/two/] (it is out of copyright). I read the Dover reprint, but will have to check out the audio reading some time.

There are reviews and synopses aplenty all around the internet, so there is not much for me to add, except to say I found it much, much better than I expected. I had read some criticism of the goofy names and place-names (apparently Eddison had created the characters and story as a child, and returned to it as an adult to actually write it, but did not have the stomach to change the names), and I was a little put off at first by the extremely antiquated prose, although as I read on, I grew to like it more and more, and savored it. The Elizabethan prose is really beautiful, even when the narration describes death and dismemberment. It is not a book you can tear through in one night, but why would you want to? The story line is interesting, the characters are vivid (although you may want to keep notes to keep some of the names straight), and world draws you in.

The world of the book is called “Mercury” although really it is an alternate Earth; in fact the Greek gods are invoked by the characters and the world is inhabited predominantly by humans though they call themselves Demons, Witches, Ghouls, Imps, Pixies, Foliots, and Goblins. An early chapter mentions that the Demons are horned, but this is never mentioned again and it may be a reference to their helmets.

The story tells of a war between the Demons and Witches, which involves several pitched battles, and an expedition to recover a Demon lord who is magically kidnapped to a surreal ‘underworld’ (which is actually atop a mountain). His brother eventually reaches the mountain-prison, after battling a manticore and taming a hippogriff. Part of his journey is obstructed by various hellish visions, including one of his trapped brother:

Darker grew the mist, and heavier the brooding dread which seemed elemental of the airs about that mountain. Pausing well nigh exhausted on a small stance of snow Juss beheld the appearance of a man armed who rolled prostrate in the way, tearing with his nails at the hard rock and frozen snow, and the snow was all one gore of blood beneath the man; and the man besought him in a stifled voice to go no further but raise him up and bring him down the mountain. And when Juss, after an instant’s doubt betwixt pity and his resolve, would have passed by, the man cried and said, “Hold, for I am thy very brother thou seekest, albeit the King hath by his art framed me to another likeness, hoping so to delude thee. For thy love sake be not deluded!” Now the voice was like to the voice of his brother Goldry, howbeit weak.

But the Lord Juss bethought him again of the words of Sophonisba the Queen, that he should see his brother in his own shape and nought else must he trust; and he thought, “It is an illusion, this also.” So he said, “If that thou be truly my dear brother, take thy shape.” But the man cried as with the voice of the Lord Goldry Bluszco, “I may not, till that I be brought down from the mountain. Bring me down, or my curse be upon thee for ever.”

The Lord Juss was torn with pity and doubt and wonder, to hear that voice again of his dear brother so beseeching him. Yet he answered and said, “Brother, if that it be thou indeed, then bide till I have won to this mountain top and the citadel of brass which in a dream I saw, that I may know truly thou art not there, but here. Then will I turn again and succour thee. But until I see thee in thine own shape I will mistrust all. For hither I came from the ends of the earth to deliver thee, and I will set my good on no doubtful cast, having spent so much and put so much in danger for thy dear sake.”

So with a heavy heart he set hand again to those black rocks, iced and slippery to the touch. Therewith up rose an eldritch cry, “Rejoice, for this earth-born is mad! Rejoice, for that was not perfect friend, that relinquished his brother at his need!” But Juss climbed on, and by and by looking back beheld how in that seeming man’s place writhed a grisful serpent. And he was glad, so much as gladness might be in that mountain of affliction and despair.

Eddison clearly has read his Arthurian romances, Norse sagas, and Greek myths, and the heroes of his story tend to be much more like Nietzschean ‘blond beasts’ than the sort of characters that populate modern fantasy novels. In fact there is another scene on the mountain where Lord Juss is ‘tempted’ by a vision of despair at the ‘meaninglessness’ of his struggle, but he eventually overcomes it by sheer force of will. I understand Tolkien disliked this work’s ‘morality’ (and terrible names) while praising the world-invention and writing. Like Tolkien and many other readers, I found Lord Gro — the Goblin traitor — to be the most likeable character, and probably this is because he is the one character least at home in the book’s world.

I wish I’d found this map [http://www.sacred-texts.com/ring/two/...] and printed it out while I was reading this book, but as usual I did most of my research after finishing it.

One of the most interesting aspects of the invented world to me is the number of proverbs and sayings Eddison has his characters recite. I think that on my next reading* I might even try to extract all the “Mercurial proverbs” into a future post. They are very colorful and would help bring alive an alien, archaic world for a RPG. I am guessing that some or most are actually drawn from literature, just as the songs and poems in the story are (Eddison even provides a list of sources for these in an appendix, as well as a chronology, including many ‘off-screen’ events).

Another clever stylistic device is the use of even more archaic English when letters or books are read. Here is an example from a letter:

"Unto the right high mighti and doubtid Prynsace the Quen of Implande, one that was your Servaunt but now beinge both a Traitor and a manifiald parjured Traitor, which Heaven above doth abhorre, the erth below detest, the sun moone and starres be eschamed of, and all Creatures doo curse and ajudge unworthy of breth and life, do wish onelie to die your Penytent. In hevye sorrowe doo send you these advisoes which I requyre your Mageste in umblest manner to pondur wel, seeinge ells your manyfest Overthrowe and Rwyn att hand. And albeit in Carcee you reste in securitie, it is serten you are there as saife as he that hingeth by the Leves of a Tree in the end of Autumpne when as the Leves begin to fall. For in this late Battaile in Mellicafhaz Sea hath the whole powre of Wychlande on the sea been beat downe and ruwyned, and the highe Admirall of our whole Navie loste and ded and the names of the great men of accownte that were slayen at the battaile I may not numbre nor the common sorte much lesse by reaisoun that the more part were dround in the sea which came not to Syght. But of Daemounlande not ij schips companies were lossit, but with great puissaunce they doo buske them for Carsee. Havinge with them this Gowldri Bleusco, strangely reskewed from his preassoun-house beyond the toombe, and a great Armey of the moste strangg and fell folke that ever I saw or herd speke of. Such is the Die of Warre."

Even some of Eddison’s characters stumble over written documents, and while it does add another level of difficulty to an already difficult book, it certainly increases the feeling that you are observing a real, if strange, world.

I was tempted to look for a ‘meaning’ to the story, despite Eddison’s straightforward rejection of such in his dedication:

It is neither allegory nor fable but a Story to be read for its own sake.

This reminded me immediately of Tolkien’s statement that LotR is not an allegory either, not that anyone believes him. Taking Eddison at his word, The worm Ouroboros is a great story, capturing a strange but believable world inhabited by the kinds of heroes we find in Viking or Celtic legend: a world at war, and with heroes who live for war. It is not surprising that Tolkien would find the unabashedly pagan heroes and their love of battle distasteful, but taken as a story, and not a morality play, there is much to enjoy in the doings and sayings of these barbaric nobles.
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*Yes, this ranks with The well of the unicorn, Hrolf Kraki’s Saga, and Lord of the rings as something I’ll be re-reading.