Beyond Life, Gallantry, Figures of Earth, The Silver
Stallion, Domnei/The Music from Beyond the Moon, Chivalry, Jurgen, The Line of
Love, The High Place, Something About Eve, The Certain Hour, The Cords of
Vanity, From the Hidden Way/The Jewel Merchants, The Rivet in Grandfather’s
Neck, The Eagle’s Shadow, The Cream of the Jest/The Lineage of Lichfield,
Straws and Prayerbooks, Townsend of Lichfield, (The Storisende Edition of ‘The
Biography of Manuel’) by James Branch Cabell.
“Over the years I
developed a deepening interest in Cabell, picking up the odd volume here and
there from used book stores, but always yearning for the complete Biography Of
Manuel, as Cabell came to call the series of books linked by the lives of
Manuel (the Count of Poictesme) and his heirs. These were gathered and
published in a uniform binding called the Storisende Edition, consisting of
eighteen volumes, and released between 1927 and 1930 in limited numbers. This
year I finally got an incomplete set (it lacked Beyond Life and Gallantry)
for about $200 (a complete set was going for about $500). These dark gray-green
tomes now sit proudly on my shelves. Each is signed in pencil by James Branch
Cabell, in small, neat letters. Some of these books have never been cut, so my
eyes are the first in over eighty years to read them.” To complete the set, “I
got Gallantry first. It is an ex-library copy, and as such
carries the usual marks as well as Cabell's name in white on the spine. It is
slightly faded and has a bit of a torn page where the bar-code was apparently
removed but is otherwise in good shape. Beyond Life was next,
and it too carried the marks of use as small speckles of white paint on the
spine and light pencil notations on the inside. I hardly mind as these show the
books were actually used and appreciated; some of the volumes in my incomplete
edition had not even been cut. And of course, both books have the neat pencil
autographs of James Branch Cabell himself, attesting to its brief but personal
contact with their author.” “As I placed the final (and, paradoxically, the
first) volume on the shelf with its fellows, I half-expected a dusty,
sepia-toned ghost to appear, smelling of cigarette smoke and ink, and reward me
with an ironic glance at my achievement. For I had at long last attained the
consummation of my dream to own a complete (if mismatched) set of the
Storisende Edition of The Works of James Branch Cabell.” – Power of
Babel.
Ranking: Essential.
File Code: Novel. Collection. Hardbacks.
The Way of Ecben, by James Branch Cabell
Not a ‘Manuel’ book but linked with them by theme.
‘Decorated’ by stray illustrations by Frank C. Pape from other Cabell books. A
limited 1929 edition signed by Cabell, except for its cover it is in conformity
with the Storisende Edition. Prefaced by a sonnet using all the words in the
titles of the ‘Biography’, it is something of an afterword to, meditation on,
and epitome of Cabell’s previous literary endeavors. I used to have a lesser
but still quite old ‘Kalki’ edition, bought at Yesterday’s Warehouse, but Nippy
chewed off the spine cover of that one.
Ranking: Essential.
File Code: ‘Novel’. ‘Fantasy’ (or Romance, in the old
meaning). Hardback.
Figures of Earth, by James Branch Cabell, Illustrated by
Frank C. Pape.
A Comedy of Appearances. Although I
have the Storisende Edition of this book, I also had to get this 1925 edition,
for the complete glory of the Pape illustrations. I was introduced to them in
somewhat diminished form in the Del Rey Adult Fantasy books, and there they
lacked some of the magnificent full-page illustrations. Manuel has the obligation of making a
fine figure of himself and interprets this to mean sculpting a statue. As he
travels through the world with the high purpose “to see the ends of the Earth
and to judge them”, he finds that even the finest people have feet of clay. My
favorite character he meets is the magician Miramon Lluagor, “lord of the nine
kinds of sleep and prince of the seven madnesses”, who has all the
artistic temperament of any creative genius. After finding success in all that
the world expects of him, he finds his life must begin again in quest of his
first and still unfulfilled goals.
Ranking: Essential.
File Code: Fantasy. Novel. Hardback.
The Silver Stallion, by James Branch Cabell.
A Comedy of Redemption. Although I
have the Storisende Edition of this book, I also had to get this 1928 edition,
for the complete glory of the Pape illustrations. I was introduced to them in somewhat diminished form in the Del Rey
Adult Fantasy books, and there lacking the magnificent full-page illustrations. After Dom Manuel’s disappearance out
of Poictesme, the remaining lords of the Silver Stallion (an order of chivalry
rather like the Round Table) must disband and seek out their separate fates.
This book was the first Cabell I ever read (in the Del Rey edition). The best
section is of course Miramon Lluagor’s attempt to circumvent his destiny by the
use of three wishes which almost ends in the destruction of the universe. The
adventures of grumbling old Coth, the fate of Guivric the Sage, what happens to
the pedantic Kerin when he ‘falls’ down a well, and the surprising secret about
the domestic arrangements and religious position of Ninzian are very close
seconds. This book contains the Map of Poictesme.
Ranking: Essential.
File Code: Fantasy. Novel. Hardback.
Domnei: A Comedy of Woman-Worship, by James Branch Cabell.
Illustrated by Frank C. Pape.
Although I have the Storisende Edition of this book, I also
had to get this 1930 edition, for the complete glory of the Pape illustrations.
The Del Rey Adult Fantasy edition did not have them at all. It is the story of
the contest between Perion de la Foret and Demetrios (pagan son of Miramon
Lluagor) for Melicent, one of the daughters of Dom Manuel. Although first
published as a straight-out ’Romance’ (old use of the term), it was here
revised and added to and illustrated to provide links and likenesses to the
more satirical and ‘saucy’ books in the series. The modifications to the
fierce, barbaric nature of Demetrios by the simple presence and character of
Melicent help define and illustrate the effect of the old chivalric code had on
the older world; Perion himself, before meeting Melicent a simple rogue, is
ennobled by that ideal in her service. I can’t say that Cabell thoroughly
approves of the paradigm (it seems a little crazy to him), but he gives that
divine madness the fairest arguments and examples that he can.
Ranking: Essential.
File Code: Fantasy. Novel. Hardback.
The High Place, by James Branch Cabell. Illustrated by Frank
C. Pape.
A Comedy of Disenchantment. Although
I have the Storisende Edition of this book, I also had to get this 1923
edition, for the complete glory of the Pape illustrations. I was introduced to
them in somewhat diminished form in the Del Rey Adult Fantasy books, and there
lacking the magnificent full-page illustrations. Deals with Florian, the French
Regency era heir to Jurgen and Manuel, makes a deal with Janicot, ‘a brown man
with queer feet’, to win his childhood ideal, Melior, an enchanted princess
from a lost castle that has been sleeping since the old time of Count Manuel.
Unfortunately for Florian, this also awakens his mistakenly canonized ‘patron
saint’ Hoprig, who takes his new religious duties to his ward very seriously
indeed, and with less than heavenly restraint. When Florian, who is something
of a wastrel and a Bluebeard, tries to remove his less-than-ideal wife,
heavenly and hellish powers are called to battle. It ends with Florian being
sent back to his childhood where he wakes up from what seems a dream. He has
his whole life to live again – and he does all the wicked things he ever did,
except this time he doesn’t awaken the princess. This book has the
Collyn-in-the-Pot, which element has inspired a piece of my projected Bob Bellamy
sequel.
Ranking: Essential.
File Code: Fantasy. Novel. Hardback.
Something About Eve, by James Branch Cabell. Illustrated by
Frank C. Pape.
A Comedy of Fig Leaves.
Although I have the Storisende Edition of this
book, I also had to get this 1929 edition, for the complete glory of the Pape
illustrations. I was introduced to them in somewhat diminished form in the Del
Rey Adult Fantasy books, and there lacking the magnificent full-page
illustrations. Brings the life of Manuel up to the South in the 1800’s,
where Gerald Musgrave puts off a career of writing and an affair with his
cousin Evelyn and leaves a Sylan (who wants a physical body) in his place,
while he goes in quest of the glories of fabled Antan. “Something About Eve, an
entry in the Poictesme series, "shows its non-hero feebly intending to
gain promised glory awaiting in the land of 'Antan' but forever delayed on
Mispec Moor (anagram: 'Compromise'), wearing literal rose-colored spectacles
and beguiled by the woman Maya.” – The Encyclopedia of Fantasy. Praised by
Robert E. Howard, it has its points, but is a weaker entry in the series.
Missing the Frontispiece illustration, I fear.
Ranking: Essential.
File Code: Fantasy. Novel. Hardback.
The Cream of the Jest, by James Branch Cabell. Illustrated by
Frank C. Pape.
A Comedy of Evasions. Although I have the Storisende Edition
of this book, I also had to get this 1927 edition, for the complete glory of
the Pape illustrations. I was introduced to them in somewhat diminished form in
the Del Rey Adult Fantasy books, and there lacking the magnificent full-page
illustrations. Felix Kennaston has a secret. While by day he is a rather drab
and bourgeois writer of novels, by night, with the aid of what appears to be
the half of a broken talisman, he is the demiurgic Horvendile, in quest
throughout history for the divine and unattainable Ettarre. The book is a
meditation, as it were, on the double life of an author, as a creator and as a
human being, and the elusive muse that he chases forever vainly. Can this quest
be reconciled with ordinary life in the world? The answer he finds is evasively
ambiguous. The Del Rey version had only the map and the Sigil of Scoteia as
illustrations, so all the pictures here were eye-openers. At first I found this
book not quite as fantastic as the others, but it has grown on me.
Ranking: Essential.
File Code: Fantasy. Novel. Hardback.
Jurgen, by James Branch Cabell. Illustrations by Frank C.
Pape.
A Comedy of Justice. Now here is where I should have another
McBride edition, with its black cover and darkly guilded lettering, but no. I
couldn’t at the time find a copy within my means, and then I had no more means
whatsoever. What I do have is this Dover edition that has all the Pape
illustrations, and at least for now I have to be content with that. After all,
it has all the contents if not the body of that volume, so should I not be
content? Even so. Given a chance I will get that edition in a heartbeat. Aging
pawnbroker Jurgen, one-time poet and rascal, is given his youth back for a year
to follow his dreams and desires. Despite his best efforts he finds that an old
mind in a young body won’t let him enjoy his escapades as whole-heartedly as he
might; also he is plagued by a recording shadow that follows him everywhere –
except into the dark, where there are no shadows. “Cabell was propelled into
the limelight by having charges of obscenity levelled against his ninth
novel, Jurgen. The notoriety that resulted gave an enormous boost
to his sales, not only for Jurgen, but for all previous and
subsequent books, and Cabell had to resign himself to being known as
"the author of Jurgen." Although the court finally
decided that the passages were too literary and ambiguous to be deemed
indecent, the notoriety persisted. Cabell says he found
himself importuned (by fans who could not distinguish between an
author's work and his life) by young men with requests to be taught the Black
Arts, and by young ladies with what he called "surprising
suggestions." “English artist Frank Cheyne Pape (there
should be an accent over that final 'e': and it's pronounced paw-PAY). Pape had
previously done more romantic pictures for collections of fairy tales and the
like, but after the witty and accomplished work he did
for Cabell's books he was tapped to do similar drawings for authors
like Suetonius and Anatole France and Rabelais, writers who were deemed at the
time to be ribald or dangerous, but whose books nowadays would hardly quicken a
pulse. Pape, who was born in 1878, did little work after the Forties, and
died in 1972.” – Power of Babel.
Ranking: Essential.
File Code: Fantasy. Novel. Softcover.
Preface to the Past, by James Branch Cabell.
Something of a novelty. The Kalki Editions of ‘The Life of
Manuel’ books were printed without the special prefaces supplied in the
Storisende Edition, but they are here all gathered in one Kalki book. I used to
have 2 or 3 other Kalkis; now this oddity is the only one.
Ranking: Keeper.
File Code: Essays. Collected. Hardback.
James Branch Cabell and Richmond-in-Virginia, by Edgar
MacDonald.
“In his prime, Vanity Fair nominated James
Branch Cabell for "Immortality" on its pages reserved for acclaiming
the most select of notable achievers. Favored by the intelligentsia, Cabell was
the author of a series of fabulous, well-told fictions that in the 1920s made
him a household literary name. Among his many acclaimed books published by 1930
are Jurgen, The Lineage of Lichfield, The
Silver Stallion, Something About Eve, The White Robe,
and The Works of James Branch Cabell in eighteen volumes. By
the time of his death in 1958 the list of his works had become prodigiously
long, but he had been in eclipse for almost three decades. This definitive
biography serves to restore to Cabell the recognition he deserves. Here he is
portrayed as a jesting critic of southern chivalry, an ambivalent artist whose
feelings for Richmond required a lifetime to reconcile. He was quintessentially
a Virginian. His native Richmond shaped him, and its social milieu indelibly
marked him. He matured as a writer in the climate of the postbellum South and
excelled in subjecting the rigid graces of "Richmond-in-Virginia" to
satire and burlesque. Like his fellow Virginian Ellen Glasgow, he had mixed
emotions about home. Not to love Virginia was an act of betrayal, yet to
condone its stultifying, Old South idealism was to betray oneself. With the
deterioration of Richmond's Edwardian values in the 1920s Cabell emerged as a
major literary figure, hailed as an iconoclast and debunker of myths, but by
the 1930s his mannered, self-conscious style was out of fashion. Cabell was
dogged by scandal. There was the question of homosexuality. It was charged that
he murdered the man reputed to be his mother's lover. After a notorious New
York trial, his most notable book Jurgen was suppressed for
violating anti-obscenity laws. In this inclusive examination of Cabell's life
and milieu, a fascinating literary figure is rescued from the literary shadows
and acknowledged as a writer of major worth in the canon of American
literature.” -from the cover. The part I particularly liked was where for a
while he lived a life as a recluse in his mother’s house and had no idea that
people thought that HE had killed his mother’s lover.
Ranking: Essential.
File Code: Biography. Literary. Hardback.
No comments:
Post a Comment