Darkling Child: Into the Archive

Merlin (Copyright 1978; First American Edition 1979 Putnam), by Robert Nye.

I first got this book in a Bantam paperback edition back in 1981, off the spinner-rack at a Pic’n’Pac near the town college. That it was about Merlin intrigued me, of course, but the fact that the cover advertised it as “A Very Adult Fantasy” gave me a moment’s pause. Still, I was graduating high school that year, so I figured it was time to put my big boy pants on. After all, it couldn’t be straight-out pornography.

Nor was it. The most that could be said about it was that was bawdy, not erotic: almost in the same fashion as Rabelais or Chaucer, but with a comedic injection contrasting Medieval style and story with dirty jokes and over the top ‘adult’ situations. The story of Merlin, born a failed Antichrist trying to thwart his father the devil’s plans, always finds his efforts undermined by human weakness, in the end especially his own. Merely human endeavor, no matter how wise, cannot save mankind while it stands poised on the banana peel of doom.

Well, I went on to college and found Falstaff (a longer and more engaging work), and followed his books until his crowning achievement, The Late Mr. Shakespeare (1998), the last, I think, of his ‘Thomas Urquhart’- style novels. He died in 2016. I have been trying to get a hardback copy of Merlin for years, and finally found one at a reasonably low price. While I do not consider Nye’s novels all undisputable masterpieces (his main fame was as a poet), I do find them engaging entertainments that offer their own special appeal that one can find nowhere else, a blend of philosophy and scatology. There are a couple of his novels, dealing with Gilles de Rais and Lord Byron, that I would like to try. 

Items from the Wish List: Robert Nye

Merlin By Robert Nye

In this rollicking, bawdy extension of the Arthurian legend, Merlin refuses to act out his role as an antichrist and engages, instead, in mischievous, frequently outrageous tricks involving Arthur and his knights. – Amazon.

The Life and Death of My Lord, Gilles de Rais by Robert Nye

A recreation of the Bluebeard story which follows a French Army captain, executed in Brittany in 1440. The list of his crimes include witchcraft, heresy, sacrilege, sorcery, the evocations of demons and the practice of unnatural crime against children, ending with their murder for his delight. – Amazon.

The Memoirs of Lord Byron: A novel by Robert Nye

Robert Nye supplies answers to the questions of the Byron "mystery". Why were his memoirs were torn up? Could they have contained revelations of his incestuous love for his sister, or details of unnatural sexual practices? The book undoubtedly shocked the few who were privileged to read it. – Amazon.

Robert Nye (and Thomas Berger, for Company)

Falstaff, by Robert Nye.

I read this in the college library, being rather drawn in by both Shakespeare and biographies of imaginary people and ‘historical’ novels. I read it, and was amused by its Rabelaisian, Thomas Urquhart-like prose style (unrecognized as such by me at the time) and its reconstruction of an age. Falstaff has always been one of those figures that fascinate me, from seeing him on beer signs as a child up to studying Shakespeare in college to watching Orson Welles’s portrayal on film. He is ambiguous, sensible, cowardly, outrageous, humane but all-too-human, a celebrator of gusto who sighs and rebels against the dying of the light, a braggart and a mocking mirror held up to pretentious ideals. In this story the dying Falstaff has holed himself up in his ‘castle’ for a hundred days, determined to tell his story as taken down by several secretaries, including his stepson Scroop, who is determined to ‘unwrite’ the elderly knight by putting down what he thinks he knows to be the provable facts instead of Falstaff’s boasting tales. Somewhere between them the truth lies, but even when the fat knight finally dies the spirit of what the man truly was remains hauntingly evasive and somehow tauntingly immortal, bidding the puzzled Scrope (and the reader) “Remember me.” I remember I was so naively impressed when I finished reading it that I wrote “What is Truth?” in fancy letters on the inside cover of the library copy. This Half-Price Books copy’s jacket is in pretty poor shape, but I can’t repair it or quite do without it just yet.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Fictional Biography. Novel. Hardback.

Faust, by Robert Nye.

Falstaff, Merlin, and Faust make up a kind of trilogy in Nye’s work. “ “Hey, Faust". . . . So begins Nye's slangy, shaggy, pseudo-Rabelaisian reworking of the Faust legend-but the demythifying raunchiness that worked fairly well for Falstaff (1976) and Merlin (1979) mostly falls flat in this macabre, pornographic description of Faust's last 40 days (before the Devil comes to claim his soul). . . as told by ""Kit"" Wagner, Faust's servant/son/executioner. Forget the noble archetype: Nye's Faust is an unwashed 1540 stumblebum with a permanent boil on his nose and an intermittent yen for sodomitical rape; he's a seedy has-been trying to renew his 24-year contract with the Devil by murdering Pope Paul III (with a poisoned communion wafer). And, when not figuring out how to put off the hellfire, Faust and Kit are hanging around the castle with kinky women, indulging in an irritatingly anachronistic stream of hip talk (""We had this long hassle about Predestination""), or copulating with a necromantic harem-""a row of amazing young chicks"" who are mysteriously swept away, one after another, by the infernal powers. There are also sophomoric puns, irrelevant bits of stray erudition, jokes about Luther and Calvin, and a guest appearance by the Virgin Mary. There's no doubt that Nye is, on his own terms, a skillful writer, and he is always interested in more than mere scatalogical horseplay. But this time his tireless jazziness becomes tiresome, he degrades the tragic vision of the Faust originals without putting anything in their place, and-like a gifted raconteur telling a long, tasteless joke-he starts on a false note and stays there throughout.” – Kirkus Review. And that, amazingly, sums my experience up to a tee. I ordered this book years later when it became clear I wasn’t going to find it anywhere else, and it didn’t quite live up to my admittedly high hopes raised by his other books. Maybe I just missed the right time to read it.

Ranking: Keeper.

File Code: Novel. Fantasy. Hardback.

Mrs. Shakespeare: The Complete Works, by Robert Nye.

“In a memoir written seven years following her famed husband's death, Anne Hathaway recalls her life with William Shakespeare, especially a remarkable week spent in London, in April 1594, in his lodgings over a fishmonger's shop.” – Amazon.  Almost a prequel or short trial run before his more monumental “The Late Mr. Shakespeare”, it’s a look at Anne Hathaway and at her enigmatic role in the life of the playwright, their disparate ages, their long separations, and the perplexing ‘second-best bed’ left to her in his will. It particularly considers what marriage to a none-too-faithful artist can entail, especially if complicated both by social convention and actual love. I can’t say I’m loving the cover of this Penguin edition of a graffitied Shakespeare with make-up and gold squiggles for hair; it gives an entirely wrong impression.

Ranking: Keeper.

File Code: Novel. Historical/Biographical. Softcover.

The Late Mr. Shakespeare, by Robert Nye.

“From the pen of the writer whom Peter Ackroyd called "one of our best living novelists" comes a work that is rich, strange, and wonderful. Welcomed in Shakespeare’s own land as the most original, exciting, and provocative novel about the playwright since Anthony Burgess’s classic Nothing Like the Sun, Robert Nye’s The Late Mr. Shakespeare is a literary event. Our guide to the life of the Bard is an actor by the name of Robert Reynolds, known also as Pickleherring, who asserts that, as a boy, he was not only an original member of Shakespeare’s acting troupe, but also played the greatest female roles, from Cleopatra through Portia. In an attic above a brothel in restoration England—a half century after Shakespeare had departed the stage—Pickleherring, now an ancient man, sits down to write the full story of his former friend, mentor, and master. Ancient he may be, but fond, faithful Pickleherring has forgotten not one jot, and using sources both firsthand and far-fetched, he means to set the record straight. Gentle readers will learn much that will open their eyes. One by one, chapter by chapter, Pickleherring teases out all the theories that have been embroidered around Shakespeare over the centuries: Did he really write his own plays? Who was the Dark Lady of the sonnets? Did Shakespeare die a Catholic? What did he do during his so-called lost years before he went to London to write plays? What were the last words Shakespeare uttered on his deathbed? Was Shakespeare ever in love? Pickleherring turns speculation and fact into stories, each bringing us inexorably closer to Shakespeare the man—complex, contradictory, breathing, vibrant. Robert Nye has given us an outrageously bawdy, language-loving, and edifying romp through the life and times of the greatest writer who ever lived. The Late Mr. Shakespeare proves how alive he was.” – Amazon. Ending with the Great Fire that immolates Pickleherring, his manuscript, and his memory-boxes, it is a fitting final work and farewell novel from Nye.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Novel. Historical/Biographical. Hardback.

Arthur Rex: A Legendary Novel, by Thomas Berger.

Berger, who was probably most famous for his book “Little Big Man” (which got made into the Dustin Hoffman movie) was one of the few authors I’ve actually seen in the flesh when he came to talk at SWTSU. I recall him as a dumpy little grinning man with a bald head and circles around his eyes, rather like Uncle Fester. I had already read “Arthur Rex” in the college library and knew what a great book it was but couldn’t think of anything to ask him about it, so never made any sort of personal contact. “The author emphasizes the glory and idealism of Arthur's court at Camelot, but the ultimate futility of any attempt to ignore human nature and sinfulness. The book is written in an archaic style appropriate to the subject, but with a witty and engaging tone. It is essentially respectful of the Arthurian tales while putting a more modern, even somewhat rueful imprint on them. For instance, the wizard Merlin makes occasional anachronistic references to such things as aircraft, viruses and nuclear power, but always couched in period-appropriate terms. Berger gives considerable attention to the adulterous relationships between Guinevere and Sir Lancelot, and Tristan and Isolde, and even offers a somewhat sympathetic portrait of the villainous Mordred. The Lady of the Lake is a prominent character.” – Wikipedia. A meditation on the nature of heroes and legends, it ends with the great line: "King Arthur, who was never historical, but everything he did was true". I used to have a paperback before I found this copy. The cover is by Jean-Leon Huens.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Novel. Legend. Hardback.

Old Summer Reads

The Green Knight, by Vera Chapman.

“Vera Chapman, also known within the Tolkien Society as Belladonna Took, was a British author and founder of the Tolkien Society in the United Kingdom, and also wrote a number of pseudo-historical and Arthurian books. Chapman wrote three fantasy novels based on Arthurian legend: The Green Knight (1975),King Arthur's Daughter (1976), and The King's Damosel (1976).” – Wikipedia. I bought The Green Knight for the Hildebrandt cover (I got the other two some years later; they also had Hildebrandt covers, but I sold them eventually), and it influenced some of my first ever drawings. Read the book, too, but wasn’t very impressed. They based that animated movie “Quest for Camelot” on “The King’s Damosel”. Go figure.

Ranking: Keeper.

File Code: Fantasy. Novel. Paperback.

The Face in the Frost, by John Bellairs.

“Many years ago (evidence suggests it was 1979 or so) there came the first time I bought books with my own money. Before then I had to beg Mom long and hard. But I had made $10 doing yard work, and I was ready to step out on my own booking adventures. There was no local bookstore, only the racks in the grocery store, drugstore, and convenience stores. I chose to go to Gibson's, our small local department store, and while Mom combed the clothes aisles, I browsed the racks, looking for fantasy in the Tolkienian vein. With my bill and some loose change I was just able to buy three paperback books (wondrous times!), and I chose The Source of Magic by Piers Anthony (a dragon on the cover), The Illearth War by Stephen R. Donaldson (two cool wizardy guys on the front, and a comparison to JRRT), and The Face in the Frost, by John Bellairs (good things by Lin Carter and Ursula K. LeGuin quoted, and again a cool wizardy guy). Now thirty years later I have given up on Anthony after following the Xanth series for twenty or so sequels, wait patiently for Donaldson to grind out the ninth (and last) book of the Thomas Covenant series, and mourn that there is no more genuine Bellairs forthcoming, ever. Thirty years on I am grateful that my instinct and luck led me to buy that first Bellairs.” – Power of Babel. The Carl Lundgren cover is sweet, and it has illustrations by Marilyn Fitschen inside. I have since bought a newer copy, and its included in the hardback “Magic Mirrors”. Used to have a silly little sticker of a dragon on it.

Ranking: Keeper and Essential

File Code: Fantasy. Novel. Paperback.

The Abominations of Yondo, by Clark Ashton Smith.

Macabre tales by Lovecraft’s old pal. This secondhand edition is from 1974. Never read it.

Ranking: Dispensable.

File Code: Horror. Anthology. Paperback.

Incubus, by Ray Russell.

A trashy supernatural novel later made into a trashy supernatural movie. What can I say, it was the 70’s and we were young. I remember I transcribed some of its ‘spells’ into my red spiral notebook ‘grimoire’. I must have thrown that away, after taking any drawings out.

Ranking: Nostalgic Keeper.

File Code: Horror. Novel. Paperback.

Sherlock Holmes vs. Dracula; Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Holmes, “By John H. Watson, M.D.” as Edited by Loren D. Estleman.

Both Penguin books. You’d think a match-up between Holmes and Dracula couldn’t fail, right? But it’s basically a retelling of Stoker’s book with Holmes jammed into the lacunae and offstage interstices. Couldn’t bring myself to read the Hyde book after the first few pages.

Ranking: Dispensable.

File Code: Horror. Detection. Pastiche. Novels. Paperbacks.

Interview with the Vampire, by Anne Rice.

Mike bought this at Pic-n-Pac, the first of what became the Vampire Chronicles. I had tons of Anne Rice once upon a time, but then I sold them all; this is the only one I have left. I got tired of her cult and her personal vacillations. Basically, this is vampire erotica and meditations on mortality (sex and death), that old teen stew.

Ranking: Keeper.

File Code: Horror. Novel. Paperback.

Merlin, by Robert Nye.

The cover says, “A Very Adult Fantasy.” A cross between Arthurian lore, Rabelaisian scholarship, medieval demonology, and a dirty joke, it is withal a heady and amusing brew. I read this book before I read “Falstaff” in college. I’ll always give a book about Merlin a try.

Ranking: Keeper.

File Code: Fantasy. Novel. Paperback.

The Book of the Dun Cow, by Walter Wangerin, Jr.

Another book from Eckerd’s and the high school period. It has been compared to a cross between “Animal Farm, Watership Down, and The Lord of the Rings”.  A religious fable that deals with a sort of paradise, a fall, a flood, a struggle with evil, and ends with a redemption, and all told with … chickens. And other animals. Long after reading, the characters of John Wesley Weasel and Mundo Cani Dog still resonate. Told in an oddly poetic, simple, incantatory style. It has a sequel, “The Book of Sorrows” that I bought and found disappointing, and then an inevitable 3^rd book, “Peace at the Last”, that I only just found out existed. Still, this initial book can stand on its own and is great; I’ve read it many times.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Fantasy. Novel. Paperback.

She, by H. Rider Haggard.

A Del Rey fantasy book. I tried to collect the other three in this series, but when I found the two that I could get were tedious, I sold them and stuck with the original classic. Besides being a good read, it is culturally significant within the fantasy genre, as his works were read and enjoyed by C. S. Lewis, and even Tolkien was able to draw a few gems from Haggard’s mines and polish them up.

Ranking: Keeper.

File Code: Adventure. Novel. Paperback.

That's Absurd

Beowulf, by Robert Nye An adaptation and interpretation of the Beowulf story for younger readers. I was first exposed to this book (unknowingly) in my senior year when Mrs. Richardson read us a bit of it for an assignment (without mentioning the author) about re-writing a classic in our own words. Didn’t know it was Robert Nye, whose adult books I discovered in college. Got this edition and recognized it in the first few pages and made the connection. A cover by Jean Leon Huens. Ranking: Keeper. File Code: Children’s Novel. Paperback.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, by Tom Stoppard. Read this play in my senior year of SHS and felt sophisticated and world-weary; bought a copy from one of the last book sales I ever went to in high school. A highly amusing ‘metafiction’ on two minor characters from “Hamlet” and their existential situation as they try to figure out their role given only the clues they witness when they’re ‘on’ in Shakespeare’s play. Made into a rather unsatisfactory movie. Ranking: Keeper. File Code: Drama. Paperback.

Welcome to the Monkey House, by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. A collection of his early short stories. I remember reading one, “Harrison Bergeron”, in middle school, and being impressed. That sparked a vague interest, and with enough gossip that interest developed until I got a few of his books for a quarter each at a garage sale. This was one of them. I’ve never agreed with his limited philosophy, but he always has something interesting to say, a limpid prose style, and viewpoint that seems valid enough to argue with. Ranking: Keeper. File Code: Short Stories. Anthology. Paperback.

Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. A man gets ‘shaken loose in time’, and seems to experience the past, the present, and the future all at once, including a visit to some aliens who all see time this way, which leads him to a fatalistic point of view and ends in his assassination. Vonnegut’s opinion is that everything, including the human race, is a machine that has no freedom, but must proceed to an inevitable end. I think this is analyzing life using a philosophy, rather than developing a philosophy from observing life. Experience shows me that free will does exist, even if desired results are not guaranteed. Still, as I say, his arguments do arise to the dignity of debate. Ranking: Keeper. File Code: Science Fiction. Paperback.

Breakfast of Champions, by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. Another classic among hipster nihilists, attacking the materialistic values of the post-war prosperity and suggesting that humans are machines with pre-determined functions. Vonnegut is the bitter jester that shakes up facile preconceptions but offers no satisfying answers, merely shrugging and stating, “And so it goes.” It’s an entertainingly ironic farce, and how does it end? With an instance of completely human yearning. Ranking: Keeper. File Code: Science Fiction. Paperback.