My captor now lifted the wire noose until I stood. I was conscious, as I have been on several similar occasions, that we were in some sense playing a game. We were pretending that I was totally in his power, when in fact I might have refused to rise until he had either strangled me or called over some of his comrades to carry me. I could have done several other things as well – seized the wire and tried to wrest it from him, struck him in the face. I might have escaped, been killed, been rendered unconscious, or plunged into agony; but I could not actually be forced to do as I did.

At least I knew it was a game, and I smiled as he sheathed Terminus Est and led me to where Jonas stood.

Jonas said, “We’ve done no harm. Return my friend’s sword and give us back our animals, and we will go.”

There was no reply. In silence the two praetorians (four fluthering sparrows, it seemed) caught our destriers and led them away. How like us those animals were, walking patiently they knew not where, their massive heads following thin strips of leather. Nine-tenths of life, so it seems to me, consists of these surrenders.

- Gene Wolfe, The Claw of the Conciliator

As if some invisible hand had spread a curtain over us, the shadows of the trees fell upon the howdah. The glitter of billions of shards of glass was left behind with the staring of the dead eyes, and we entered into the coolness and green shade of the high forest. Among those mighty trunks even the baluchither, though he stood three times the height of a man, seemed no more than a little, scurrying beast [..]

And it came to me that these trees had been hardly smaller when I was yet unborn, and had stood as they stood now when I was a child playing among the cypresses and peaceful tombs of our necropolis, and that they would stand yet, drinking in the last light of the dying sun, even as now, when I had been dead as long as those who rested there. I saw how little it weighed on the scale of things whether I lived or died, though my life was precious to me. And of those two thoughts I forged a mood by which I stood ready to grasp each smallest chance to live, yet in which I cared not too much whether I saved myself or not. By that mood, as I think, I did live; it has been so good a friend to me that I have endeavored to wear it ever since, succeeding not always, but often.

- Gene Wolfe, The Claw of the Conciliator

In the brown book in my sabretache there was the tale of an angel who, coming to Urth on some petty mission or other, was struck by a child’s arrow and died. With her gleaming robes all dyed by her heart’s blood even as the boulevards were stained by the expiring life of the sun, she encountered Gabriel himself. His sword blazed in one hand, his great two-headed ax swung in the other, and across his back, suspended on the rainbow, hung the very battle horn of Heaven. “Where wend you, little one,” asked Gabriel, “with your breast more scarlet than the robin’s?” “I am killed,” the angel said, “and I return to merge my substance once more with the Pancreator. “Do not be absurd. You are an angel, a pure spirit, and cannot die.” “But I am dead,” said the angel, “nevertheless.” You have observed the wasting of my blood – do you not observe also that it no longer issues in straining spurtings, but only seeps sluggishly? Note the pallor of my countenance. Is not the touch of an angel warm and bright? Take my hand and you will imagine you hold a horror new dragged from some stagnant pool. Taste my breath – is it not fetid, foul, and nidorous?” Gabriel answered nothing, and at last the angel said, “Brother and better, even if I have not convinced you with all my proofs, I pray you stand aside. I would rid the universe of my presence.” “I am convinced indeed,” Gabriel said, stepping from the other’s way. “It is only that I was thinking that had I known we might perish, I would not at all times have been so bold.”

- Gene Wolfe, The Shadow of the Torturer

Det blir litt smålig å skulle sitte og prikke i Det Norske Selvbildet hele tiden. Joda, det er mye å ha moro med, men det er et lite land, så hvor viktig er det? Hvorfor ikke like gjerne dra til en norsk småby, og skrive harmdirrende og satirisk om lokale småkonger? Eller gå på jakt etter Narvestadene i nabolaget ditt? Selvsagt er vi noen fjols, hvem er ikke det?

Jeg er derfor i utgangspunktet skeptisk til bøker med titler som Verdens beste land, men jeg velger å gi Nina Witoszek en sjanse. Jeg er i humør for litt nasjonal navlebeskuing. Deler av resultatet er som forventet. Witoszek dekonstruerer Det Norske Selvbildet, og får med seg både sekstiåtterne og Rehmans mullahløft på turen. De vanlige holdeplassene.

Har hun rett? Ja, jo. Sikkert. Jeg tenker: Herregud da, sikt høyere. Skru av medievirkeligheten. Lytt og se rundt deg, og fortell meg så hva du ser. Det blir for mye ord på ord i høytsvevende idéhistoriske luftslott, for lite konkret.

De historiske trådene her er mer interessante. Det er også perspektivene fra utlendinger som har flyttet hit, og pamfletten avslutter langt sterkere enn den begynner, med noe som nærmer seg en skarp analyse av Norge og dets plass i Europa. Resultatet stiger allikevel aldri høyere enn solid intellektuell kulturkritikk, et felt hvor Norge er så vant til middelmådige bidrag at vi kanskje bør være takknemlige, men som iallefall jeg er lunken til.

Når jeg umiddelbart plukket opp Ekte sekstiåttere av Tor Egil Førland og Trine Rogg Korsvik da jeg så den i bokhandelen var det først og fremst fordi jeg er lei av å høre om dem. Jeg er lei av “68’er” som besvergelse, et skjellsord man kan fylle med antydninger om virkelighetsfjerne men allmektige venstresidetullinger. Jeg er lei av å høre om deres ideologiske forbrytelser og deres totale makt over norsk kulturliv. Det er lenge siden. De nærmer seg pensjonsalder. Nok nå.

Derfor Ekte sekstiåttere, som kaldt reduserer myter til statistikk. Ekte sekstiåttere – her definert som radikale Blindern-studenter i perioden 1964-73 – var unge menn, de ble stadig mer radikale utover sekstitallet, de gikk i foreldrenes politiske fotspor, og var svært lunkne til hasj og amerikansk counterculture. Arbeiderklassen var godt representert. Kvinnene deltok, men sjelden som ledere. Ml’erne var få, men veldig godt organiserte. Så sier tallene. Her er det tabeller som viser hvem sekstiåtterne egentlig var og hva de egentlig stod for, blandet med anonyme sekstiåtteres minner fra denne tiden, og intervjuer med profilerte eksemplarer.

Flotte greier. Fra myte til sosiologi og historie. Som besvergelse er sekstiåtter-begrepet utdatert – i den grad vi fremdeles lever med arven etter dem er det fordi senere generasjoner selv har valgt å føre den videre, så la oss så heller oppspore og undersøke disse. Som historie er dette derimot relevant og spennende.

The faeries in Susanna Clarke’s world are not friendly little creatures with magic wands, but the faeries of folklore: Dangerous creatures who live on the border between sanity and madness. This border is also a physical border. There are many places in England where you can cross into Faerie, often unawares. A bridge, a bush, a forest. Inside, time moves differently, and common sense is useless. Whether you’re chained to an insect-ridden bed or a guest at a wonderful palace may depend entirely on which eye you’re seeing with.

I’m not sure what I could say about Jonathan Strange & Mr Norell to do it justice. Luckily I’m not reviewing Clarke’s debut novel, but The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories, a collection of stories set in the same alternate England. These are the stories Clarke published during the ten years she spent writing Strange. The emphasis is more on women than in her novel, and more on faeries than on magic. The style is the same, 19th century fiction with eyebrows slightly raised, but lighter, without the oppressive mood of Strange‘s subplots.

This is a clear recommendation for anyone who liked Strange. Another recommendation: Hope Mirrlees’s Lud-in-the-Mist, Clarke’s 1926 forerunner. Lud-in-the-Mist uses the same theme of a land of common sense and a Faerie land of madness that border each other, with people crossing from one to the other with curious results. Strange is more accomplished, with its alternate history of English magic, but what made it great was also there in Lud-in-the-Mist.

The idea that gods exist only to the extent that we believe in them is kind of a fantasy cliché, but the reason it is overused is that it is a good idea, and very effective when used right. One of the authors who does use it right is Terry Pratchett, who applies this theme to many of the Discworld novels, and particularly Small Gods and Hogfather.

Hogfather is the best of these two, and one of the best of the series. The Discworld Santa Claus has been killed, and suddenly new gods are appearing rapidly, (the god of hangovers, the god of indigestion, the god that steals your socks, etc.), to fill up the belief vacuum. Death and Death’s granddaughter are on the case, and it all builds up beautifully to one of the best exchanges of the series.

Hogfather doesn’t rely much on backstory, so it’s a good introduction if you haven’t read any Discworld novels. There was also a fine mini series made from it in 2006, which I recommend if you’re unsure about tackling the books. (And .. huh, seems they’ve now filmed The Colour of Magic as well. Will check it out.)

Nah, not really. If this is wrong, I don’t want to be right.

However, from a practical viewpoint, it is probably a good idea to limit book purchases to an amount that can be safely balanced on the floor. This book queue pushes the limit – it is just about to tip over. (In which case I have this picture, and can put it all back in the right order.)

Royalists, parliamentarians, independents, puritans, presbyterians, catholics, soldiers, English, Irish, Scots, all plotting in shifting alliances – the English civil war period was a complex event, and Michael Braddick’s God’s Fury, England’s Fire doesn’t make it much clearer. That’s not in itself a bad thing. I think one of the jobs of a historian is to confuse us, to help us understand how unclear and complex historical events really were. Contrast that to the charlatans who treat history as a well of clear moral lessons for our time. I don’t want clarity from history. I want truth.

But to this unavoidable challenge Braddick adds the avoidable one of unclear language. As he himself might put it: the passive voice is highly present in the pages of this book, representing a challenge of interpretation for the reader, who finds themselves in a continous linguistic struggle for understanding. Ie.: Braddick writes poorly, which makes the book hard to read. Nobody ever does anything here, things just sort of happen. When, at the end, Charles I is executed, (I mean martyred), you’ll almost believe the axe flew by its own accord.

That’s a shame, because this is a fascinating subject. I’m most interested in the cultural aspects. The collision of ideas and beliefs and practices, daily life in the shadow of political and religious upheaval. Some examples: A witty prisoner, censorship by ear-cropping, and descriptions of the cost of war for common soldiers. Fine and vivid writing, which unfortunately is not representative of the whole.