has come recently commented on one of my old reviews. Happens sometimes, you just wrote does not seem to interest anyone and a few years ago called the attention of a visitor who passed by, that's life and not worth thinking a lot about the subject.
The fact is that the ineffable anonymous turn back and put half my enthusiastic appreciation for "Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell" by Susanna Clarke. An interesting bath humility, one can say that a particular book is a masterpiece but someone will always remember you for it is a pain unbearable. Fortunately I have an ego
bombproof and I am not frighten by critics outside like that. After a brief reflection, I shook my head and sighed. "Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell" is a masterpiece, no matter who though, which does not mean you have to like everybody. After all, Tolkien hated Shakespeare ....
admit that when I read the great work of Clarke if there was one thing that bothered me somewhat. A book so enormous, enormous and complex could be a single outbreak? Did not have bottomless this author to your career? "The bar was not set too high? The same thoughts
assaulted me when I started reading "The Ladies of Grace Adieu," the next work of Britain to reach the English market. Well, after a reading frenzy I could breathe a sigh of relief. Clarke was at least as good a storyteller as a novelist and the flame that had scorched his great novel burning just as much in their stories.
Tales, yes, set in the same universe of his opus magnum and even have some appearance of old known as the Duke of Wellington, King Raven and Jonathan Strange. We therefore once again, to the spurious cross between Jane Austen and Neil Gaiman has been the delight of many, this fascinating hybrid between fairyland and early nineteenth-century England. And, of course, Clarke gets an unexpected artifact as work with the gracefulness of a ballet dancer.
Stories like the title of the book, "The Mrs. Mabb "," Mr. Simonelli or widower duende "or" Tom Brigtwind or how the bridge was built Thoresby magic "have the same virtues as its big brother" Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell ", and even end up being more affordable and pleasant to not having an overwhelming presence.
Of course, Clarke introduced a new record in his work, I mean stories written in the style of traditional fairy tales, where the reference points both Jean Austen would not like the brothers Grimm, folklore and anthropology rather than nineteenth-century English history. This section would stand stories like "In Lickerish Mount, "" The Duke of Wellington lost the horse, "Antickets and Frets" and "John Uskglass and saithe in Cumbria." And though they are well written and not without its charm, in my humble opinion are somewhat far from the achievements of his other stories. Are interesting but not stunning, pleasant but not exciting, a path not as fruitful as the rest of his work.
Despite their variety, we must recognize that these stories share a series of common ideas. On the one hand are very feminine and even feminist (especially "The Ladies of Grace Adieu"). Stories in which women are the protagonists (sometimes players only) and where these are demonstrated superior to men (in a society as sexist as the nineteenth century) are common in this volume. In a way, a kind of compensation to the very masculine "Jonatahn Strange and Mr Norrell", where women seem to take the role of victims to save and little else. Something that once drew my attention taking into account the sex of the author and the long tradition of female witchcraft is in fantastic literature. Now
heroines can be as clever or more than men and witches so terrible and cruel as the Raven King himself, a change from the more refreshing and enjoyable. Finally there
an issue that I think Clarke is a true masterpiece: the transitions from the kind cotidianedad the utmost cruelty. We started reading one of his stories and the atmosphere pleasant, almost bucolic, and deliciously English permeates the work, then, little by little, things are changing, imperceptibly, and when we want to account for the savagery and pain make an appearance with devastating force. It is in this contrast between the two worlds, civilization and barbarism, the England of the Napoleonic era and the fairyland, science and magic, where Clarke's writing has more strength, which shows all its power and effectiveness demonstrate when the two sides of the same coin: the man and the elf.
Of all the tales are a few that deserve a little more detail. "The Ladies of Grace Adieu" is that it has been more enjoyable round. Not only because of its subtlety, good work and terrible feminist message if not why, in the end, Jonathan Strange himself meet with some opposition to it is better to withdraw.
"Mrs. Mabb" has a say about Carroll imagination and poor inceible milk and makes it very clear that that in love and war anything goes.
"Mr. Simonelli or widower duende" reminded me a lot like "Wuthering Heights" by Bronte, by setting and the demonic nature of the elf-like character as Heatcliff of the Yorkshire moors. It is probably the most romantic work of Clarke in the literary sense of the word.
Finally, I can not fail to mention "Tom Brigtwind or how the bridge was built Thoresby magical, a real gem of a humorous and exuberant imagination unleashed. The one I have remembered his famous novel.
I can think of a single but the dazzling magic of Susanna Clarke is there life beyond Jonathan Strange? Will it be able to create a work so exciting but set in another universe, different, in short?
Time will tell, I personally know that I will enjoy trying to answer this question with the next book to appear in our language.
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