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Tales Within The Tale

There are many strands of magic and history in Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell.

Most experienced readers won't have problems to enter Clarke's magical kingdom, but I've known about some unable to finish the book, even citing that it was boring, too slow, hard to grasp or distracting at some points.

Some press published this novel as “Harry Potter for grown-ups”. Bullshit! Nothing further than the truth. If you expect finding Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell constantly moving their wands (which they don't need or have) like Harry and Hermione, you better look somewhere else.

This may not be a book for everyone and it certainly contains many unexpected elements, which make it much more delightful than many others I've read.

It's a long novel, but so it was one of my all time favorites, Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon, a book I met every night during many months.

He who says a long novel is boring just because is long doesn't know what a great book can do, or maybe is looking in the wrong places.

Mr. Strange and Mr. Norrell invite you to sit in your favorite couch with a big cup of coffee, or any other beverage (tea, perhaps?), and a few snacks, to immerse in their fantastic world. I settled down there for such a long time that I didn't want the story to end, and that has been one of the most unusual critiques that Clarke's novel has received from many of her readers, including a few famous writers: the book ends too soon. It's a great companion.

The many plots and characters are built slowly and there are parts where very little seems to happen, but it's all part of Clarke's craft and works quite well.

Occasional readers may be distracted by the copious footnotes. Some are just bibliographic references to magical books or obscure spells, but then we have the longer ones, some resembling small stories or essays; tales within the tale.

Yes, many of the footnotes are long digressions, but I got used to them and even expected them in many parts of the story. I found them charming.

They are also a clever way to present unknown information to the reader without making the characters look silly explaining everything between them over and over again.

The footnotes play a very important role in the novel, supporting the narrative to create a fantastic milieu where magical and historical events mix so well that you'll start wondering what is real and what isn't.

The narrator of Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell does a great job, transforming herself (Clarke says it's a she) in a very important and entertaining piece of the puzzle at many times.

Zeitgeist

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell is much more than a neat tale. It is a ride from the wild English North to the mundane London, to the many battlefields where the Duke of Wellington and Napoleon fought, to the Venice where Strange meets Lord Byron and the darkest roads of Faerie.

The elegance of men and women of the capital contrasts with the tragedies Strange witnesses during his military adventures along Wellington and the eternal ballrooms of Lost Hope. Worlds are colliding everywhere; English and French, men and fairies, past and present and, of course, Norrell and Strange.

Austen's England is admirably depicted and wickedly spiced by Clarke's tremendous imagination.

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell does a very good job painting a credible picture of an era.

A Fine English Novel

Neil Gaiman, a good friend of Clarke and author of American Gods, defined her work as “unquestionably the finest English novel of the fantastic written in the last seventy years,” and Time magazine was even clearer when calling the novel a "masterpiece of the genre that rivals Tolkien."

And they are right; I was so absorbed by the world of magicians and fairies as I was when roaming around Middle-Earth.

Susanna Clarke's wit, precise use of words and obvious love of literature (notice how important libraries and books are for Mr. Norrell and Strange) have created a remarkably original and compelling piece of art.

English fantasy and science fiction have always been different; Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell definitely is.

The Cast

Our gentlemanly magicians are accompanied by an extremely well-drawn group of characters, including historical figures such as King George III, Napoleon, the Duke of Wellington and Lord Byron.

From these I liked Wellington the most; he keeps looking for new ways of applying the skills of Strange to his military campaigns and at one point asks: “can a magician kill a man by magic?" to what Strange replies, "I suppose a magician might…but a gentleman never could."

Wellington's pragmatism shows when a few dead corpses, reanimated by Strange, start speaking “one of the dialects of Hell”. “They have learned it very quickly... They have only been dead three days,” the Duke comments.

Miss Pole and Arabella, Strange's wife, are the only women in the novel and they act according to their social status, at least until a certain gentleman starts playing games with them. I disagree with those saying women in Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell don't have an important role; Miss Pole and Arabella are, I think, central to the story.

Then we have the servants, the deftly, autonomous and surly Childermass, who works for Mr. Norrell, and the competent and loyal Stephen Black, Sir Pole's Negro butler of majestic appearance, who develops a weird relationship with the gentleman of the thistle-down hair.

There he is, the gentleman of the thistle-down hair, the villain of the story, a fairy king with no name, or at least we're not told one. A powerful character who is as charming as cruel and is often seen through the eyes of Stephen Black, who accepts his presence as something quite natural; a very smart move by the author.

The two dandies surrounding Mr. Norrell are a precise example of society's hypocrisy, parasite-like beings who care a shit about others.

And there are two other magicians, Vinculus, a charlatan who nobody cares about, and John Uskglass, the Raven King, founder of English magic and ruler of the North for more than three centuries. They are also very important for the fate of our two heroes.

The man under the hedge, sir. He is a magician

Susanna Clarke skillfully weaves the actions of all them. “Writing often seems more like a process of unearthing detail, of archeology rather than making stuff up,” she comments.

The Future of Clarke's Magic

I was missing this book as soon as I read its last line. There are so many places to visit and people to meet in Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell that I put the book in my read-again list almost immediately.

The author is already working in the sequel and has said “the next book will be set in the same world and will probably start a few years after Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell finishes.” I'm looking forward for it.

At the end Susanna Clarke has fulfilled Mr. Norrell's dream by bringing magic back to England, and the world.

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