Posted: June 12, 1997 at 20:01:48: by Richard Frahm
: I seem to be getting out some Witch World
postings just as the board's name changes. Oh
well.
: The Best Witch World Book (by Andre Norton or
anyone)
: The Witch World, of course. The first is the
best, an utterly captivating immersion, for its
hero and for ourselves, in a new and wonderful
culture.
: The first pages, with Simon in Cornwall, could
come from straight from film noir or perhaps from
a clone of John le Carre. Dark grey is the
dominant impression and then the book hits its
first high point - the wonderful conceit of the
Siege Perilous. Has anyone read this book without
wondering what kind of world the stone would send
him or her? So much of Norton's work has been
about juveniles finding themselves in the world
(including the Tregarth triplets' entries into the
original series). The Witch World is completely
about adults - very adult adults - but it too is
about finding the right life for oneself: for
Simon, for Jaelithe, for Loyse, and for Koris.
: When Simon appears in the Witch World, it is not
like Dorothy's entry into Oz, with a shift from
sepia to Technicolor. The moors along the borders
of Alizon and Estcarp like the moors along the
borders of Cornwall are bleak. But it does
offer one clean break, a fight between a woman and
pursuing hunters that he instinctively feels is,
unlike the world he has known, a fight in which,
without thought, he can side with clear good over
clear evil. The book's world opens up as it goes
along, becoming progressively more magical and
colorful . . . although certainly never chirpy.
: I particularly liked two aspects of this book
that have gradually disappeared from the Witch
World. One was the emphasis on the combination of
magic and high technology. Es's glowing globes,
the modern sanitation that Simon approvingly
notes, Sulcarkeep's (nuclear?) power source
coexist with illusion and shape-changing. Over
time, magic seems to have taken over the Witch
World, which I think hurts the stories. The
second was the namelessness of the witches. It
gave them a sense of illusion, of unity and lack
of individuality. And it made Jaelithe's
rebellion more powerful. By the late books, the
witches have been given "false" names - Gull, etc.
I can see how, just as a matter of narrative
style, it can be hard to describe a scene without
names for several of the characters. But I regret
this change.
: The first book has one other noteworthy quirk,
although I'm not sure what it means. All three of
the main female characters are described in one
strikingly similar respect. Jaelithe is described
as having her jewel "between the small mounds of
her breasts." 33. When Loyse is first described,
we are told that "Her body was as straight and
slender as a boy's, with only shadow curves to
hint she was not a lad" 67. Simon finds that
Aldis is not the "over-ripe and full curved" woman
Jaelithe described, but instead had the form "of a
young girl not fully awakened to her own
potentialities, with small high breasts modestly
covered, yet perfectly revealed," p. 140. I'm
happily married to a women with "small high
breasts," but I don't understand the prejudice
against full figures - or quite why all the
women's breasts had to be described at all.
: I first read the Witch World in the mid- to
late-1960s, when I was in junior high school or
early high school. I read it again within the
past year, in part thinking that my third grader
might enjoy it. It's not for him yet. It may
not have been for me when I first read it. I did
not remember the harshness of the book, the
merciless and vicious nature of the initial fight
between Jaelithe and the Alizonders, the attempted
(and nearly completed) rape of Jaelithe in
Verlaine. The Witch World generally is a place
where no quarter is given, or asked; a place whose
rules of engagement appear to violate
international and U.S. military law. But I do
hope that he, and his younger sister, will read it
someday. It is one of THE very best books of
fantasy around and the first opening into one of
the richest and most textured fantasy worlds in
existence. Plus, I want them to read through the
dense first 220 pages and come to the fourth
paragraph from the end:
: "Doubtless he shall," she agreed to his
statement concerning Fulk with her usual
tranquillity. "As you have said, we are still in
the midst of a war, and not victors at the end of
one. Verlaine and Karsten, too, shall be attended
to in their proper seasons. Simon, my name is
Jaelithe."
: "It came so abruptly, that for a full
moment he did not understand her meaning."
: But we do. And I hope, eventually, my children
will, too.
: Coming next, the WORST Witch World book (and
it's a real stinker)
I really enjoyed and agree with most of Hank's
comments about Witch World but I have a little
trouble with one issue that has bothered me for
quite a while. Where is Simon when he meets Jorge
Petronius? Hank's Simon is in Cornwall but the
description of the scene sounds like some grubby
semi-industrial town. It has a railway station,
neon lights, and "towering buildings...about a
late 17th farmhouse in the heart of a 20th century
city". None of those chasing Simon have Cornish
names (i.e. Sammy, Hanson, Lampson, Kotchev) but
at the farmhouse in the back are the menhirs of
The Siege Perilous. Simon when questioned about
his background knows nothing about Cornwall except
that his grandparents were from there. Then
Petronius explains about the Cornish background
that makes Simon special but says nothing to
indicate that he and Simon are presently in
Cornwall. There is a real mystery that Norton
never cleared up about this opening.
I suspect the second most popular title may be
Year of the Unicorn. I have worked a little in
Seattle's best used sf/fantasy bookstore and the
most popular title for women was by far this. We
could never keep enough in stock.
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