Gormenghast

[flexagon]

I've officially started reading the Gormenghast novels by Mervyn Peake... Titus Groan, Gormenghast and Titus Alone. They are long, at least when taken all together, and the writing is flat-out insane... something that would be Gothic if it didn't have such a sly intellectual feel under all the rococo imagery. It really makes me want to write, and I mean write brutally, for the sake of writing, with no regard for the reader. Peake sure didn't have any. As the smallest possible example of what I mean, here's his description of someone peering through a keyhole:

...he was able by dint of concentration to observe, within three inches of his keyholed eye, an eye which was not his, being not only of a different colour to his own iron marble but being, which is more convincing, on the other side of the door.

Owwww. It hurts, it hurrrts... please don't stop.

Comments

[savage-rose.livejournal.com]

Ooh, I love that. Very "dark and stormy night". Clearly a Snoopy fan.

[flexagon]

*grin*

Yes... or a fan of Edward Bulwer-Lytton, who actually said it before Snoopy.

It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents--except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.

(Oh my.)

Maybe this year is the year I enter the dreadful writing contest at http://www.bulwer-lytton.com ...? We have until April 15. :)

[artana.livejournal.com]

Very much dry British wit.:P Is he British by any chance?:)

[flexagon]

Yes, he was. I looked it up to be sure, but can't say it was a surprise after seeing 'colour' in that very quote.

[artana.livejournal.com]

It was the Douglas Adamish spin of words that made me pretty sure. There are very few non-Brits who can pull off sentences of that sort.

[miyyu.livejournal.com]

Hot damn! I may have to pick those up.