The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde

Oscar Wilde’s only novel is a dark little tale of excess and debauchery in the upper echelons of Victorian life. It concerns a handsome young man named Dorian Gray, and his chance meeting with the devious and witty old cynic Lord Henry through their mutual friend, the painter Basil Hallward. Dorian is absolutely empty-headed, modelling for the painter without a care in the world, until Lord Henry strikes up a firm friendship with him and tells him all about the wonders and pleasures of the world available to someone as young and drop-dead gorgeous as Mr Dorian Gray; if only until old age and ugliness sets in. After he finishes sitting for the latest portrait, Dorian suddenly has a tantrum over the fact that this likeness of him will continue to remain young forever, while he himself will only ever get older and uglier until the day he dies – foolishly saying that he would give his soul if only it were the other way round. After being gifted with the painting, Dorian Gray suffers a traumatic relationship with an actress and realises, to his horror, that the image in the picture has begun to change – reflecting the inner corruption of his soul, the Dorian Gray in the portrait begins to age and develop outward signs of a corrupt lifestyle. With this undeniable proof that his hasty wish has been granted, he sets out on a personal journey of discovery to see what depths of pleasure and depravity he can reach, heedless of the damage he does to his acquaintances or his soul as he is assured that he will retain his youth and good looks despite whatever foul deeds he commits. The painting will pay the price.

          Overall it’s quite a good book – a very simple concept at its heart allowing Oscar Wilde to tell a rather unique and engrossing story. The writing is excellent, packed with a certain amount of literary skill that often fails to be boring, whilst displaying those characteristic Wilde witticisms that makes one wonder if the man was really like this. Most notably this is seen in the character of Lord Henry, a dark and captivating figure with a sharp tongue and a whole catalogue of sexist remarks; one is inclined to want to punch him every time he enters the room. He’s wonderful. Of the plot, it progresses quite naturally, at a steady and deliberate pace, hitting some superb high points as it rolls inexorably towards its grim conclusion. It’s a sick little book, and for the most part I enjoyed it.

          Of the author, what more needs to be said? A few years after The Picture of Dorian Gray was published, Oscar Wilde – once the most celebrated man in the British Isles – was marked by brutal misfortune as a result of the harsh anti-homosexuality laws and attitudes of the era. Oscar Wilde was a talented writer – a fact that he was all too aware of – and that his literary career was cut short like this is a shame and a tragedy. The preface at the beginning of the book outlines a bewildering ethical and aesthetic standpoint that the man seemingly hoped to convey through his writing, and while this more than anything else makes him seem a tad pretentious, it’s difficult to deny that he had style and intelligence to back it up – and this book goes some of the way to proving it. While I can’t help but think he was a bit a conceited old bastard, nobody, least of all this man, deserved the fate in store for him.

          So yes; a damn good book. Dark, and at times horrific, the plot is fresh and original, the writing impeccable, style and poignancy combined to create a book worthy of one of the most famous names of the Victorian era. Go ahead and read it; you’ll certainly remember it at the very least.

Biblioture

Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray. Penguin: Reading. (1994 [First Published 1891])

Discworld Books 5 to 8, by Terry Pratchett

Since reviewing the first four Discworld books in September last year, I’ve been aching to get my teeth into the next chunk of Terry Pratchett’s flagship series. Amongst the next four books, reviewed in chronological order, are Sourcery, Wyrd Sisters, Pyramids, and Guards! Guards!

5: Sourcery

This book is the first since The Light Fantastic to feature Rincewind, the inept and unqualified wizard, and his Luggage, and we now find him working as an assistant in the Unseen University Library, alongside everybody’s favourite Orangutan Librarian. The Wizards are still a bickering bunch of old men whose main ambitions are to assassinate their way up the university hierarchy, and it appears that yet another Archchancellor needs to be appointed to that once again vacant position. The arrival of a ten year old boy with more magical power than all the oldest and highest-level wizards at the University put together plunges the whole place into chaos, and Rincewind, following the mass exodus of all the other vermin in the place, decides to run for his life. As the Sourcerer – so called because he is a source of magic (hence the pun on the word) – expands his control beyond the University and consequently begins to unravel the fabric of the universe, Rincewind once again is thrust unwillingly along a path to try and save the world.

          Altogether, this is probably one of the worst books in the series. A bit of a come-down after Mort, I know, but unfortunately Sourcery is one of the most unashamed ‘cod-comic-fantasy’ works in the entire Discworld canon – it has little to say, the characters aren’t especially interesting, and the plot is a tad wishy-washy. It’s essentially the same story as The Light Fantastic, consisting of Rincewind doing his utmost to avoid having to do anything dangerous or heroic, only without Twoflower being dragged along for the ride; instead he has as companions Conina, a barbarian who would rather be a hairdresser, and Nijel the Destroyer, a skinny middle-class teenager who would rather be a barbarian. Without any definite ideas to poke fun at or decent characters to keep it romping along, the main problem with this book is that its humour is lacking and not especially well-refined. Even the Luggage fails to perform to its previous standard, with too many attempts to grant it a personality reducing it almost to the level of a cheap gag rather than the great icon of the series it once was.

          Feel free to miss this book. There are better in store.

6: Wyrd Sisters

Granny Weatherwax, the witch of Lancre who previously featured in Equal Rites, is joined by Nanny Ogg, the elderly mother and grandmother of half the kingdom’s inhabitants, and Magrat, the young and naïve New Age witch. When King Verence of the tiny kingdom of Lancre is murdered by the scheming Duke Felmet and his wife, the recently-formed witches’ coven end up holding the late king’s infant son. Shakespeare and the entire fairy-tale canon are parodied, joked-about and critiqued in the course of this sixth Discworld book, and to superb effect.

           Wyrd Sisters is a very good Pratchett work, easily one of his best. Although one might be inclined to dismiss this as a mere parody of Macbeth – one of the most apparent rip-offs on display here – there are many more facets of this book that go up to make it uniquely Discworld; the subject matter being rather more ‘about’ the theatre than simply making fun of any one work in particular. Multiple works of Shakespeare, witch folklore in general, stereotypes of rural life, fairy tales of both Grimm and Disney persuasion, actors, writers and special effects, all are playfully woven together in Wyrd Sisters to make it deliciously funny, a little bit playful, and thoroughly readable. The best aspect of this book by far is the witches themselves, the three women who are amongst the very best characters in the whole series. They spend most of the book bickering – or rather, Granny Weatherwax and Nanny Ogg bicker as Magrat, being the youngest and least experienced, merely gets bossed around – whilst trying to decide on the proper way to go about this unwelcome new problem. Granny’s prideful bossiness and Nanny Ogg’s uncouth cheeky nature and love of alcohol work well off one-another, and to counterpoint them both with young Magrat’s faintly pitiful mysticism and her clumsy attempts at being her own modern style of witch result in three excellent, distinct characters – each is a work of art on her own, but together they give this book one of the strongest cores in all of Discworld.

          If you want a laugh, then definitely read this one. I cannot recommend it strongly enough.

7: Pyramids

Book 7 is an unusual specimen, but is a Discworld book through-and-through. Ancient Egypt, ritual and religion are given a thorough going-over in the way that has now become the hallmark of this series. By applying one or two real-world rules to the concepts outlined, and then watching as a rational 20^th century mindset grapples with the all this rampant absence of logic. A land very much in the mould of Ancient Egypt, complete with hordes of bickering priests devoted to an endless pantheon of deities, thousands of years of homogenous history in which new ideas and outside influences are frowned upon, and funeral customs that generally involve the construction of vast, elaborately decorated stone structures with sloping sides and pointy tops. And camels. We cannot get enough of the camels.

          Teppic, crown prince of the Old Kingdom of Djelibeybi – conspicuous because of its time-slowing pyramids, its vast number of local gods, and for its great length/immense lack of width (having grown up along a river) – has just completed his training at the famous Assassin’s Guild of Ankh-Morpork, when he inherits the throne of his homeland a bit sooner than expected. He travels home to discover that nothing much has really changed in his absence, while he has changed a little too much – a modern, cosmopolitan mindset that puts him at odds with the old High Priest Dios. While it dawns on Teppic that he’s little more than a figurehead whose sole purpose is to keep the kingdom ticking-over for another generation, the construction of a new giant pyramid for his late father begins to completely bugger up the differences between time and space. Geometry, it turns out, has more in common with nuclear physics here on the Disc.

          Pyramids is definitely a good one. Right from the start at the Assassin’s Guild (something of a Hogwarts for contract killers) the book is witty, well-paced, and hits the mark spot on. The late King Teppicymon XXVII, while in much the same vein as the dead king from Wyrd Sisters, is a good secondary character who provides a suitable amount of black humour as his spirit observes his own mummification, while the pyramid contractors Ptaclusp and his two sons, Ptaclusp IIa and Ptaclusp IIb, are a perfect trio of characters who enliven much of the book with their designer funery monuments and Quantum Geometry. Another fine character is You Bastard, the greatest mathematician in the history of the Disc, but I shall say little more about him here – read the book, and you will love him.

          In the end, Pyramids is actually quite a good story, a tad science-fictiony in places (I mean this in a good way, unusually) which makes well-rounded points against religion, ritual, and the Egyptian afterlife, whilst poking fun at the ancient world in general, especially ancient Greek philosophy, drama and mathematics. Definitely worth a read, and its stand-alone nature amongst the Discworld canon makes it possibly one of the more accessible books for a newcomer.

8: Guards! Guards!

Ankh-Morpork has long proven itself to be the premier Discworld location, an amalgamation and mirror of every major western city on our planet. In this book we get to see this grubby jewel of cities not from the perspective of an aloof wizard, or a hapless tourist, or a privileged member of one of the thousands of Guilds that cluster inside its walls, but rather we see it through the eyes of the humble, underpaid and unfortunate survivors of the Night Watchmen; the remaining few dregs of society who constitute what’s left of the old-fashioned law and order of the city. Ever since Lord Vetinari, the Machiavellian Patrician and ruler of Ankh-Morpork, formally legalised crime in the city so as to make the crime-rates more manageable (and taxable, presumably), the need for a regular law-enforcement body has steadily dwindled to the point of extinction. The last remaining members are the cynical old drunkard Captain Vimes and his two aides, Sergeant Colon, and the short, vile Corporal Nobby. Three men to patrol the night-time streets of the largest and foulest city on the Disc. That is, until the young, idealistic and, dare we say it, heroic Lance-Constable Carrot joins the force, with a rusty old sword in one hand and an outdated law-book in the other (not to mention a trusty Protective device somewhere in-between), and the four watchmen bear witness to a crime of a devastating and near-mythical variety. It seems that a gigantic dragon is loose on the streets of Ankh-Morpork, and the Night-Watch are the only people who want to do anything about it.

          Guards! Guards!, at around 50% longer than any of the previous instalments, is one of the most complex Discworld books so far – though not actually complicated, you’ll be pleased to hear. Captain Vimes is as cynical a protagonist as we will ever get, and it is for this reason that he will go on to become one of the best and most versatile heroes of the series. While personally I am more of a fan of the witches of Lancre, Vimes and his crew of misfits are a good set of characters who give this book a definite new mood, and a unifying core that we cannot help but root for and love. The hooded secret society, another selection of misfits – albeit one bent on seizing control of the city via their misguided machinations – are a characterful group of villains and are easily the best antagonists of the series so far. Their plan is a perfect subversion of that old cliché ‘long-lost king returns to kill an evil dragon and thereby reclaim his rightful throne’, but having it take place in what is, essentially, a modern city where hot-dog salesmen spawn wherever a crowd gathers – for instance, at a dreadful disaster. The real hero of this story is not the dashing guy with the glittering sword who arrives after a life of exile to reclaim his supposed birthright, but rather it is the unwashed, uneducated sceptics who patrol the streets and ask for no gratitude – and who don’t get any either.

          In essence Guards! Guards! is a marker-stone in the development of Pratchett’s expanding world. At the top of the city is the Patrician, Lord Vetinari, a man who has briefly appeared in several of the previous books (most notably in Sourcery, but to no real effect), but it is here first of all that we see one of Pratchett’s greatest characters emerging, a man so devious, so manipulative, so paranoid that he can remain in control of a city as chaotic as Ankh-Morpork. Like so many of the other characters in this book Vetinari is highly cynical, and he therefore runs the city not as an idealist seeking to do right, or as a lunatic who only wants power and wealth from his position, but rather as an engineer maintaining a machine – it doesn’t have to work perfectly, it just has to function, to do the job it was meant to do. Vetinari is basically a tyrant, a dictator, but he is as benevolent a one as it is possible to get. In addition the other supporting characters are excellent as well; Cut-Me-Own-Throat Dibbler the street-vendor, bustling entrepreneur and seller of suspect goods, makes good in the first of what will be many appearances in the series, and the Librarian of the Unseen University finds an interesting little role in this book as he ends up being temporarily drafted as a member of the Watch. Lastly, one of the finest aspects of this book is Lady Sybil Ramkin and her collection of swamp dragons. Sybil Ramkin is one of the most effective characters on display, a no-nonsense breeder of pet swamp dragons whose firm-headed sense of aristocracy, her towering stature and her complete lack of vanity make her a wonderful final supporting character; and that's to say nothing of the swamp dragons – a species of animal so weird and volatile (literally: explosive) that they could only come from a Discworld book.

          All in all, a very good entry in the series. I thoroughly recommend it.

In conclusion, of this selection of Pratchett's works Sourcery is not that great, while all the others are excellent and well worth a read. If there’s a common theme for this phase of the series, it seems to be a lot to do with kings and kingship. Sourcery seems to be dominated with the idea of whether ‘power = right?’, while Wyrd Sisters and Pyramids are both about murdered kings and their successors. Guards! Guards! finally brings this train of thought to an end by dealing with it head-on, wilfully pointing out what's wrong with the common tropes of heroes and kings and thereby having great fun with the idea. All in all, the Disc proves to be a good arena to test these ideas, and to great humorous effect. None of these books are too difficult to grasp, but there’s definitely more going on underneath than you would expect from what some, admittedly silly people, still think of as just another comic-fantasy series.

If I had to pick a favourite, I would be hard-pressed to choose; Wyrd Sisters is a well-rounded comedy, Pyramids is one of the most enjoyable sci-fi works I’ve ever read, and Guards! Guards! is thoroughly Discworld through and through, and has swamp dragons. I think my favourite might have been Pyramids, strangely enough. The Quantum Geometry alone is delicious, but along with designer pyramids, the Assassin’s Guild and one of the broadest swipes at Ancient Greek literature/mathematics/philosophy ever attempted, this particular book has a distinct quality that separates it from the other entries in the series. Unlike the others mentioned in this review, it does not reuse characters from previous instalments, and nor is it followed by sequels which feature the same characters – making it a rare stand-alone example. The main characters, admittedly, are not the best – both Wyrd Sisters and Guards! Guards! are better in this respect – but the supporting characters, the plot, the setting, and the humour more than make up for this. But overall, a firm thumbs-up for all three.

Biblioworld Part 2

Pratchett, Terry. Sourcery. Corgi: Reading. (1989 [First Published 1988])

Pratchett, Terry. Wyrd Sisters. Corgi: Reading. (1989 [First Published 1988])

Pratchett, Terry. Pyramids. Corgi: Reading. (1990 [First Published 1989]

Pratchett, Terry. Guards! Guards! Corgi: Reading. (1990 [First Published 1989]