| Title | : | The Vanishing Tower (The Elric Saga, #4) |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0441860397 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780441860395 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Mass Market Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 176 |
| Publication | : | First published January 1, 1970 |
The Vanishing Tower (The Elric Saga, #4) Reviews
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The Vanishing Tower begins in archetype and cliché and ends in wholesale destruction and despair. Perhaps not an unsurprising progression for Prince Elric of Melnibone, exiled lord of a ruined city, wielder of the black blade Stormbringer, Eater of Souls.
This book consists of three individual but closely related adventures, and I must admit I would have stopped reading with the first, “The Torment of the Last Lord,” if I hadn’t learned long ago to trust Michael Moorcock. Tall willowy hero and short wily sidekick strive to rescue a lovely queen of myth, lulled into a charmed sleep by an evil magician the hero has vowed to destroy? Sounds familiar. But fortunately things get better by the end of “Book One” (Among other reasons, because the “Noose of Flesh” is such a supercool weapon).
Book Two, “To Snare a Pale Prince” is more my style, a Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser sort of adventure in which Elric and Moonglum enter Nadsokor City of Beggars to retrieve Elric’s stolen magic ring from the Beggar King Urish. In this book, Elric’s encounter with Checkalakh the “Burning God” is particularly memorable.
But the best part of the novel is Book Three, “Three Heroes with a Single Aim,” in which three incarnations of the Eternal Champion—Elric, Coram, Erekose—united to journey through space and time in the “Vanishing Tower” to battle for the fabled city of Tanelorn. And isn’t it fitting that the last part of the story turns out to be the best?
I thought I’d end this by sharing a thought I recently had about the kind of hero Elric is. When I first encountered him, during the Nixon administration, I thought of him as a breath of fresh air, not smug like the straightforward heroes of Tolkien, and--worse--all the proliferating Tolkien clones, those vigorous defenders of the post WWII Cold War consensus. Elric was so much edgier, so much more unlikable; he seemed to embody the post-60’s and earlier ‘70’s. He was part of the way forward.
Nowadays, when I'm no longer sure there is a way forward, and every two-bit superhero seems suffused with pain, possessed of (or by) a tortured origin story, the dark ironies of Elric’s history may seem old hat, a countercultural commonplace, a trope as cliché as the sleeping beauty narrative that began The Vanishing Tower, and caused this jaded reader to yawn.
Well, then, let’s see Elric for what he really is, the embodiment of something a century and a half older: a return to the Byronic hero: "a man,” as Lord Macaulay said, "proud, moody, cynical, with defiance on his brow, and misery in his heart, a scorner of his kind, implacable in revenge, yet capable of deep and strong affection".
Or, perhaps, it would be even better to let Lord Byron himself—as he did in “The Corsair”(1815) sum up the characteristics of the Byronic hero:That man of loneliness and mystery,
Scarce seen to smile, and seldom heard to sigh…
He knew himself a villain—but he deem'd
The rest no better than the thing he seem'd;
And scorn'd the best as hypocrites who hid
Those deeds the bolder spirit plainly did.
He knew himself detested, but he knew
The hearts that loath'd him, crouch'd and dreaded too.
Lone, wild, and strange, he stood alike exempt
From all affection and from all contempt.
There it is. Elric to a “T”. A personality inspired not by the “countercultural revolution” of the 1960’s, but by real revolt, steeped in anarchy and blood: the French Revolution of the 1790’s. -
I am Elric of Melnibone, last of a line of great sorcerer kings. This blade I wield will do more than kill you, friend demon. It will drink your soul and feed it to me. Perhaps you have heard of me by another name? By the name of the Soul Thief?
Also known as the White Wolf, because he is an albino warrior. And as the Prince of Ruins, because in fulfilling a dark prophecy he has destroyed Imrryr, the Dreaming City, his own capital on the island of Melnibone. Also as Stormbringer, by the name of the magical sword he carries, forged in the fires of Chaos. Also as the Eternal Champion, one of the incarnations of the rebel soul who fights against Fate across overlapping worlds and warped timelines in the multiverse imagined by Michael Moorcock.
The present volume, known initially as "The Sleeping Sorceress" is a collection of three novellas, most of them presenting Elric and his companion Moonglum on a personal vendetta, chasing after a powerful sorcerer named Theleb K'aarna. While the structure of the stories is clearly inspired from sword & sorcery classics from Robert E Howard, Jack Vance or Fritz Leiber, Moorcock is creating his own style, distinguished primarily by the nature of his hero, neither the bloodthirsty barbarian (Conan) nor the humorous scoundrels (Fafhrd & Gray Mouser). Elric is nobody's hero, least of all in his own eyes. He will fight against demons and cruel kings and dangerous magicians, even agaisnt gods, but he is never happy about it, and he is always questioning his motives and his future, he is always rebelling against being pushed like a pawn across the Younger Kingdoms by forces beyond his comprehension.
"I am so weary of gods and their struggles" he murmured as he mounted his golden mare.
"But when will the gods themselves weary of it, I wonder?" Moonglum said. "If they did, it would be a happy day for Man. Perhaps all our struggling, our suffering, our conflicts are merely to relieve the boredom of the Lords of the Higher Worlds. Perhaps that is why when they created us they made us imperfect."
There is a progression in the champion's journey, revelaed not only in the battles he fights and in the alliances he makes and dissolves. The changes come mostly from the unbreakable link between the man and the doom sword he carries. Without the sword, Elric is so weak he cannot even stand up on his own legs. With Stormbringer in his hand he is near unbeatable, but the price he pays is absorbing into himself the souls of all the dark creatures he kills. How long until Elric himself is turned into a hellspawn by all the horrors he imbibes?
And a white-faced demon stood over the dead thing of Hell and its crimson eyes blazed and its pale mouth opened and it roared with wild laughter, flinging its arms upward, the runesword flaming with a black and horrid flame, and it was a wordless, exultant song to the Lords of Chaos.
There was silence suddenly.
And then it bowed its head and it wept.
I have remarked before on the concise and colourful prose of Moorcock, and this collection is no exception. It packs in less than two hundred pages more action and more ideas that a modern fantasy doorstopper. It creates a special mood, mixing horror with myths of creation, fantasy with science-fiction, philosophy with swashbuckling adventure. Some passages work better than others, and initially I was disappointed with these three novellas, considering them repetitive of plot elements and with character motivations already used in every previous episode. By the end though, I got drawn back into the Moorcock multiverse, and I decided to give it an extra star, in the context of the larger Elric epic, rather than for the individual novellas included here.
- - -
The Torment of the Last Lord sends Elric and Moonglum to a northern kingdom, there to confront the armies of demons led by Theleb K'aarna. Succubi, a mechanical bird, a beautiful woman sleeping in an abandoned castle, a summoning of eagles, a touch of romance and a powerful magic artefact hidden on an island isolated by a ring of volcanoes - these are some of the ingredients that spice up the quest.
To Snare a Pale Prince Elric and Moonglum recuperate in a quiet town, but get in trouble over a couple of ladies of the night, resulting in the powerful Ring of Actorios that Elric uses to summon supernatural help being stolen. The clues lead to a city of thieves:
Framed against the scarlet sunset, Nadsokor looked from this distance more like a badly kept graveyard than a city. Towers tottered, houses were half-collapsed, the walls were broken.
Once there, the companions discover another devious plot by Theleb K'aarna. More monsters from the Hell dimensions, more battles, more existential angst result in yet another Elric typical adventure.
Three Heroes with a Single Aim. is my favorite in the collection. It takes the reader for the first time to Tanelorn, the fabled refuge for tormented souls, the secret garden of peace in a world ravaged by wars.
Come, rest in Tanelorn - peaceful Tanelorn, where even the Great Lords of the Higher Worlds cannot come without permission.
Even Tanelorn, sitting between the Young Kingdoms and the Sighing Desert, cannot offer Elric peace from memories of dark deeds, from his dreams and his existential questions. His restlessness is aggravated by the knowledge of the presence of Teleb K'aarna, still hatching his evil overlord schemes somewhere out in the world. My favorite passage describes the appeal of the emptiness to the troubled mind:
For several hours Elric of Melnibone tramped through the Sighing Desert and gradually, as he had hoped, his sense of identity began to leave him so that it was almost as if he had become one with the wind and the sand and, in so doing, was united at last with the world which had rejected him and which he had rejected.
In the wastelands, the former sleeping sorceress Myshella makes a comeback and gives Elric another quest, that of destroying a doom machine that Teleb somehow discovered and plans to use against Tanelorn. Valiant Elric jumps into the fray, and lands in a place between worlds, where he meets with two other incarnations of the Eternal Champion. Only together, the three warriors can enter the vanishing tower from the title and there defeat yet another powerful and slightly deranged sorcerer / godling. If it sounds familiar, it may be because the champions coming together into something much stronger that the parts appeared also in a novella from the second episode.
It might be interesting to read later the stories of Corum, Hawkmoon and the other incarnations of the hero with a thousand faces in the multiverse of Moorcock. For now, the collection concludes with another meditation on the conflict between Law and Chaos, and of where exactly Elric loyalties lie. I guess I will find out when I reach the end of the cycle.
Recommended as part of the larger Elric saga. -
Elric of Melnibone makes his return in what will no doubt be acclaimed as one of the very best chapters in the saga of the doomed albino prince. While many of you may recall reading this installment in the series as The Vanishing Tower, Mr. Moorcock has made substantial alterations to the text.
Signed edition is limited to 300 copies, each signed by Michael Moorcock, Tyler Jacobson, and Walter Mosley. -
Elric of Melniboné, proud prince of ruins, last lord of a dying race, wanders the lands of the Young Kingdoms in search of the evil sorcerer Theleb K'aarna. His object is revenge. But to achieve this, he must first brave such horrors as the Creatures of Chaos, the freezing wilderness of World's Edge, the golden-skinned Kelmain hordes, King Urish the Seven-fingered with his great cleaver Hackmeat, the Burning God, the Sighing Desert, and the terrible stone-age men of Pio. Although Elric holds within him a destiny greater than he could ever know, and controls the hellsword Stormbringer, stealer of souls, his task looks hopeless, until he encounters Myshella, Empress of the Dawn, the sleeping sorceress.
I think this is my favorite book in the series so far. It was typical sword and sorcery swashbuckling for the most part, but the more metaphysical and philosophical elements of the series were much better engraved into the overall flow of each tale. In previous books, the whole multiverse, time travel and reincarnation systems were a bit vague and hard to follow, but all of my questions and doubts were cleared up in this one and I finally feel like I have a grasp on the world building and the whole Eternal Champion theme. Elric has fully grown into his title of a doomed hero, where not even death can set him free from his cruel fate or eternal suffering. -
I liked this somewhat less than a few of the previous books in the Elric Saga, but only because it had less of the nearly meta-multiple-worlds eternal hero/villain in it except for the last tale.
The rest of it seemed very natural for a sword and sorcery adventure and rather plain. You know, a mysterious woman, albeit overpowered and in need of more overpowered help, almost throwing herself at evil (debatable) albino Elric after he avows he needs nothing, not even a reason to do whatever he wants.
Eternal brooding nightmare of a man, serving chaos though not always being served BY chaos, always/never regretting, tossed by fate, used by his malicious soul-drinking sword, and in a never-ending search for wisdom.
Good. Very good stuff.
In general.
This one reads like what Stephen King will eventually do better in his Dark Tower. Still, interesting to see the seeds. :) -
A.k.a "The Sleeping Sorceress". Kind of a bit less fun than the previous longer ones, maybe because a tad too repetitive for my liking, but still very enjoyable. I love how Elric's sword and Elric's magic isn't something he can depend on. No wonder he's upset all the time. :P
Myshella.. D: -
"Perhaps all our struggling, our suffering, our conflicts are merely to relieve the boredom of the Lords of the Higher Worlds. Perhaps that is why when they created us they made us imperfect."
the story follows the same structure as the previous ones, there are three story arcs, Elric defends Kaneloon against Theleb K'aarna - the sorcerer against whom Elric seeks to gain revenge. the second story follows Elric as he is captured by the Begger King of Nadsokor and forced to fight off The Burning God and afterwards defend the Caravan of Tanelorn and travel to the Eternal City with an old friend. The third story, 'again' brings Elric in an encounter with Theleb K'aarna's cunning sorcery. but in his attempt to counter the sorcerer's plan to attack Tanelorn (Theleb K'aarna, is sadly given little explainations regarding his motivations in attempting so much destruction. it is perhaps only because he is being manipulated without his knowledge by fate as well) he is transported to another plane and there meets old companions (though forgotten). Prince Corum and Erekose - the incarnations of himself who live to defend the cosmic balance in all times and planes. I liked this part of the stroy. the part which hints at greater events taking place, gives insight into the overarching powers that control everything and of which, Elric is an important piece. It can direct the story to give us, at least, hopes to understand better Elric's destiny and to fulfill our thirst for a resolve. The main thing that bothers me about this book is that it does not add anything new to my understanding of Elric's position (at least not on a fulfilling scale) in the current state of The Universe. There are hints as there were before but it doesn't seem to be enough because still I feel, after finishing the book, as if there is a gap. We read more of Elric's adventures, his grudge (which I could easily call petty) drives him and gives rise to his conflicts against Theleb K'aarna who is not even a notable antagonist. what motivates the sorcerer is very unremarkable and Elric should've been done with him a long time ago. what I want to see is how the greater conflict (which we keep hearing about) will reflect on Erlic, what is his role as our dark Protagonist? how will he come to face his destiny and how his destiny will leave him? It'll be good to get to the real issues already!
the adventures are still exciting and it's good to go along with Erlic and exprience new things and be in that certain world again. -
This is perhaps the least remarkable of the Elric collections, at least for me. The Torment of the Last Lord is a fairly middling tale with little in particular to recommend, while Three Heroes With a Single Aim, while much better is also basically the exact same story already told in King of Swords (I'm not entirely sure which came first, actually, but still). The middle one, To Snare the Pale Prince, is much better - among the best of the whole lot in general - but that's still one great original story out of three, which isn't a terribly good average.
Three and a half stars for this one. More than worth reading for the middle story alone, but the other two drag down the rating a little. -
So, three novellas, structurally identical, wherein each the same lame antagonist threatens something that Elric wants preserved simply because he hates the antagonist, who returns from prior installments with new armies (one for each novella here) and new versions of the Fell Sorcery, only to be--surprise!--countered by Elric & Co., when they very luckily accidentally find a useful numinous object or when they very originally and unintuitively invoke the aid of some divine patron or other, or both. Sadly, the antagonist escapes every time, which guarantees at least one more exercise in tedium to kill him off. I suppose this gives the volume a unity of sorts, and detailed comparisons likely should be made between the three novellas.
This is not to say that the individual iterations do not possess items of interest.
Fr'instance, when confronted with crocodile-elephant things (alliphants, maybe? elegators? Nothing so cutesy--they're just oonai, which recalls Butler's later ooloi, if only in terms of silly spelling), Elric comments, "not an aesthetic combination" (23), which is a nice joke at the author's expense. (No shit--elegators are a profoundly stupid idea.)
We also find more evidence in our unceasing quest to ferret out the sources and analogues of R. Scott Bakker's work: "There was more to summoning than the words of invocation. There were the abstract thoughts in the head, the visual images which had to be retained in the mind the whole time, the emotions felt, the memories made shap and true" (27). Not quite utterals/inutterals, but, you know, the influence is plain.
Elric, in explaining his summoning, notes that it is based on "an ancient bargain my ancestors made" (29). This is constant throughout the first four volumes; Elric is the beneficiary of contracts that he did not negotiate and for which he provided no consideration. He is rescued from many lethal scenes by obligors on ancient accords, all because he is to fulfill his end of the contract at some future date, as succesor in interest of the original obligees. Perhaps the finale to the series will render all of it sensible. But, for now, the contractual divines are functioning only on the metafantastical level as a fairly clever means for Moorcock to write the deus ex machina into the narrative with mechanical regularity. The oddity would be for Elric to rescue himself one time, and, importantly, the story is to an extent mostly about the contracts and their performance. It's a story for lawyers who are closet fantasy nerds, who should recongize all of the nastiness of feudalism underlying the silly geektalk about sorcery and nuclear-swords.
By the time of the second novella herein, Elric is "already a hero of several ballads by poets not over-talented" (77)--a fine bit of self-derogation by the author.
The same novella reveals that Elric possesses Plot-Significant Jewellery, in the form of a magic ring. (Alrighty then!) The second novella likewise features as sub-antagonists the Beggar King and his beggar army, "proud in their perversity" (87). (Alrighty then?)
The third novella notes Elric's "pointless search for a meaning to his existence" (132), which didn't strike me as the assumption in previous volumes, except for the fundy crap in volume III, which also appeared ex nihilo.
During an eternal champion interlude in the third novella, Erekose wonders why they have to fight for the destiny of the universe so often, and Corum responds that "perhaps domestic problems are worse" (154). I for one wouldn't mind seeing Elric demand his wife's handkerchief, or quibble with her regarding the pickledish, or see her bankrupt him via adultery, or deliver him locked in the attic for treatment of his hysteria.
Recommended for persons reincarnated in some form or another to fight again and to suffer again. -
Getting hard each time to write reviews for these. So much happened in this book that it would be impossible to sum it up properly, so it's easier just to think of what the highlights were for me.
Mostly I was happy to finally see the fabled city of Tanelorn. I loved the idea all along that there was a city that exists in every world and lasts for all time. I was glad it turned out to be more than just a myth.
Not many fantasy novels use the somewhat sci-fi device of alternate realities, but Moorcock uses it very well. In this book Elric actually travels again to another world where he meets with two of his alternate selves, previous future or parallel incarnations of himself, it's hard to tell. And I've since learned that these are actually main characters from some of Moorcock's other books, which is a really good plot device to use, to say that each of his heroes are facets of eachother. This is a device that
David Eddings could have used!
Things are somewhat confusing at times when Elric refers to things that have happened in the past. I believe it may be because the books weren't written in their chronological order, and things may have been changed around (is this true?). But Elric once thinks back about Yrkoon usurping his throne, but having recently read the previous books I ended up shouting at Elric "but you left him in charge, you fool!".
See my other reviews of the Elric series:
←
#3 The Weird of the White Wolf |
#5 The Bane of the Black Sword → -
This is the fourth of the core six Elric novels. It has more of a feel of a stand-alone heroic fantasy novel rather than the little-lost-piece-of-a-big-puzzle atmosphere of the other books. Elric, accompanied by his faithful companion Moonglum, seeks the evil Theleb K'aarna, and his relationship with Stormbringer, The Black Blade of Chaos, swings even further out of Balance. Listen to Hawkwind's Live Chronicles album for further details. Classic stuff!
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Aventuras interesantes y originales, con un villano temible y una heroína más aceptable que las anteriores, aunque también muere de manera un tanto patética. El Orden hace más acto de presencia, y es molón. Genial la descripción de Nadsokor. Moorcock nos quiere dar gato por liebre, queriéndonos hacer creer ahora que Elric destruyó Melniboné y a los melniboneses: pues no fue así, hicieron una incursión (muy mal planificada) en la que quemaron un poco Imrryr y mataron muchos esclavos, pero los melniboneses quedaron en esencia a salvo (si quería hacer la historia más épica y a Elric culpable de genocidio además de de traición, ¿por qué no reescribió el asalto a Imrryr en El misterio del lobo blanco cuando tuvo ocasión?).
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Another fun Elric adventure. They’re so short plus thoughtful, melancholy, and psychedelic. What’s not to like
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Interesting volume that contains the same story from the Corum books, but from E’s POV. The Cosmic Kick Line still makes me chuckle.
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Notice: I have made a review for every book of this series and they need to be read in order since they are supposed to feel like an on-going impression. So if you read the second without reading the first will feel rather off.
I am mostly focusing on the style of storytelling and a lot less on if it reads well or something sophisticated like that. For the same reason I tend to have lots of SPOILERS which means that if you read this text you will know THE OVERALL PLOT and how much I DIDN’T like it. So be warned that this is a mostly negative opinion for the whole trilogy which tends to reveal in detail why I didn’t like it. Better be read after you have read the books or if you want to avoid a not-so-smart series. YOU HAVE NOW BEEN WARNED and I can now initiate the slaughter.
--- The Vanishing Tower ---
Elric is chasing the sorcerer and is again attacked by monsters. Being the useless idiot he is, he once again summons a god to help him. But the god refuses and thus Elric is captured. Yeah, that shows how strong he is without his gods. And here I am waiting to see how will he manage to escape now that his ace is not working. Well guess what, even if one god refused and he gets immobilized, he can still summon A DIFFERENT GOD to save him and kill the monsters. Wow, the tactics in this story are breath taking.
After that he ends up in a castle where a beautiful woman inside is in a coma by a sleep spell… AGAIN! Jesus Moorcock, that is the third time you use the exact same premise! So the woman talks to Elric in his dreams (because there was nobody around to tells us all that) and explains how the sorcerer he is looking is the one who put her to sleep (how convenient) and that he plans to conquer the entire world with a huge army he will bring from another dimension. Hm, isn’t that a repeat of the third book? And that was the villain’s plan for betraying his former queen? He wanted to be the ruler of the world? I thought he was just jealous of Elric for seducing her.
Anyways, he is told to go find a McGuffin to beat the invading army which is hidden in the other side of the world. She placed it there to be safe from evil hands yet for some reason the sorcerer knew about it and sent there a demon to protect it. Weird, why didn’t he take it for himself if he knew its location and just had it guarded? Or why didn’t he just destroy it? Plot hole!
Anyways, Elric needs to go there and he doesn’t travel on foot but by flying on the back of a magic bird the woman gave him. Man, she does anything she likes even when she is under the most powerful spell in existence… So he goes to that place, kills the demon and gets the trinket which can save the day. But wait, he also finds a jewel the demon had that can wake up people. So let me get this right; not even the gods can cure sleep but a jewel a mook demon had, can? And why the hell did the villain sent there a demon that had a way for the woman to wake up? Shouldn’t he send someone who didn’t have one? Plot hole!
So Elric goes back and meets the invading army. He fights them for a while but because no god helps him gets captured again. The villain so desperately wants to kill him that he… orders to be taken alive to his quarters where he blabbers for hours how great he is. Expectably, Elric manages to escape and wakes up the woman who triggers the trinket and the entire army dies in seconds. Yet the villain escapes death by teleporting away… for the second time. Man, not only his entire plan got ruined because he didn’t just kill Elric right away but he conveniently uses teleportation to prolong the chase. This is all so cheesy…
Once again Elric did squat by himself and the woman gets the hots for him. And after a hot night together… He dumps her and leaves again. What a loser…
After that two women trick him, throw him unconscious, and steal his ring. He needs that ring in order to summon gods thus he chases them to a place where he gets captured once more. It was all a trap by the villain again in order to kill him. And that is why instead of just draining all his life with his ghoul assistants, or have his head chopped off as the local ruler demands, he throws him in a dungeon to be killed by a trapped god there. What a fakin’ joke of a plot! Just kill him dammit! That is what you want!
In the dungeon, the god is about to kill Elric, who is unable to summon a god to help him because he doesn’t have the ring. But worry not as a god comes to help him anyways. Not only he couldn’t summon one, not only the god was an enemy of his god and thus shouldn’t help him, but also he came to help a mortal when it was forbidden for his position. What a fakin’ joke of a plot!
Elric goes outside where one of his friends is attacked by monsters the villain summoned. For no explanation at all, he is able to summon monsters of his own to fight back, even when that was impossible. Then the villain escapes by teleporting for the third time. Terrible plot; just terrible.
Then he goes to the place his ring is kept and faces another demon the villain summoned, who is impossible to be killed. Well how nice you idiot sorcerer, if you had such a beast in your command, why didn’t you sent THAT to guard the trinket in the previous arc? Or destroy it. Or bring it to you. Anyways, Elric is unable to win but again, a god comes to save him even when he neither could summon one nor asked for it. Plain horrible plot.
As a reward, Elric is taken to Tanelorn, the perfect city of peace and happiness. And what does he do? He dumps that place too. What a goddamn loser!
Then the villain attacks again, this time by finding an ancient weapon of doom. What the hell, how many masterplans does he have anyway??? Elric is again unable to defeat it and just about he is to be killed… he is teleported to safety. HOW CONVENIENT!
He is taken to a place where two more of his incarnations are to join powers in order to stop a cosmic threat. That is a repeat of the third book as well. Then they go to defeat an evil dwarf in a magic tower. That is a repeat of the fourth book. They defeat him and as reward, he is given magic weapons found there to defeat the super weapon of the sorcerer. HOW CONVENIENT!
He goes back and with that he defeats the machine and the monsters of the villain, who then teleports away… for the fourth time. Fak, this got uber lame!
He then finds the woman from the beginning of the story dead, killed in the battle. He feels bad about it when he could have saved her if stayed by her side instead of dumping her. Well that serves you right! -
برجی به رنگ مرگ
-
Theleb K'aarna, minor adversary in previous books, has now been elevated to the status of prime enemy of Elric, and all three stories are about Elric's pursuit of him across many lands and different planes of existence. Ho hum. In terms of the overall arc of the series, Elric is temporarily re-united with Prince Corum and Lord Erekose to become The Three Who Are One. These are alternate manifestations of himself, from the other planes. Where is this series going?
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· Book 1:
Elric of Melnilboné ★★★★★
· Book 2:
The Fortress of the Pearl ★★★★★
· Book 3:
The Sailor on the Seas of Fate ★★★★★
· Book 4:
The Weird of the White Wolf ★★★
· Book 5:
The Vanishing Tower (aka “The Sleeping Sorceress”) - to be read.
· Book 6:
The Revenge of the Black Rose - to be read.
· Book 7:
The Bane of the Black Sword - to be read.
· Book 8:
Stormbringer - to be read.
· Book 9:
Elric at the End of Time - to be read.
· Book 10:
Daughter of Dreams - to be read.
· Book 11:
Destiny’s Brother - to be read.
· Book 12:
Son of the Wolf - to be read.
(Following the
Tor reading order) -
4/5
La quinta entrega del Emperador Albino vuelve a consistir en una narración formada por tres historias diferentes con ciertos elementos en común. Theleb K´aarna encarna al nuevo rival de Elric tras haber acabado con el anterior y es quien da cohesión a los tres relatos largos que componen el libro. Mi favorito es el segundo, con la búsqueda de el Anillo de Reyes que le roban a Elric, una historia llena de aventura y seres repugnantes. El personaje femenino que aparece esta vez en este libro está más desarrollado que en los anteriores, salvo en La Fortaleza de la Perla, y añade mucha identidad a la historia, pese a su destino. En la última de las historias vuelve aparecer el recurso de los diferentes héroes del Multiverso, como ya ocurriera en El marinero de los mares del destino. Muy interesante e inusual. Quizá la variedad de escenarios o acontecimientos no sea tan deslumbrante como en otros volúmenes, pero su lectura resulta muy agradable. Y, según veo por mi anterior puntuación, me ha gustado más en esta ocasión. A continuación, en orden cronológico, viene la historia, la última en escribirse, que menos disfruté en su día: La venganza de la Rosa. -
Este libro me gustó mucho más que el anterior.
Repitiendo, estoy leyéndolos en orden cronológico por lo que, para mí, este es el 5to libro que leo de la saga.
Habiéndolos leído todos de corrido siento que me estoy cansando de la dinámica de situaciones o historias "desconectadas" en cierto sentido. Sí, tenemos al mismo personaje principal, a sus amigos o acompañantes -que muchas veces van cambiando- y todo su pasado y lo que sucedió en los libros anteriores que lo condicionan. Pero cada libro se podría leer bastante independiente de lo otro y no cambiaría mucho, excepto algunos datos de worldbuilding que se aprenden en libros anteriores.
En cada libro se inicia y se termina una aventura nueva, llena de acción y amenazas. Si bien mantenemos un hilo conector, que une a toda la saga, y cosas o sucesos de los libros anteriores influyen y crean consecuencias en los siguientes, no hay alguna conexión mayor. Y está bien, porque se puede cerrar el libro sin quedarse con una intriga mayor o una imperiosa necesidad de leer el siguiente. Pero también siento que les falta profundidad.
Comprendo completamente que es un libro viejo, con un estilo viejo, y que ahora la fantasía cambió bastante. Se nota mucho que los amigos y los enemigos se hacen en dos segundos. Una sola acción buena ya convierte a un personaje en un aliado, y una acción mala ya lo convierte en enemigo. Una sonrisa de una mujer ya la convierte en amante, y haber dormido una vez con ella ya la convierte en un gran amor. No llegamos a conocer en profundidad a ninguno de los personajes, ni vemos el desarrollo de sus relaciones. A veces ni siquiera vemos en profundidad a Elric, excepto en ciertas partes. Si bien su accionar, sus pensamientos, sus pesares y sus problemas se entienden perfecto a lo largo de cinco libros, nos tomó cinco libros intentar conocerlo un poquito y lo hacemos solo al rasgar e intentar "analizar" su comportamiento y algunas frases de reflexión que tiene de a momentos.
La historia no está mal, es entretenida, siempre está avanzando, no tiene relleno y el universo está bastante interesante. Solo que honestamente me habría gustado encontrarme con un poco más de desarrollo de personaje. -
This shows how good Moorcock can be when he leaves most of the angst behind. There's plenty of fantasy weirdness without passing over the line into dull cosmic abstraction. A talking metal bird, a weak flaming god, and an evocative sense of setting: good stuff. In this volume, Elric acts more like a proper Byronic hero and less like a depressed, angry adolescent, so that's good, too.
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In The Vanishing Tower, Elric becomes a moody wanderer who is of few words but steeped in brooding introspection. It also has perhaps the clearest character development of any Elric novel in the series so far.
The first Elric novel, Elric of Melniboné is perfectly paced and deeply enjoyable. It demonstrates an engaging and unique prose style that carries the story rapidly, and has a wide cast of interesting and believable characters. The second novel, Sailor on the Seas of Fate is less refined. It reads a lot like a few short stories tacked together and generally doesn't continue the events of the first novel in any meaningful way. For resolution of the first novel, one must wait until The Weird of the White Wolf which is the true sequel to the first novel - in the sense that it addresses the questions left open at the end of Elric of Melniboné. Like Sailor on the Seas of Fate however, The Weird of the White Wolf has significant issues with pacing. Perhaps it is symptomatic of it quite literally being a few short stories adapted to fit together, but the complete novel feels off. The most significant action occurs in the first part, and the latter two thirds of the book feels more like appendices than adventures on the same level as the first.
The Vanishing Tower is a much more refined effort than the two novels that preceded it. It feels planned - and it is clear to see real development of the characters. Elric is pushed further and further into despair over the course of this novel, and the descent is tangible. The characters also finally reach a significant location which has been mentioned regularly since the first book. I won't reveal where so as not to spoil it if you haven't read the series, but suffice to say this location comes under significant threat, and Elric deals with this threat in a satisfying way (that also ties into the greater Moorcock multiverse).
Overall, in my view this is the strongest Elric novel since the opener. It has generated a lot of tension going in to the following novels. I only hope that the conclusion to the core Elric series (in two books time) will release this tension well - and I think this book has restored my faith in Moorcock's ability to do so. -
Moorcock presenta más facetas del Emperador Albino en estas tres historias que van muy correlacionadas, lo que finalmente, como en el primer libro, da una sensación de historia conjunta y no solo una sucesión de relatos que podrían leerse sin orden.
Elric finalmente tiene un villano a su altura, el hechicero que conocemos en el último relato de El Misterio del Lobo Blanco y su presencia da más cohesión a estas adictivas historias, además de verdaderos retos para el príncipe pálido.
Los tres relatos aquí sirven para recuperar algunos personajes ya conocidos, siendo la tercera parte, "Tres héroes con un mismo propósito", la que más me ha gustado porque nos ha dejado entrever muchas más cosas sobre el Multiverso y de las demás encarnaciones del Campeón Eterno...
No podría decir más que no haya dicho hace poco sobre las aventuras de Elric. Hoy en día podrán ya no ser tan impactantes como en su tiempo, pero siguen teniendo un especial atractivo, con esos aires místicos y cósmicos, y su desesperado protagonista. -
This series does not keep its momentum very well, but I am crossing my fingers that the last few books of Elric are not as drab as this one. "Drab" might be a bit strong since the book has a lot of action, beautiful sorceresses, strong dude-bonds, and demonic redheads- but it all seems so passé!
What drew me into the series in the first place, Elric's weakened condition and intellectual musings, has been all but absent in this entry. So when the book should be full of gripping action sequences pitting Elric's wit against the forces of Evil, it only left me thinking, "oh great, another chance for Elric to bemoan his situation to Arioch and describe his over-sized, pulsating black sword. And yup- he was saved by some random spell of his ancestors' distant past that just so happened to be exactly what he needed oh and yup, there he goes describing his sword again..." -
Some very brief thoughts here. The episodic quality of these stories seems to put some people off, and that is a matter of taste. I enjoy the meandering quality of the books. So many fantasy works have a tightly focused quest that it's refreshing to have a break from that, more like the wanderings of Conan. I have never found the "transgressive" agenda of the books to be fully successful. Moorcock has discussed these works as an anti-Tolkien experience, but they still seem deeply enmeshed inn the tropes of that style. Still, in spite of my usual distaste for medieval fantasy, I find this series an intelligent and appealing exception.
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Elric mopes his way into a fourth book in pursuit of the sorcerer who escaped him in the third. At this point I'm pretty sure Elric's superpower is making things worse for himself. Probably comes from carting around that sword all the time. Worse than the One Ring, that thing.
The Vanishing Tower has some good ideas and nice imagery, but I could reprint most of my critique of the last book and it'd be just as valid. At least Elric gets a vacation for a while. -
Probably the best know of the Eternal Champion incarnations. Elric is a tragic figure, enough to make an ancient Greek weep with joy. Great fantasy epic. Not your Tolkien style story. Very good plots and characters. Highly recommended.
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70's pulpy goodness
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I was disappointed with book 3, but this one was as good as the first 2.
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Elric vs Theleb K'aarna, in three exciting novellas, merged together to form...a novel of sorts. Elric battles a recently acquired arch-nemesis, as well as battling himself, and his tragic love affairs continue unabated.
It was this volume, more than any to date, that I came to appreciate the philosophy of Moorcock's magic system, as practiced by Elric. Summoning Arioch at the first sign of trouble with some chance that he would not respond had pretty much worn thin. The idea that the Gods, and divine beings, have their own struggles, and magical summonings used to take advantage of this is a solid concept. Rather than memorizing spells for particular effects, one invests in mythical lore, learning of the antagonisms between divine entities. To battle a particular demon, simply summon that demon's nemesis, who will do the job for you. There is a simplicity and an elegance to this system. The summoning itself can become as easy or difficult as the story requires, and smacks heavily of ancient Greek magic. Without googling, I wonder how much (or little) Moorcock 'world-built' this system in advance, or whether names and relationships were plucked out of the ether and wreathed in appropriate language to suit the tale at hand. Not in itself a bad thing, and while I appreciate a decent world build as much as the next fantasy buff, a solid core understanding of how elements of story will pan out is enough of a basis for a cracking story.
Moonglum is hanging around too, which is usually not a good sign, as Elric's companion's life expectancy is not long.
Moorcock explores the multiverse more with this merged collection, and again we meet other elements of the Eternal Champion. With the 3 heroes linking arms and causing a swathe of destruction upon their shared obstacles, I am reminded of this in one of the Corum books I'd read ages ago. Just how far I'll be taking this Moorcock reading to explore this in full I'm not sure yet, but I do have quite the collection sitting on the shelf waiting for the read, and, like Stormbringer, they are murmuring in anticipation of finally getting read.
Again, a breezy fantasy read, short, and am happy to keep reading the next ones in line. I have felt that the Elric stories are the core of Moorcock's fantasy stories, and while I've nibbled a few of his other series, I always felt that I should have read the Elric series to ground all of the others. Let's see how accurate that is should I make an epic Moorcock reading adventure for this year.
