Krishna
John Segundus joins a society of ‘gentlemen’ magicians in York. When asked why no one was practicing magic while all were studying it, he was told that to perform magic is ungentlemanly. He was shot down and insulted by Dr Foxcastle. Mr Honeyfoot was much taken in by Segundus and they discussed well into the night why there was no magic being done in England anymore. Then Honeyfoot had an idea.
He had heard of a true magician who could do magic who lived in a remote village. Segundus and Honeyfoot meet him and are impressed with the library he had. But they had no occasion to pursue the books there. When they are back, they report that the magician, Mr Norrell, could do magic but found the fellow magicians in the society very skeptical.
They write to him asking if he could come to York and perform his magic. After raging against them for being skeptical, he agrees to perform magic in the local cathedral at the appointed hour. But there is a condition. If he could successfully do it, they should stop calling themselves magicians. If he loses, then he will never again claim that he can do magic as long as he lives.
On that day, they are surprised to find no Norrell there but his assistant assures them that he can do magic from afar. They are astounded when all the statues in the cathedral start speaking of the things they have witnessed in their hundreds of years of existence.
Mr Norrell decides to come to London given his newfound fame but sees that in the first party that he agreed to attend, no one recognizes him.
Later he is befriended by one Drawlight who assures him that he will make Norrell famous and respected. He is really hoping to ride in the coattails of Mr Norrell to stardom and wealth.
When he learns that Sir Walter’s sickly betrothed Miss Wintertowne died before he could get his hands on her wealth by marrying her, Mr Norrell decides to reanimate her back to life.
The act itself is funny. Insisting on solitude, he sits next to the dead young woman’s body and chants the magic words. A spirit apparition appears and says that he is the greatest in the world. His fees for restoring the lady is half her remaining life and a chance to help Norrell in all his future jobs and also to provide advice. Norrell accepts.
When the lady is revived, it astonishes and pleases the household. They also notice that one of the fingers of the revived lady has disappeared!
Now that he has gained credibility, the next attack on the French seems to have an enormous number of British ships blockading all French ports! The astonished French two very brave sailors to investigate where weird things are seen. One ship seems to shimmer a bit and when the sun peeks out briefly, all ships vanish for a moment. They then find the truth: The ships are “made” from rain water! (It suddenly clouded in all ports and started raining hard).
Vinculus, the only magician who refuses to leave London as Mr Norrell wanted, amazes his servant xxx with a real magic show of cards (The cards which xxx had taken but strangely transformed!)
Meanwhile the scene shifts to Lauren Strange who is the father of Jonathan Strange. The father was vindictive and obstinate and to punish a student, leaves the windows of the room open. He himself freezes to death and the servant survives. Jonathan Strange is in love with a girl but she, daughter of a curate, does not care for him, money or no money. He goes to her village with a servant to propose and on the way when he enters a village, finds that there seem to be no adults in the village. Just outside, though, they meet a huge crowd staring at a hedge.
Strange learns that they are staring at a magician sleeping in open air in a freezy night in the hedge and are afraid to wake a magician, lest he brings what he is dreaming back into the world. He then opens his eyes, says he is Vinculus and says that the second great magician in all of England is he, Jonathan Strange!
Strange manages to do a couple of tricks and is surprised by his success. He then meets two of the ex magicians and he requests a meeting with Mr Norrell. Mr Norrell agrees, thinking that Strange is another of those faux magicians. They meet and seem to dislike each other at first sight. Norrell, of course, while professing to bring magic back to England, does not want any competition to himself. Stange does not agree with many of Norrel’s theories including blackballing the greatest of the ancient magicians, The Raven King.
Meanwhile Stephen Black and Miss Wintertowne are under a spell and made to participate in balls and dancing every year by the thistle headed man so that they both are totally tired during the day. But the admiring man keeps pouring Stephen with great wealth and Stephen cannot escape his ‘good fortune’ no matter how he tries. A dog comes and gives him a commendation; he ‘finds’ gold coins a very valuable sceptre, a crystal ball, a crown – without even trying.
The book flags a bit when Strange, who becomes a student of Norrell finally after making a book change places with its image in the mirror (don’t ask!). He goes to Poland to help General Washington defeat the French. He helps the British by ‘paving’ good roads by magic which lasts only a limited time and helps the British move faster. All boring stuff.
Meanwhile Childermass goes after Vinculus because he believes that Vinculus has the original magic book of The Raven King with him. He tracks the whereabouts of Vinculus and reports back to Norrell.
The story veers between ‘interesting’ and ‘juvenile’ and that is why I found the story very irritating. When Mr Norrell refuses to cure the mad king of England with magic, they invite Strange. He secretly visits the King who seems to see a tall gentleman behind Strange and addresses himself to this invisible man. When he agrees to go out with Strange, the doctors who are phenomenally upset with anything magic confront him with strange tales of his assistants being locked up in a brooms cupboard and the brooms beating him causing bruises all over his body.
The king behaves as a perfect idiot child all the way through – supposedly due to madness.
Later, Strange and Norrell part ways because Strange – as a loose cannon – wrote a critical article about another piece he himself assisted in publishing. Then the story totally goes down, with Strange accompanying General Wellington in his campaigns and using magic to subdue the French and more importantly, Napoleon (in Waterloo, no less).
The man with the thistle down hair admits to Stephen he is a fairy and is determined to make Stephen the King of England. He also tells him that he is now tiring of Lady Pole and she promptly dies! He now has his sights on Mrs Strange and lures her into his kingdom, this time with the intent to keep her permanently. Strange gets a shock when she disappears but then she appears back equally mysteriously.
This is why I am not charmed by the novel, it just wanders all over the place, with ostensibly no fixed aim. The humour running through and the magical plots are partly interesting, but is it enough? There does not seem to be any common thread among the seemingly disjointed story lines.
The story moves to weirder places. By learning how to ‘go mad’ from a cat woman who eats mice than prefer human food, he learns how to go mad and first succeeds in getting the fairie (the thistle down man because he is one) on command and manages to reach the fairie ballroom. He meets Arabella there but the fairie seems to have banished him to an island. Do you follow any of these? Nor did I, when I read it. Such a waste of a plot!
Strange has completely gone mad and the story turns totally senseless. Not even worth describing at this point. Suffice it to say that he has become uninterested in his personal self and is obsessed with doing magic. Outside world spreads rumours about him.
When Drawlight confronts him, Strange sends multiple messages to Childermass, to Mr Norrell himself. Sends letters and also a small box with a finger in it. He exposes Mr Norrel’s follies with the fairie but Drawlight is too frightened. Lascalles meets him on the path back, learns all the secrets and shoots him dead in a seemingly enchanted place. And then he goes back, lies to Childermass and Mr Norrell and is found out by Childermass. He is humiliated and demands that Mr Norrell choose between them both and Mr Norrell sides with Lascalles. Childermass leaves Mr Norrell’s employment in disgust.
Later, Mr Norrell realizes that Strange is in his own house now, and Lascalles, with pistols and Lead Chains (since lead is protected against any magic) goes to bind Strange’s hands. But on the way, Mr Norrell seems to walk through a wall and disappears, alone to confront Strange. Lascalles goes back to the study, with his pistols and waits for either one to appear. He is determined to shoot instantly if it is Strange who comes back.
Then, weirdly, the servants and Lascalles all decide to exit the house and go away. You go ‘huh?’.
In the library, Mr Norrell and Strange meet but they do not seem to fight. Instead they cooperate in getting Mrs Strange back through summoning John Uskglass aka The Raven King. It all feels a lot tedious.
And a lot of people are killed and one resurrected. This includes the thistle down hair man, who we understand is a fairie and not a good one either.
There are a whole lot of loose ends. The ending itself is one, though I don’t know how else the author could have ended it if not this way. Then there is the question of what happened to The Raven King, who, apart from a shadowy presence, never appears? Where did Simon Black, the butler, go eventually?
Does the author plan a sequel? Is that why so many questions have been left unanswered?
Finally, when I think back, what are my impressions of this book? There is magic and there is surely humour. But everything seems to hop around a lot and things introduced (the magically shining coins in the pub to quote an example) never make an appearance again. Almost like the weird background characters wandering about in Star War movies.
And people really behave in unpredictable ways and sometimes in fairly irrational manner. Otherwise capable people turn into a childish version of themselves suddenly. These jar.
So did I not like this book then? There is still a lot to like; the story is unusual and holds your interest almost all the way through.
Not a spectacular book, but different, and partly interesting.
5/10
— Krishna