Ken Follett World Without End Ep
Reney Shammo
The story centers around the lives of several young people. Merthin and Ralph, the two sons of a disgraced knight, have very different personalities and ambitions. While Merthin aspires to be a master builder (and eventually to remodel the Kingsbridge cathedral), Ralph tries to regain the family position by serving the Lord of Shiring and becoming a knight. Merthin is intelligent and kindhearted; Ralph is proud and cruel, reminiscent of the evil William Hamleigh from the previous book.
Merthin spends most of his life trying to marry Caris, the daughter of a wealthy wool merchant. Though she loves Merthin and has a sexual relationship with him, Caris is unwilling to give up her own independence. As a young woman, she shrewdly helps her father with his business, developing a prosperous new way of making cloth; when circumstances conspire against her forcing her to become a nun, she becomes adept at the art of healing and a leader in the convent.
By making Caris into a modern mouthpiece, Follett shows that he cannot simply create and enjoy the world of the Middle Ages without judging it by his own standards. Though the book does contain a rich and fairly accurate tapestry of life in a medieval town, the picture is somewhat distorted by the insertion of such an anachronistic character. Despite this, I did enjoy the book and found it about on par with its predecessor, The Pillars of the Earth.
Ken Follett's novel World Without End is the companion volume to his earlier book, The Pillars of the Earth, published in 1989. In Pillars, set in twelfth-century England, Follett told the story of the people who built a cathedral in the fictional town of Kingsbridge. World Without End is set two hundred years later in the same town, with the cathedral in place and with some of the same families present several generations later, as we can tell by surnames like Builder or Barber that, like the professions they designate, descend from father to son. World Without End is also a story about progress and its effects. Kingsbridge Cathedral, a towering achievement in its time turns out to be structurally unsound, and the current generation must find ways to rebuild and repair it based on better knowledge and the perspective of years.
Ken Follett was born June 5, 1949, in Cardiff, Glamorgan, Wales, to Martin D. Follett (a tax collector) and Lavinia C. (Evans) Follett. Follett and his family moved from Wales to London when the author was ten years old. During the years in London, Follett, who was bored in school, began playing guitar and learning songs popularized by Bob Dylan and the Beatles.
Follett was educated at University College, where he studied philosophy and received a bachelor of arts degree in 1970. As a student in the 1960s, he was involved in political activities, including protests against the Vietnam War and opposition to apartheid in South Africa.
After graduating from college, Follett worked as a journalist and pop music critic in Cardiff and London. He began writing fiction on the side and took a position at Everest Books in 1974 in order to learn more about the publishing industry. Although he had already published several novels (including several murder mysteries under the pseudonyms Symon Myles, Piers Roper, and Bernard L. Ross), his first major success was a spy novel, Eye of the Needle, published in 1978, which won that year's Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America. It was made into a popular movie in 1981.
In 1968 Follett married Mary Emma Ruth Elson, with whom he had a son and a daughter. The couple divorced in 1984. Follett married Barbara Broer in 1985. His wife is a member of the British Parliament and an active member of the Labour party. She was recently appointed as Minister for the East of England and Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State in the Department for Work and Pensions. The couple resides in London, England.
The book opens on Halloween, with the inhabitants of Kingsbridge awaiting the All Hallows service on the following day. Gwenda, age eight, is instructed in the art of pickpocketing as a means to help her poor and hungry family, and is sent into the gathering crowd to do her job. She succeeds in stealing Sir Gerald's coin purse, which is dangling in reach from the man's belt.
Chapter 2 introduces us to another of the four children who become central characters of the novel. Eleven-year-old Merthin is the son of Sir Gerald, from whom Gwenda has stolen the money. His family, once aristocratic, is no longer well-off, and the loss is a great hardship. Merthin's brother Ralph is the third of the central characters to be introduced. Caris, the fourth key character, is the daughter of Edmund Wooler. For differing reasons, the four children end up together in the forest outside of town. Ralph and Merthin go there to practice shooting arrows at targets, an idea suggested by the clever Gwenda, who accompanies them. Meanwhile, Gwenda is fleeing from town to avoid being caught for her thievery. In the forest the children encounter a knight, Thomas Langley, who bears a secret that will turn out to be a central part of the remaining story. He is on the run from a pair of thugs, who show up right behind him. They have stolen Gwenda's money package and buried it out of sight. With help from the others, Ralph, skilled in archery, fends off and kills the thugs. Thomas loses an arm from the injury he sustains in the attack, and the children work together to set his bleeding wound.
In Chapter 3, the children return from the forest. Gwenda goes to Caris's luxurious family home to look at the puppies they have been keeping. Caris offers Gwenda one of the puppies, and the two become fast friends. Caris's mother suffers from a wasting disease and is on the verge of death. She seeks out the help of Sister Cecelia, who provides comfort but says that there is nothing she can do, and that God is the only healer.
Chapter 4 takes us inside the cathedral and into the lives of the monks and nuns who live and work there. Brother Godwyn longs to study at Oxford, but Prior Anthony does not approve of this plan. Thomas, the knight the children encountered in the forest, enters the monastery just as he has told the children that he would. As Part I closes in Chapter 5, Gwenda tells her father that she has lost her money (the thugs took it), and he returns to the forest with her to recover it from the dead bodies. Caris's mother dies, and she is left in the care of her aunt Petranilla, the mother of Godwyn.
In Part II, which takes place ten years later, Merthin is twenty-one years old and an apprentice builder, with Elfric as his master. Merthin is fabulously talented, while Elfric is not. Merthin and Caris are in love but stay chaste, although Merthin is subject to lust and being seduced by other women, including Elfric's ugly daughter Griselda. Griselda, who is already pregnant by another man, lures Merthin into a sexual encounter so that she can entrap him into marriage and name him as the father of her child.
Gwenda is in love with Wulfric, but Wulfric is in love with the vivacious Annet Perkin. Caris, who remains close with Gwenda, wants to help her get Wulfric's attention. She therefore obtains a love potion from Mattie Wise. But Gwenda's father, the no-good Joby, has other plans. He connives to sell Gwenda into prostitution in exchange for a cow. Fortunately, Gwenda manages to kill her captor and escape. Gwenda's ambitious brother Philemon enters the monastery and becomes Godwyn's right-hand-man.
The coming Fleece Fair is threatened by the possibility that the Italian buyers will go to another town to buy their fleece. This is a continuing concern throughout Chapters 7 and 8. Part II closes with the collapse of the bridge just as Fleece Week begins and the crowds are trying to get across. Many die, including Wulfric's entire family. Gwenda escapes by swimming across the river while others drown. Without the bridge, merchants cannot get to the town to sell their fleece.
Part III begins with a description of the horrific results of the bridge's collapse. Mother Cecelia organizes a crew to care for the wounded, in which Caris distinguishes herself for her calm manner and problem-solving ability. The priests are busy performing funerals while the townspeople make shrouds.
Prior Anthony is one of the victims of the bridge collapse, so Kingsbridge will need a new prior. Godwyn shows his desire to be prior of Kingsbridge and, with the help of Philemon, begins to think of strategies to obtain this goal. Blind Brother Carlus is also in line to be prior. In spite, Godwyn makes a plan to rearrange the furniture before a big funeral so that blind Carlus will trip in the processional and lose favor. He succeeds in this plan, but new candidates for the job emerge, including the nephew of Earl Roland. Father Murdo is another possible candidate for priorship. He is not considered bright, but he is well liked by the multitude.
More revelations emerge concerning the secrets of Thomas Langley, the knight the children encountered in the forest, who is now a monk. We learn that the secret had something to do with Queen Isabella and a parcel of land.
Wulfric and Gwenda take the ferry built by Merthin, leaving Kingsbridge together to return to their village of Wigleigh after the bridge's collapse. Gwenda continues to be in love with Wulfric, but Wulfric plans to marry Annet Perkin. Gwenda begins to help Wulfric to tend his fields, hoping to win his love. Wulfric finds that he may not be able to receive the inheritance that is due him. Gwenda tries to help him get it back, and Wulfric is impressed with her efforts. She continues to work the fields, while Wulfric's fiancee Annet looks on. Joby, Gwenda's father, tries to sell her off once again, but Gwenda sets the house on fire and escapes.
Griselda's entrapment of Merthin becomes clear, so the two are not forced to marry. Elfric fires Merthin only six months before the end of his apprenticeship. Elfric will not give Merthin back his tools, leaving Merthin with little chance of making his own living. Merthin finds some work but thinks about leaving Kingsbridge in order to increase his chances. Meanwhile, Elfric continues to fight Merthin in all his efforts. Merthin is the obvious candidate to build a new bridge to replace the one that collapsed. Edmund supports him in this.
b37509886e