A Night in the Lonesome October – Roger Zelazny, 1993
Having dealt with the immensity of The Book of the New Sun last week, and with this being the last post before Halloween, I thought it was a perfect time to look at perhaps the best Halloween book ever written: Roger Zelazny's A Night in the Lonesome October.
Snuff is watchdog and faithful companion to Jack, who wields a knife, and they have come, in the last days of September, to a small village outside London. Others too, soon take up residence. There is the cackling Jill, who flies through the night on her broomstick, and her cat Greymalk. There are Morris and MacCab, bodysnatchers, and Larry Talbot, who becomes a good deal more lupine at the full moon. There is the Mad Monk Rastov and Owen, the Welsh druid. The Good Doctor, along with his hunchbacked associate and a third man, a huge, hulking figure, arrive at an old farm house, while the sinister Count prefers a disused crypt. All these varied persons have an animal associate with them, and all are come to take part in the Game. Some are openers, and will, at the full moon on All Hallows Eve, attempt to open the doorway, that the eldritch elder gods may return, while the closers work to ensure this never happens, but, for much of the story, no one knows who is on their side, and who is against them. And all the while, the Great Detective and his trusted companion dog their heels, determined to solve the mystery of what will happen on a night in the lonesome October.
 |
| All rights Gahan Wilson |
As I stated in my review of Zelazny's Lord of Light, his trademark as a writer, along with some sparkling prose, is his way of taking established mythologies, sifting them through his own imagination and crafting superlative tales. This time he delves into far more modern legends, those of the quintessential horror stories and classic monster movies, grisly Victoriana, the Cthulhu Mythos and the Sherlock Holmes canon. His spin is to give centre stage to the player's animal comrades, making their interactions, their alliances and enmities the focus of the book and relegating the icons of book and film to supporting characters and cameos, referred to, but only appearing intermittently. It is therefore, Snuff, Jack's dog, who is our narrator-protagonist and Zelazny's writing of the canine is a delight throughout as Snuff's voice walks a perfect line between wry and satirical. The book can be uproariously funny at times, particularly when Zelazny lampshades horror tropes: 'The master's blade flashed, the woman screamed and there was a rending of garments...Why his list of materials required the edge of a green cloak worn by a red-haired lady on this date at midnight and removed while still on her person, I am uncertain. Magical rotas sometimes strike me as instructions for lunatic scavenger hunts.'1. As the novel goes on, however, and the situation becomes more critical, Snuff's relaxed, deadpan narration means that we understand immediately how dire things are without Zelazny needing to force a sudden, dramatic change in tone: we take it seriously because our wry, understated narrator is taking it seriously.
As well as the obvious homage to the horror genre, there are more nuanced overtones of the spy and detective story, as Snuff carefully manoeuvres his way through the Game, swapping information and forging temporary alliances while trying to solve the central mystery – where the ceremony will need to take place. An even subtler nod comes in his relationship with Graymalk, which has all the frisson and wit of Bogart and Bacall at their finest, albeit in a rather more understated, English manner. Zelazny also uses their growing respect and understanding as a stand-in for the one that develops between Jack and Crazy Jill, and therefore he only needs to allude to several shared carriage rides and meals, and, with Snuff and Graymalk's repartee in mind, we already have a full picture of their relationship.
 |
| All rights Gahan Wilson |
The interactions between the animals is also heightened by the fact that when the legends do appear, Zelazny writes them as just that: legends. Indeed, the way that I refer to them in my summary is how they are referred to throughout: the names 'Frankenstein', 'Dracula' or 'Sherlock Holmes' are never mentioned. Zelazny is uninterested in delving into their psyches or presenting a new interpretation; they are there to be excellently written archetypes. When Snuff first encounters Holmes, he remarks 'As a watchdog, I could appreciate the mode of total attentiveness he assumed. It was not a normal human attitude. It was as if his entire being was concentrated in the moment, sensitive to every scrap of intelligence our encounter furnished'2, which is such a unique way of exactly representing Holmes' abilities. Likewise, Dracula, who appears most infrequently of all, carries with him more than the required menace, as Zelazny makes it clear that even Snuff is intimidated by the Count, though he prefers to use the word 'impressed'3. Indeed, the only established figure who receives much characterisation is Larry Talbot, whom Zelazny develops from the ever-helpless victim of his lycanthropic curse into a more capable figure and worthwhile ally to Snuff.
 |
| All rights Gahan Wilson |
Zelazny's writing is more restrained here, allowing his dryness and wit to come to the fore, though the pared-down style does not limit the ingenuity at work. Snuff's backstory is alluded to in a single sentence, 'I like being a watchdog better than what I was before he summoned me and gave me this job'4, and an entire article at Tor.com has been rightly devoted to the economy and wit of that sentence.
There are also illustrations by Gahan Wilson, which are odd to say the least, but do contribute to the overall eccentricity of the book. Plus he draws an excellent Lon Chaney Jr.:
 |
| All rights Gahan Wilson |
Though it may have less substance than some of Zelazny's other work, this light-hearted homage to a far more modern pantheon is also much more fun to read. The structure helps; thirty-one chapters, plus a prologue, one for each day of October, slowly building from brief, two-to-three page chapters, through the artful politics and drawing of battle lines to the fateful confrontation. I am aware that some fans will try to re-read the book every October, only reading the relevant chapter each day, and I applaud their restraint, as once I begin, I find it is such a glorious read that it's very difficult to stop.
Criminally, this wonderful book is out of print, so if you want a copy, Amazon's your best bet!
1 Zelazny, Roger. A Night in the Lonesome October, Orbit, 1994. pp. 31
2 pp. 46
3 pp. 145
4 pp. 2
Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny – 1967
There is no one like Roger Zelazny.
As well as penning the Chronicles of Amber series, Roger Zelazny is perhaps best known for beginning with established mythologies and crafting wry, superlatively written epics from them. Before Lord of Light, I had read two others, Creatures of Light and Darkness, his highly experimental, mostly successful, re-shaping of the Egyptian pantheon, and A Night In The Lonesome October, in which he deals with a very different set of legends in a tongue-firmly-in-cheek manner, and which is, incidentally, one of my favourite books of all time. As for Lord of Light, it won the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1968, was the film that the false production company were planning to make in the Oscar winning thriller Argo and has been praised by such illustrious folk as Neil Gaiman and George R.R. Martin, the latter calling it 'one of the great works of our field'1.
'His followers called him Mahasamatman and said he was a god. He preferred to drop the Maha- and the -atman, however, and called himself Sam. He never claimed to be a god, but then he never claimed not to be a god… Therefore there was mystery about him'2
The enigma that Zelazny presents us with in these now famous opening words resonates throughout the novel, as we are presented with a world in which Zelazny extends the often repeated Arthur C Clarke quote that 'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic'3and explores instead the line between sufficiently advanced technology and divinity.
The novel tells of the above mentioned Sam's struggle against the gods of his world, of whom he was once one himself, allying himself with the Rakasha demons of Hellwell, as well as taking on many names and identities, including Siddhartha, Tathagatha, Great-Souled Sam and Buddha, all in order to free humanity from the gods' tyranny. However, as we soon learn, the population of this planet are all the descendants of human passengers from a crashed spaceship, and the gods are the crew and any they have chosen to elevate to godhood. These 'First', of which Sam is one, have lived so long due to a process of technological reincarnation, whereby they transfer their consciousness into a fresh body when their current one grows old, and have continued to further advance their technology to the point of gaining incredible powers, taking names from the Hindu religion, building themselves a city in the sky called Heaven and finally declaring themselves to be gods. All the technology of these human gods, however, is denied to the rest of the world, and even the gaining of a new body has a dark catch added to it: priests called the Masters of Karma, who mentally probe each applicant, and if the applicant is deemed not to have lived a 'good', or obedient, enough life, they are reincarnated into the body of an animal, or worse. This hoarding of fantastical technology, however, creates a political schism, between the Deicrats, the gods and their devotees, who seek to reinforce the gods' divinity and actively discourage scientific progress among the people, and the Accelerationists, who believe it is their duty to teach the people the knowledge they possess and remove the man/god divide.
Not that you will discover much of this initially, as Zelazny allows the reader to grow accustomed to this epic world where Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva's rule is absolute, before chipping away the grandeur, not to mention the divinity, of the gods. All but the first and last chapters are flashbacks, detailing Sam's struggles against Heaven, Brahma and Kali in particular, and the reader is able to experience many of the different ways Sam attempts to undermine the gods' rule, as well as showing the decadent stagnation that the gods' power has brought them. It is also important to note that far from merely not sharing their vast technology, the gods also refuse to allow humanity to make any advances of their own, as Sam notes to Brahma 'The printing press has been rediscovered on three occasions that I can remember, and suppressed each time'4. Brahma's response is a heady mixture of self-aggrandisement and mockery 'they are still children, and like children would play with our gifts and be burnt by them'5.
A frequent criticism of the book is that the characters are not likeable or relatable and I would counter very simply: they're not meant to be. One or two, particularly the weathered Jan Olvegg and Tak, the demi-god archivist reincarnated in an ape's body as punishment for assisting Sam, are appealing characters, but in a novel that explores the line between human and god, it should not be surprising that those who claim godhood are at best inscrutable, and often, having reached the point of genuinely believing their superiority, monstrous. This does not mean that they are not compelling however; we understand the demon chief Taraka's insatiable need to prove himself against the Death-God Yama's powers, even as he betrays Sam, and we experience the shift from quiet pride to solemn fury in Yama himself, when his bride Kali chooses power over his love. Most of all, in Sam, we find a man with phenomenal abilities, who has returned from seeming death several times, holding tight to his humanity to the point of renouncing Heaven to live among humans long before his campaign begins. However impassive and enigmatic he may be, it is not difficult to admire a character who states to the ruling god Brahma, 'I felt that we of the crew should be assisting them, granting them the benefits of the technology we had preserved, rather than building ourselves an impregnable paradise and treating the world as a combination game preserve and whorehouse'6. More impressive still is that when his war is finally won 'he did not remain with his people for a sufficient period of time to warrant much theological by-play'7. While he could have simply taken Brahma's place and ruled himself, Sam stays true to his beliefs and leaves humanity to govern themselves.
Importantly, Zelazny presents us with what thousands of years old humans can remember of Earth religion, and their attempts to replicate that mythology to further their own ends, not these religions themselves. Even so Zelazny examines the power that religion can have: the reader knows that the Englightened Buddha (Sam) is a fraud, yet when one of Kali's assassins, who has been sent to kill Sam, is taken ill before he can do so, he is then looked after by the Buddhists, healed and in time takes up their robes himself. Through listening to Sam's preaching he becomes, in Sam's words 'the only man I ever knew to really achieve enlightenment'8 and is, as such, 'the true Buddha'.
Mighty themes and colossal battles only take a novel so far, however, and what adds the final blast of magic to Lord of Light is Zelazny's writing. The descriptions are beautiful, the action breathtaking; indeed, Zelazny invokes the cadences of actual religious texts to invoke the splendour of his world. Even the arrival of guests for Yama and Kali's wedding has a grandeur and a weight to it: 'They came. Out of the sky, riding on the polar winds, across the seas and lands, over the burning snow, and under it and through it, they came'9. Even in simpler, quieter moments, Zelazny's prose is evocative, often invoking colour in a way that seems to make the ordinary world bright, and Heaven luscious. In this extract, he makes vivid use of primary colours: 'Birds sang in the high, green places of the garden. Fish, like old coins, lay at the bottom of the blue pool. The flowers in bloom were mainly red and big-petaled; but there were also occasional yellow wunlips about her jade bench'10. When pointed out this seems almost simplistic, but in the reading it subliminally conveys the richness of the world. It is also worth noting the humour that seems to confound some readers11, be it the now infamous pun, or quips like 'The Lord of Karma made an ancient and mystical sign behind his back'12 but it is moments like these that humanise the text and keep it from becoming overly dramatic.
There is considerable debate – indeed George R.R. Martin even devotes a section of his Afterward to it – over whether Lord of Light is Science Fiction or Fantasy; though all of the gods' powers are due to technological marvels, reverse-engineered from a crashed spaceship, rather than genuine mysticism, the world they inhabit is home to genuinely magical demons and witches. What this debate misses, however, is exactly the ingenuity of Zelazny in meshing the two – at the time quite distinct – genres into a breathtaking novel of titanic forces and epic battles, as a once-false-god becomes a false prophet in order to end the reign of false gods, and allow humanity's rise. Lord of Light is a stunning novel that deserves all the praise it receives and I can't wait to re-read it and return to the story of one who 'never claimed to be a god. But then he never claimed not to be a god'13.
1 Martin, George R.R. Afterward in Lord of Light, Orion Group, 2009 pp. 290
2 Zelazny, Roger, Lord of Light, Orion Group, 2009 pp. 1
3 Clarke, Arthur C, Hazards of Prophecy: The Failure of Imagination'" in the collection Profiles of the Future: An Enquiry into the Limits of the Possible, 1962 pp. 14, 21, 36.
4 pp. 64
5 pp. 64
6 pp.63-64
7 pp. 282
8 pp. 113
9 pp. 190
10 pp. 259
11 http://www.tor.com/2009/11/09/science-fiction-disguised-as-hindu-fantasy-roger-zelaznys-lemglord-of-lightlemg/
12 pp. 194
13 pp. 282
