Crossposted from my blog2 StarsI’ve spoken about my love of all things Arthurian before, so I was really expecting to enjoy this book. All the ingredients are there – it’s centered on a character I normally like, on events that are often just skated over as prologue, and grounded in more unique ‘realistic’ Dark Age Britain than the typical ‘castles and knights’ setting. It was also pretty popular back in its day. Alas, I learn, yet again, that popularity often has little to do with quality. It’s not that I actively dislike the book – it’s solidly in ‘ok’ territory – but I can’t really think of anything I liked about it either. There were a lot of neat ideas but, like every character in this novel, they were never developed.It’s told, first-person, from Merlin’s perspective as an old man looking back on his life. However, the first few pages of the prologue, where Merlin describes how his memory works as an old man ‘the recent past is misted while distant scenes of memory are clear and brightly coloured’ is the last time the narrator sounds the age he is meant to be. When describing his childhood, he sounds like neither a child or an old man looking back on events – his voice simply narrates things, as they happened, with very little passion or personality, even when describing his strongest feelings. It’s all a bit too measured and distanced so that, despite being the narrator, I never felt remotely drawn to him or that I had any sort of grip on his personality. Since Merlin was both the narrator and the only character that seemed intended as more than a bunch of familiar stereotypes, this was a pretty big problem.The story chugs away pretty slowly and, because I wasn’t enamoured with the narration, at times it felt a bit like wading through treacle. Even when things did happen, though, I didn’t feel particularly excited. Everything had a tendency to happen to the characters, rather than the characters doing things for themselves. Even declaring war seemed to be just a natural course of events rather than a proactive decision made by a person. This lack of agency was only enhanced by Merlin’s magic – which rather unsatisfactorily seemed to consist of knowing what to do and that he would get out ok. As he says himself ‘I am a spirit, a word, a thing of air and darkness, and I can no more help what I am doing than a reed can help the wind of god blowing through it’. Which means that, since Merlin never once tries to stray from this path or do anything for himself without ‘the wind of god’, that there’s really no tension, and that anything Merlin does achieve isn’t something that can really be attributed to his character but to the undefined ‘god’. It robs Merlin of the moral ambiguity he should have and makes him a dumb, uninteresting, tool instead of a great, cunning and complex character. Throughout the later sections of the book when Merlin’s reputation had grown far and wide, all I could think of was ‘why? He’s done nothing for himself yet’. If his personality had been more complex, this wouldn’t be a problem, but his personality was simply ‘I am the breath of god’ and never got any further than that.And if you don’t like Merlin there’s really no one to relate to or care about in this book. His servants Cadal and Cerdic are both quite likable – but almost completely interchangeable. His teachers Galapas and Belasius have quite different methods and attitudes, but don’t get meaty enough roles for this to even be an interesting contrast. Ambrosius is wise and patient, Uther is rash, petty and impulsive. Every female is either a saint, ‘slut’, or nursemaid. The simplistic style of both the narration and the characterisation actually left me stunned when, in the last half I discovered through repeated casual use of the word ‘slut’ and one boob-groping almost-sex scene that this wasn’t written as a children’s book. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think that makes it unsuitable for most kids (I would probably have really enjoyed this book about 15 years ago) but it’s a pretty stong indicator it wasn’t meant to be aimed at them. Which left me naturally wondering who exactly it was aimed at, because it really doesn’t read like a book aimed at adults either.Eventually, the author’s note at the back of the book clued me in – people who enjoy the Arthur myth. Well, I love the King Arthur myth and it didn’t work for me. When Merlin visits the well outside Galapas’ cave I wasn’t thinking ‘oh, that’s a really clever reference to a line in Monmouth’ or when Belasius becomes Merlin’s tutor I wasn’t going ‘Ah, the romanised name of a character who got mentioned in an offhand remark in Monmouth’. Was I hell, I was hoping that they would be interesting and relevant characters and events in this book, the one I was actually reading. I’ve got nothing against these little references, actually I really like them usually, but if they take up that much page-time they need to serve a narrative purpose too. As it is there was a huge section of ‘part II’ that dealt with Merlin discovering that Belasius was a druid – and that’s not even a spoiler because literally nothing developed out of this multi-chapter waste of time and it was hardly mentioned again. The only purpose, seemingly, was to fit in the names of a couple of characters from Monmouth – one who did reappear towards the end, but in such a totally minor role that he may as well have been introduced to the reader then.Despite all that I wouldn’t say it’s a bad book. Most of it would make an alright children’s novel and the only thing I really took offense to was the casual misogyny and the way in which every single female character was portrayed. And yes, part of this is the setting but I don’t think that’s an excuse – A Song of Ice and Fire has an even more misogynist setting with an even more pervasive rape culture, but it still manages to have strong female characters and to indicate that there is something deeply wrong and unpleasant with the anti-female attitudes of the societies it portrays. Merlin, however, despite hearing that his mother was beaten almost into miscarriage for getting pregnant outside marriage, despite observing the way she was treated, even despite learning later exactly how long his mother had known his father, still goes about throwing words like ‘slut’ around to describe a serving girl in a relationship with her master and then has the audacity to complain that she left him to fend for himself when her master leaves the house. This on the same page as he’s mooning over a totally transparently non-celibate nun. Only Niniane and Ygraine escape with anything remotely resembling complex characterisation – and even then it’s all about their love lives.All in all a disappointing book on a huge number of levels for me. But I wouldn’t tell other people not to read it. I can see why people might like it but it simply didn’t work for me. As a retelling of Merlin’s early life I guess the ideas are quite interesting, as a story in its own right it’s simply dull. The elements are all there, but they’ve been stuck together with plasticine.I’m half tempted to read the rest of the series anyway, just to see how Stewart handles King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, but there are so many other books out there that I know I’ll enjoy, that I probably won’t bother.
Alas, The Crystal Cave has lost the glamour that it had exercised over my mind since I first read it when I was around 12 or 13. I can remember possessing the Science Fiction Book Club edition, one of the first books I (ahem…mom) bought after joining the club, and I remember being enthralled by the story of Merlin’s early life and the telling of Arthur’s story from a mostly historical, nonfastastical point of view.And I still enjoyed reading it this time. I recalled many scenes from my first reading (which does suggest the impact it had on me as a kid) and I still appreciate Stewart’s version of “what really happened.”But I’m no longer that 13-year old, and I would likely have given it a reserved, not enthusiastic three stars if I were rating it today.I rapidly lost interest in the story in the midst of the second book. Upon reflection, I believe it came about because Merlin – even over the course of this first book – rapidly began to lose his humanity and the tale turned to Arthur, whom I found boring at the time. The first part of The Crystal Cave is interesting precisely because we’re watching a little boy trying to come to grips with the absence of his father, his own genius and an unreliable ability to See. By the time Merlin grows up and returns to Britain to prepare the way for Ambrosius’ – his father’s – invasion, he’s become something of a self-righteous fanatic and misogynist.A second reason the The Crystal Cave has lost its “magic” is that I’m far more knowledgeable about the period than I was at 13. The physical evocation of late-5th century Britain remains believable but the politics and the ethos of the Britons doesn’t ring as true. For example, did the Britons ever consider themselves “Britons”? I recently finished a book (UnRoman Britain: Exposing the Great Myth of Britannia) that argues not only did the Britons never fully assimilate into the Roman Empire, they never forgot the tribal associations of their pre-Roman history.I’m going to go ahead and reread The Hollow Hills to see if my reactions this time are similar or whether my growth as a reader will have changed my perceptions. If they have, I’ll finally have the incentive to finish the series with The Last Enchantment and The Wicked Day.
What do You think about The Crystal Cave (2003)?
Would you recommend this book to someone who is has never read any Arthurian legends before? Like, I have a basic idea of what happens and the characters in each of the legends, and I watch that tv show Merlin (which I doubt is very accurate, but still). Do you think I would find this series as enjoyable as you did?
—Jackie
There's still a lot about The Crystal Cave that bothers me, but I think, on balance, I liked it better now than I did the first time I read it. As I've said, it's Misogynistic Merlin, which is my least favourite flavour -- you have some clear-headed, quick-thinking, powerful women, but then you have lines like this: "Duchess and slut alike, they need not even study to deceive." And the whole bit about weak female magic and Merlin needing to be a virgin and blahblahblah. Could definitely have done without that.Still, not having recently read Sword at Sunset, or anything else of Rosemary Sutcliff's, this managed to have something of that flavour without the narration, and the characterisation of Ambrosius, being too much overshadowed by Sutcliff. I know for sure which one is the better book, and which one I enjoy more, but this doesn't stand up so badly when it's not right up against something by a master like Sutcliff. I got more into the relationships this time, though I wish Merlin didn't leave such a trail of servant characters dead in his wake. I liked Cerdic, liked Cadal; their deaths because of their faith in Merlin were pretty hard to take. I know he does acknowledge a measure of that but still, gah. The relationship between Merlin and Ambrosius really does work, though, the slow realisation of what's going on there, and their closeness. Also the fact that Merlin isn't forced to be a warrior (though that makes the ending, where he is, doubly odd).The mix of magic and science here is a little weird. The standing stones are raised using math, but the prophecy really is second sight; the dragons are just symbols, but the vision is real. It's like a step between out-and-out fantasy and realism. There's nothing wrong with that, I suppose, but I tend to prefer things that go at it a bit more unequivocally! If Merlin can see the future, why is there no other magic in the world?Anyway, I'm going on to the other books now, though I seem to recall from summaries there's more flavours of misogynistic Merlin awaiting me.
—Nikki
It's hard to put my finger on what bothered me about The Crystal Cave. On the surface, it's something I should love: other people whose taste I trust loved it, and tore through it; it deals with Merlin, whose life I'm interested in; it's set in Wales; I enjoy elaborations on less explored facets of the legends... But somehow, it just took me far too long to get through it, and I happily abandoned it for whatever else looked interesting, given half a chance.Merlin's voice never quite felt real to me, for a start. I know that it's a retrospective voice, but it's so very measured, and few parts felt truly passionate. The one image that's likely to stick in my head is actually the image of Merlin travelling back to England with the king-stone stolen from Ireland, while Ambrosius lies in bed dying. The relationship between those two, I enjoyed. Mary Stewart's Ambrosius was quite similar to Rosemary Sutcliff's Ambrosius, though, which didn't do this book any favours, since I got to the part with Ambrosius after having read Sutcliff's Sword at Sunset.The whole thing about Merlin needing to remain a virgin bothered me a little. I dislike the 'women are eviiil and will steal your poweeer' trope, even if it is balanced a little by the strong and clear-headed figures of Niniane and Ygraine -- although I would have loved to see more of those two women as women, and not just the concern about who they were sleeping with. And there were several throwaway comments about women that made me disinclined to like Merlin, e.g. "Duchess and slut alike, they need not even study to deceive."I was also fond of a couple of minor characters, who died, which doesn't help with my disinclination to read the rest of the series. Maybe someday, not now.
—Nikki
