-I'm going to just come right out and say it: Mervyn Peake is the greatest writer of the English language the world has ever known. There. I said it, and I can't take it back. It's out there now, floating on the interwebs, for the world to disagree with. But at this point, I don't care if the world disagrees with me; I'm tuning the naysayers out with my rightness. Obviously I haven't read every writer of the English language, so there is the possibility that I'm wrong; but, even if I am wrong, I will still claim I'm right, as my mind simply cannot comprehend otherwise. My reviews of the first two books were relatively short and sweet, yet I feel this book requires some additional discussion to flesh out properly, as it is admittedly a rather problematic book to review. Fans of Mervyn Peake's work will staunchly support the quality, and merits, of the the first two books, Titus Groan and Gormenghast, yet Titus Alone has generated more mixed reactions, even among Peake fans. Some claim it is disjointed, and the unfortunate product of a mind wracked by a horrid disease. Some will even go so far as to deem it unreadable, and will recommend simply sticking with the the first two books.I realize I am in the minority opinion when I say this, but I wholeheartedly disagree with the negative assessment of Titus Alone. I don't see it as the product of a warped and crippled mind, I see it as the product of a terrifyingly focused mind. I dismiss the claims of it being "unreadable" as it is actually quite the page-turner. In fact, I might even go so far as to say that this book is my favorite of them. Now, I don't mean to say that I think it is better written; Gormenghast is my single favorite, and is the *cough* Peak of the series. Yet, within the context of the two previous novels, Titus Alone is, for me, somehow more grand. By themselves, Titus Groan and Gormenghast can stand alone as crowning masterpieces, whereas the glory of Titus Alone almost depends upon the previous two. Without them, the critics would be right, and it would be a stumbling, disjointed collection of ravings from a mind in its death throes; with them acting as support beams, however, this third book becomes a wonder.Titus Alone is undoubtedly a deviation. It is strange, weird, and crazy; but that, to me, is the point. It doesn't read like the first two books because it isn't meant to; instead, it is meant to pull the rug out from under our feet, and it succeeds in doing so admirably. As the title of the book says, our only physical link to the first two books is Titus. He is alone, and so too are we. Succumbing to his youthful longings, he leaves his life of comfort, tradition, and certainty in an attempt to become his own man, and to find his own way in the world. Yet, the world he finds is one he is wholly unprepared for, and neither are we. He is meant to be a castaway in this book, to be confused, scared, and restless; we too share these burdens, and Peake forces the reader along on this wild ride. Many might notice that the frequency, length, and presence of Peake's signature descriptive passages are less pronounced in this book. It moves faster, and gives us less insight into the strange new world into which we are thrust. I would argue that this is also the point. Even during scenes of heavy 'action' in the first two novels, Peake takes the time to paint to the reader the small details surrounding it; the reader is allowed to become familiar with the unique characters, the ever-important surroundings, and get the feel for every pore, crack, and stone of the setting. With Titus Alone, we lose our insight. Entire landscapes zip past us through glimpses in windows, people are different, and our introductions are quick and problematic. The world is as strange to us, as it is to Titus.The setting and narration of the first two books is inextricably bound to, and by, the crumbling, timeless walls of Gormenghast castle. Gormenghast might as well be in a snow-globe, as time seems to stand still. Peake describes Gormenghast castle as being "ponderous," and so too is the space and time which it inhabits. The rest of the world may be moving right along for all we know, yet Gormenghast "is all" and is somehow removed from time. Between this book and the previous, Titus breaks the barrier between the two worlds, and with it, our previous conceptions of space and time. Within the walls of Gormenghast castle, the focus is on the past, on tradition, on predetermined fate; yet in Titus Alone, we are exposed to a world with a focus on the future, on self-determination, and innovation. The true genius of Peake, is that he shows us the folly of casting away one set for another. Can we truly be free without losing ourselves? Can we discard our past in order to create our own future, or is our past an essential part of who we are? In this book Peake demonstrates an overcompensation of the future over the past, of youthful passion over wisdom, and as a result he forces the reader to accept that to do so makes us lose sight of the present. Suppressed by Gormenghast Titus cannot become his own man, yet to abandon it, and the seventy-six earls before him, means a very loss of identity. And perhaps, madness.Which leaves us with Peake's most provocative exploration in the book: that Gormenghast itself may be something entirely different than we, or Titus, thought. I would describe the first two books to be "dreamlike" in their feel, yet the narration in Titus Alone seems much sharper, as though the reader's eye-lense is finally coming into focus. Or is it the other way around? What does it mean for a place to be "real?" If nobody has heard of a place, and nobody can find the place, is it even a real place at all? Peake throws to us the idea that Gormenghast castle might truly be a fiction. He provides us with an... interesting resolution to this question, as Titus learns to categorize what is truly important to him, and what makes him, him. Yet, this book isn't meant to answer that question. It is meant to force Titus, and we readers, into something beyond the boundaries of these types of questions:"Whether or not his home was true or false, existent or nonexistent, there was no time for metaphysics. 'Let them tell me later,' he thought to himself, 'whether I am dead or not; sane or not; now is the time for action." And indeed the action happens. Beyond ours, or Titus' ability to handle in a comfortable way. I could easily blather on more about this book (let alone this series), so I will spare you any more musing, but I feel I need to underscore my point one last time. Titus Alone is not, in my opinion, the unfortunate ramblings of a madman, or the shadow of a novel that could have been. It is by no means "unreadable." I believe it to be a masterful stroke, looking to the future of the envisioned series, and I think if Peake had been able to finish his work, we would be looking back on this book as a wonderful fulcrum upon which the story of Titus pivots.
I met this with mixed feelings and finished it with not much of a resolution in that regard. :/This is the third book completed by Mervyn Peake, centering around the character Titus Groan, Seventy-Seventh Earl of Gormenghast. Peake was struggling with a degenerative disease and this book was apparently compiled together from various manuscripts... it shows.First, you have Titus Groan. Throughout the first book he is but an infant, and in the second still remains rather elusive and dull compared to the likes of Steerpike and Fuchsia. Yet Titus remains an enigma. "That was the irritating thing about him. He could not force a feeling, or bring himself to love. His love was always elsewhere. His thoughts were fastidious. Only his body was indiscriminate."Considering this was supposed to be the middle book of a series (always the book that seems to suffer most), this might be forgiven. Also take notice of the titles: Titus Alone, and then Titus Awakes. Obviously this isn't the book where Titus is going to develop an actual personality, or awaken. In fact, the only thing connecting him to the character we know in other books is his knowledge of Gormenghast.And what does Titus find outside of the crumbling walls of Gormenghast? Modern cities, cars, weird flying machines, underground people, a zoo, houses made of glass, poverty, money-eaters, mad scientists, love. I couldn't possibly review this without pointing out the absurdity of it.Here you have an ancient, crumbling castle governed by ritual in the first two books-- and then you're met with all this modernity. And no Gormenghast. No, not one person is familiar with his home.Titus isn't even the only character that suffers from bad characterization-- but there are others. And this is kind of painful to see, because they do not all suffer from this. In particular I'm thinking of Cheeta and the scientists (the latter feeling like something tacked on just for plots sake, something even more of an enigma than Titus).There's also the matter of writing style. Peake's writing style fits the dusty realms of Gormenghast well. But, now we don't have a Gormenghast. This book really loses the allure and charm of the previous two. Gormenghast, with all it's microscopic details yet vastness, is actually remote and far-away given the obscurity aroused when Titus mentions the name to others.I'm rather unclear on if there were multiple versions of Titus Alone. But in the one I read, things that are at first described as weird flying machines are later described as helicopters, to give one example. In an essay I skimmed it mentions this, and that editors or what have you wanted to do away with all modern coinage. I wonder if this is an artifact of that. But it is startling, especially when Titus falls out of one with a parachute. It's just so unexpected.It almost feels, at times, like a really bad movie. Or that this was some amusing longer-than-it-should-be-short-story written just for amusement's sake.So again, mixed feelings. There is definitely brilliance in this (the underground people, the jail, the beginning of the party surprise), but so many wrongs. It wasn't until the last part of the book that I started to understand why this book got such a bad reputation. Yet I still like it for what it is, and would warn against skipping it like so many instruct.
What do You think about Titus Alone (1968)?
Although the three Gormenghast novels are now thought of as a trilogy, I wonder how appropriate this designation is. Peake's intention with the series was to tell the entire life story of the character Titus Groan, and he was working on the fourth book in this series at the time of his death. He planned to write five volumes in the series, the fourth and fifth being "Titus Awakens" and "Gormenghast Revisited." Clearly Peake didn't think of this book as the conclusion to a trilogy, but a middle-section in a much larger work.Aside from that, the first two books in the series, Titus Groan and Gormenghast, tell a more-or-less complete story about the bizarre happenings at Gormenghast castle during Titus's youth. These two books, when taken together, form a complete story with a satisfying resolution. I have trouble seeing Titus Alone as part of this 'trilogy' because the storyline has very little connection to the first two volumes. In this book, Titus has set out from Gormenghast castle on his own, attempting to escape the monotonous rituals of his home. The dark, medieval setting of Gormenghast is quickly left behind, and a world full of skyscrapers, cars, airplanes and factories surrounds him. Titus quickly regrets his decision to leave home, and wishes he could figure out how to get home. Along his way, Titus's libido starts going nuts. He has a relationship with Juno, a fortysomething woman who saves him from being arrested, and ends up leaving her because he doesn't want to settle down. Later, the wealthy daughter of a factory owner becomes fascinated by him and tries to woo him. Titus is only interested in her sexually, and this makes her super-pissed, and she formulates a remarkable and haunting way of getting revenge.(My favorite aspect of this book is that we never know if Titus is simply mad, and Gormenghast--and the first two volumes in the series--have only happened in his mind. At no point in this book is Gormenghast's existence proven by anything he encounters in his travels, and no one has heard of it.This book is fascinating in many ways, but it doesn't live up to the high bar set by Titus Groan and Gormenghast. Those books were lush and complex and inspire a real sense of awe at the world's strangeness, where Titus Alone is a bit sketchy and sometimes even vague. And implausible. Titus is kind of a whiny bitch, so why does everybody and their mother want to follow him on his travels? And why do they all show up at the most convenient times? It feels more like the characters are just doing what the author needs them to. This book isn't near perfect like the first two, but it's still an entertaining read, with some characters that are as compelling in their surreality as the other books' cast. The names aren't as awesome: Rotcodd and Steerpike and Prunesqallor were names from Gormenghast castle. The characters he's meeting in this book have names like Cheetah and The Black Rose. Not as entertaining.And I digress. If you haven't followed my reviews on this series, I highly recommend both Titus Groan and Gormenghast as must-read fantasy. "Titus Alone" is an optional third part of this 'trilogy' which makes for an entertaining and quick read, but has neither the scope nor the depth of the volumes that came before.
—Michael
"Titus Alone" has the charms and eccentricities, the verbal and visual beauties of its two formidable predecessors, but it is only about half as long as they are, with extremely short chapters, and it lacks their concentrated richness, their depth and perspective. Is it a radical departure, a sleeker, more streamlined work, its short chapters and overall length appropriate to its more modern setting? Or is it a diseased creation, the production of an artistically disappointed man who had suffered a nervous breakdown two years before and was already in the grip of Parkinson's disease? Or is it best viewed as a mere charcoal sketch, a study containing all the lines but lacking the coloring of the painting that--for whatever reason--was never completed? I think it is a bit of all three, but I favor the "charcoal sketch" view. The shape of the book--beginning (the modern urban world, Muzzlehatch, his menagerie, Juno), middle (the underground world of beggars and criminals), and conclusion (Titus' revival from illness by Cheetah followed by her betrayal)--seems altogether complete in outline. The theme of madness and Titus' fear of it--which some have seen as proof of Peake's artistic breakdown--is entirely appropriate, given that our hero has been formed and shaped by a world--Gormenghast--that other characters view as his own fantastic creation. No, I do not find the work deficient in construction or obsessive in its themes. Its principal defect is a lack of texture and balance. Because this book, unlike the others, is not crowded with a richness of incidental characters or overflowing with metaphors and vividly painted scenes, it lacks completeness and complexity, and its eccentric characters and bizarre scenes--no stranger than those of the two earlier books--seem odder and more isolated by comparison.All in all, an interesting but disappointing read. Still, essential for Peake fans.
—Bill Kerwin
Even though I felt like a lot was missing from this story, I still gave it five stars. There's just something about Peake--again, even feeling a difference in his writing in this novel--that is so engrossing. His stories and characters, once you delve in, are almost irresistible. I missed so many of the characters from the first two books, but their presence was still felt at times, and even felt very strongly, because of Titus's longing for home and to figure out just who he is as a part of and apart from his ancestral home, Gormenghast. So many of the characters I wish were more fleshed out. So many scenes were sudden in their time skips. And still I was so into the book. Again, Peake's draw for me is so compelling. I may have to seek out the novel that his wife worked on because I really hate to leave this endlessly creative world that Peake designed (or discovered, I might say, for in the books, Gormenghast and all the rest of the world and its inhabitants are as real to me as Tolkien's Middle-earth is, and Tolkien is often talked about that way).I'm sure I'll revisit this one. Peake's writing is worth it.
—Audrey
