Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell
Right now I’m not sure who originally recommended this novel by Susannah Clarke to me but Amy B loaned it out so first thanks go to her.
I was enthralled. The writing is definitely top-notch for a modern author though not up to the standards of classic literature and the Idea Clarke created was unexpected in the best possible sense. The novel is very evocative of “Englishness” and the alternate history it presents is thoroughgoing and convincing.
Clarke’s writing is very much a pastiche of different styles. I occasionally thought the story had dropped into a quote from a reall or imagined book because of the dramatic change in voice but since the style stays good though it alters, this is not such a defect.
The story (for those few of you who haven’t heard all about and/or read the thing) is of the “revival of English magic”. English magic has its own history, its own literature and its own scholarship which has fallen on hard times. One magician sets out to revive it and another comes along and assists him. In true mythical fashion the characters fulfill a prophecy without knowing it and without desiring to know it. I am not sure I appreciated the way the story ended but I was carried away through all 850 pages.
Clarke has been compared to Austen and while there is social satire alive in the book, she is not nearly so acerbic and her touch is not nearly so light. Still, for a 21st century novel, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell is extraordinary.