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beatriz95 's review for:
The Crystal Cave
by Mary Stewart
If there is one tale everyone may know about, one king we have heard of, that would be King Arthur, the Once and Future King. I have grown watching “Quest for Camelot”, or “Merlin the Magician”, dreaming about what it would be like to live in a time of such adventures and chivalry.
The tale has been adapted in many different ways, some childish, and some darker than I would have imagined as a child. There is darkness in the original tales, that is for sure, and the chivalry of the Knights of the Round Table could turn out to be just for show (just look at Lancelot).
Not only that, but chivalry itself has nothing to do with the original myth, for the real Arthur had to live around …., and the figure of the knight did not appear until the Middle Ages. That being said, this retelling of the story is somewhat more plausible, for it is set in the correct time period, and although there is a bit of the supernatural in the tale, it is very faint. I find that I actually enjoy it like that, which is a surprise as I love magic (thank you Harry Potter).
This book is all about Merlin, the magician that would guide Arthur as King of Britain. Here we follow him from a somewhat harsh childhood as a bastard Welsh prince, until the beginning of his twenties.
It was, simply put, amazing. It took me long to read it, but not because it was boring (although there is indeed very little action), but because I wanted to savour the beautiful and atmospheric narrative. Mary Stewart may very well be an enchantress herself, because she somehow managed to completely captivate me with her prose. There are countless examples of her describing the smallest things in vivid detail.
“A round moon stood low in the sky, pale still, and smudged with shadow, and thin at one edge like a worn coin. There was a scatter of small stars, with here and there the shepherd stars herding them, and across from the moon one great star alone, burning white. The shadows were long and soft on the seeding grasses.”
“A robin lighted on a blackthorn at my elbow, and began to sing. The sound came high and sweet and uncaring through all the noise of battle. To this day, whenever I think of the battle for Kaerconan, it brings to mind a robin’s song, mingled with the croaking of the ravens.”
Another boon about this book? As if the theme and the beautiful prose were not enough, it is set in Wales. IN WALES I SAID. I have wanted to go to Wales for years now, due to it being the birth place of the Arthurian legends, but also because of its history and beautiful landscape. With this book, I felt as if I had actually been there, and once I finished I was left feeling a certain nostalgia, as if it were a place I longed to visit again instead of for the first time.
So, well done, Mary Stewart. Count me thoroughly impressed *claps in admiration*
“The gods only go with you if you put yourself in their path. And that takes courage.”
“I think there is only one. Oh, there are gods everywhere, in the hollow hills, in the wind and the sea, in the very grass we walk on and the air we breathe, and in the bloodstained shadows where men like Belasius wait for them. But I believe there must be one who is God Himself, like the great sea, and all the rest of us, small gods and men and all, like rivers, we all come to Him in the end.”
“Then she saw me watching her. For perhaps two seconds our eyes met and held. I knew then why the ancients armed the cruellest god with arrows; I felt the shock of it right through my body.”
“Thinking and planning is one side of life; doing is another. A man cannot be doing all the time.”
The tale has been adapted in many different ways, some childish, and some darker than I would have imagined as a child. There is darkness in the original tales, that is for sure, and the chivalry of the Knights of the Round Table could turn out to be just for show (just look at Lancelot).
Not only that, but chivalry itself has nothing to do with the original myth, for the real Arthur had to live around …., and the figure of the knight did not appear until the Middle Ages. That being said, this retelling of the story is somewhat more plausible, for it is set in the correct time period, and although there is a bit of the supernatural in the tale, it is very faint. I find that I actually enjoy it like that, which is a surprise as I love magic (thank you Harry Potter).
This book is all about Merlin, the magician that would guide Arthur as King of Britain. Here we follow him from a somewhat harsh childhood as a bastard Welsh prince, until the beginning of his twenties.
It was, simply put, amazing. It took me long to read it, but not because it was boring (although there is indeed very little action), but because I wanted to savour the beautiful and atmospheric narrative. Mary Stewart may very well be an enchantress herself, because she somehow managed to completely captivate me with her prose. There are countless examples of her describing the smallest things in vivid detail.
“A round moon stood low in the sky, pale still, and smudged with shadow, and thin at one edge like a worn coin. There was a scatter of small stars, with here and there the shepherd stars herding them, and across from the moon one great star alone, burning white. The shadows were long and soft on the seeding grasses.”
“A robin lighted on a blackthorn at my elbow, and began to sing. The sound came high and sweet and uncaring through all the noise of battle. To this day, whenever I think of the battle for Kaerconan, it brings to mind a robin’s song, mingled with the croaking of the ravens.”
Another boon about this book? As if the theme and the beautiful prose were not enough, it is set in Wales. IN WALES I SAID. I have wanted to go to Wales for years now, due to it being the birth place of the Arthurian legends, but also because of its history and beautiful landscape. With this book, I felt as if I had actually been there, and once I finished I was left feeling a certain nostalgia, as if it were a place I longed to visit again instead of for the first time.
So, well done, Mary Stewart. Count me thoroughly impressed *claps in admiration*
“The gods only go with you if you put yourself in their path. And that takes courage.”
“I think there is only one. Oh, there are gods everywhere, in the hollow hills, in the wind and the sea, in the very grass we walk on and the air we breathe, and in the bloodstained shadows where men like Belasius wait for them. But I believe there must be one who is God Himself, like the great sea, and all the rest of us, small gods and men and all, like rivers, we all come to Him in the end.”
“Then she saw me watching her. For perhaps two seconds our eyes met and held. I knew then why the ancients armed the cruellest god with arrows; I felt the shock of it right through my body.”
“Thinking and planning is one side of life; doing is another. A man cannot be doing all the time.”