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Porius
"Porius stood upon the low square tower above the Southern Gate of Mynydd-y-Gaer, and looked down on the wide stretching valley below." So begins one of the most unique novels of twentieth-century literature, by one of its most "extraordinary, neglected geniuses," said Robertson Davies of John Cowper Powys. Powys thought Porius his masterpiece, but because of the paper shortage after World War II and the novel's lengthiness, he could not find a publisher for it. Only after he cut one-third from it was it accepted. This new edition not only brings Porius back into print, but makes the original book at last available to readers. Set in the geographic confines of Powys's own homeland of Northern Wales, Porius takes place in the course of a mere eight October days in 499 A.D., when King Arthur - a key character in the novel, along with Myrddin Wyllt, or Merlin - was attempting to persuade the people of Britian to repel the barbaric Saxon invaders. Porius, the only child of Prince Einion of Edeyrnion, is the main character who is sent on a journey that is both historical melodrama and satirical allegory. A complex novel, Porius is a mixture of mystery and philosophy on a huge narrative scale, as if Nabokov or Pynchon tried to compress Dostoevsky into a Ulyssean mold. Writing in The New Yorker, George Steiner has said of the abridged Porius that it "combines [a] Shakespearean-epic sweep of historicity with a Jamesian finesse of psychological detail and acuity. Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom!, which I believe to be the American masterpiece after Melville, is a smaller thing by comparison." This new, and first complete, edition of the novel substantiates both Steiner's judgement and Powys's claim for Porius as his masterpiece.
751 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1951
About the author
John Cowper Powys
185 books159 followersPowys was born in Shirley, Derbyshire, where his father was vicar. His mother was descended from the poet William Cowper, hence his middle name. His two younger brothers, Llewelyn Powys and Theodore Francis Powys, also became well-known writers. Other brothers and sisters also became prominent in the arts.
John studied at Sherborne School and Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and became a teacher and lecturer; as lecturer, he worked first in England, then in continental Europe and finally in the USA, where he lived in the years 1904-1934. While in the United States, his work was championed by author Theodore Dreiser. He engaged in public debate with Bertrand Russell and the philosopher and historian Will Durant: he was called for the defence in the first obscenity trial for the James Joyce novel, Ulysses, and was mentioned with approval in the autobiography of US feminist and anarchist, Emma Goldman.
He made his name as a poet and essayist, moving on to produce a series of acclaimed novels distinguished by their uniquely detailed and intensely sensual recreation of time, place and character. They also describe heightened states of awareness resulting from mystic revelation, or from the experience of extreme pleasure or pain. The best known of these distinctive novels are A Glastonbury Romance and Wolf Solent. He also wrote some works of philosophy and literary criticism, including a pioneering tribute to Dorothy Richardson.
Having returned to the UK, he lived in England for a brief time, then moved to Corwen in Wales, where he wrote historical romances (including two set in Wales) and magical fantasies. He later moved to Blaenau Ffestiniog, where he remained until his death in 1963.
John studied at Sherborne School and Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and became a teacher and lecturer; as lecturer, he worked first in England, then in continental Europe and finally in the USA, where he lived in the years 1904-1934. While in the United States, his work was championed by author Theodore Dreiser. He engaged in public debate with Bertrand Russell and the philosopher and historian Will Durant: he was called for the defence in the first obscenity trial for the James Joyce novel, Ulysses, and was mentioned with approval in the autobiography of US feminist and anarchist, Emma Goldman.
He made his name as a poet and essayist, moving on to produce a series of acclaimed novels distinguished by their uniquely detailed and intensely sensual recreation of time, place and character. They also describe heightened states of awareness resulting from mystic revelation, or from the experience of extreme pleasure or pain. The best known of these distinctive novels are A Glastonbury Romance and Wolf Solent. He also wrote some works of philosophy and literary criticism, including a pioneering tribute to Dorothy Richardson.
Having returned to the UK, he lived in England for a brief time, then moved to Corwen in Wales, where he wrote historical romances (including two set in Wales) and magical fantasies. He later moved to Blaenau Ffestiniog, where he remained until his death in 1963.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 36 reviews
July 19, 2023
Porius is a mythical and mystical tale of the Arthurian times…
Hero of the story is at the threshold of great changes in his life…
Ancient gods, overseas deities, druidism, Christ and the Trinity, nature, witchcraft, wizardry and superstitions reigned over human minds simultaneously…
To me the novel appeared to be too excessive, jumbled and unconvincing, however…
Even in the obscure times and dark ages man fought desperately to achieve his intellectual goal.
Hero of the story is at the threshold of great changes in his life…
Porius himself, as he stood now motionless upon his tower, was not an exceptionally tall man. Indeed he was well under six feet. But his physical strength looked immense, and was, as a matter of fact, even greater than it looked. His face was rugged rather than austere, striking rather than handsome, formidable rather than commanding.
Ancient gods, overseas deities, druidism, Christ and the Trinity, nature, witchcraft, wizardry and superstitions reigned over human minds simultaneously…
Well! they were all children of Time, all children of Cronos, and henceforth he and Rhun and the dog and the mangled beast-head had a bed-rock understanding even if their Mithraic fraternity enrolled for righteousness were a mirage and illusion.
He sighed heavily, feeling that this link with the chained, the devoured, the tortured, the sacrificed, weighed him down to the bottom.
To me the novel appeared to be too excessive, jumbled and unconvincing, however…
But Porius said slowly: “Medrawd, I don’t believe in your eternal opposites. I don’t believe in your God or in your Devil. I’ve seen plenty of living things turn into dead things, and I’ve seen plenty of living things born out of dead things, and I’ve seen living things that wished to die and dying things that wished to live, and I’ve seen plenty of good deeds and plenty of evil deeds, but I’ve never seen what you call life or what you call death or what you call God or what you call the devil. What I feel is that everything that exists is the private experience – shared only very superficially and very casually by others – of a particular consciousness with its own particular powers of awareness.”
Even in the obscure times and dark ages man fought desperately to achieve his intellectual goal.
September 29, 2014
This is a very big book, which is usually the first thing one notices about it, but I have read it and will probably read it again. To enjoy it it might help to already have an interest in Powys' particular penchant for descriptive indulgence and proliferation of weird character-types, but I could also see how it's one of his most easily accessible books, one that could be enjoyed by anyone who has an interest in Arthurian Romances, this book being Powys' addition to that canon.
April 18, 2016
"It came from Pelagius. He recognized that clearly enough: and now as he stared at the white foam on the river's surface he thought he knew just what it was! It was the idea that each solitary individual man had the power, from the very start of his concious life, not so much by his will, for that was coerced by other wills, but by his free imagination, by the stories he told himself, to create his future ... Well! the Mithras Bull might bellow and bleed till it broke the adamantine chains of every tradition in the world! The important thing was the human imagination that defied it: the human imagination that defied not only the Bull and the Slayer of the Bull, but the Crucified and the slayer of the Crucified, yea! and all the God-bearers and all the God-slayers from the beginning of the world unto this hour! The human imagination must never be robbed of its power to tell itself other stories, and thus to create a different future."
Should your shelf already contain Memoirs of Hadrian and Death of Virgil, this would make a good third to complete the trinity.
It is hard to know what to say about this book, even harder to know whether any of you will like it. If one approaches it as hist-fic, for example, one is liable to be disappointed. If one approaches it as PoMo, one will be similarly let down. What it is most, I think, is an attempt to dramatise the emergence of a certain type of early-modern consciousness - a self-consciousness, one aware of the difference between those layers of self as well as of the fluctuating border of interior and exterior world.
He became conscious of his mind as a living entity, using his body but distinct from his body. His mind felt as if it had become a new creature, strung up in itself, flexible and porous in itself, compact and resilient from centre to circumference, and able as it had never been able before, to choose between opposite possibilities of action...
and
The thing in me that says 'I am I' can divide itself into two and yet be the same. It can say 'you' to itself when there's nothing but itself there... That's the first step....and the second step is to note that the 'I' who can say 'you' to itself can imagine itself and very often does imagine itself moving through Space quite independently of its body, that is to say, if it is the 'I-you' who usually inhabits Porius's body, it can imagine itself leaving Porius's body and taking an airy journey...but though it can imagine itself outside its body it cannot imagine itself escaping from space. Wherever it imagines itself flying it cannot imagine itself ridding itself of the idea that it is still somewhere,...in space. And the third step is to note that although it is easy to imagine this 'I am I' as leaving its body and moving from one spot in Space to another, it is impossible to imagine this 'I am I' as totally devoid of any point of localization; though this point need be no more than a moving speck."
for example. It is also, as one would expect from JCP, a text full of his unique worldview and his mythology, particularly when dealing with Merlin.
"It seemed to him ... that he shaped the recession backward of the bones under his grasp into those animal-worlds and vegetation-worlds from which they had, it seemed, only yesterday, emerged. And by degrees the figure he was holding grew less self-contained, less buttressed-in upon himself, and the man's very identity seemed slipping back into the elements. The human frame he held became an organism whose concious recession into its primordial beginnings extended far beyond the prophet's temporary existence. It was as if what he had held, and what he could so easily have crushed, became a multiple identity composed of many separate lives, the lives of beasts and birds and reptiles, and plants and trees and even rocks and stones! this multiple entity was weak and helpless in his grasp; and yet it was so much vaster, so much older, so much more enduring than himself that it awed him even while he dominated it."
To contrast the impression that may be given by the quotes above, I should also say that I found this an enthralling, exciting book - one that I eagerly picked up and reluctantly put down.
One note of caution - do not read any version of the text other than that published by Overlook - the previous editions were heavily edited and cut down in order to permit publication, and seriously damage the work.
October 28, 2012
Interim review. I'm on p. 424, but just want to get this off my chest.
I have a problem with John Cowper Powys: I don't know where his allegiances are. What I strongly suspect is that he's a better person than me in that he doesn't have allegiances. In Atlantis, I was against the Olympian gods and on the side of the revolution, whether that were a revolt of women, of giants and monsters, or of an earlier set of gods. I'd have said he was, until the end when Atlantis, home of the revolution, turns out to be the seat of Science (in its bad aspects). Yes, but I know John Cowper Powys was a pacifist-anarchist and anti-tyranny and anti-patriarchy... wasn't he? So what happened to the revolution?
I have a similar puzzle with Porius. I find easy to choose my side: it's with the tribes, with the druid, with the ancient mother-run culture of African descent; with them I'd plant my standard against Rome and Rome's tame Britons. But things are in nowise so simple. Arthur's a tame Briton, for one, and earns nothing but admiration here [so far]. The three grandmothers, in charge of that old society, Wyrd Sisters, are more or less loony, and the druid, once you meet him, doesn't inspire your confidence.
Merlin, now, Merlin - after a rocky start - I can stand with, on firm ground [so far].
I have a problem with John Cowper Powys: I don't know where his allegiances are. What I strongly suspect is that he's a better person than me in that he doesn't have allegiances. In Atlantis, I was against the Olympian gods and on the side of the revolution, whether that were a revolt of women, of giants and monsters, or of an earlier set of gods. I'd have said he was, until the end when Atlantis, home of the revolution, turns out to be the seat of Science (in its bad aspects). Yes, but I know John Cowper Powys was a pacifist-anarchist and anti-tyranny and anti-patriarchy... wasn't he? So what happened to the revolution?
I have a similar puzzle with Porius. I find easy to choose my side: it's with the tribes, with the druid, with the ancient mother-run culture of African descent; with them I'd plant my standard against Rome and Rome's tame Britons. But things are in nowise so simple. Arthur's a tame Briton, for one, and earns nothing but admiration here [so far]. The three grandmothers, in charge of that old society, Wyrd Sisters, are more or less loony, and the druid, once you meet him, doesn't inspire your confidence.
Merlin, now, Merlin - after a rocky start - I can stand with, on firm ground [so far].
February 1, 2010
JCP is unquestionably the finest British novelist of the twentieth century. This is the longest, most magnificent, strangest, most thought-provoking book I have ever read. Occasionally over-written and confusing, it is nonetheless a wonderful work of the imagination, marked by a depth of insight and an understanding of human psychology that rivals Dostoevsky.
July 19, 2023
"Well! the Mithras Bull might bellow and bleed till it broke the adamantine chains of every tradition in the world! The important thing was the human imagination that defied it: the human imagination that defied not only the Bull and the Slayer of the Bull, but the Crucified and the slayer of the Crucified, yea! and all the God-bearers and all the God-slayers from the beginning of the world unto this hour! The human imagination must never be robbed of its power to tell itself other stories, and thus to create a different future."
Tragically, this is a first Arthuriana book I struggled to finish, disappointed as I am familiar with Powys's literary criticism where he is clearly at his strongest.
The mythos is strong here, with countless gems of Arthurian and Welsh lore, just my cup of tea, but to read it is to drag ones feet through the deep swamp that is Powys's writing style, which isn't my cup of tea.
I kept thinking of Borges bragging that he reads books whilst others brag about writing them: ought one over-write only because one can? Is it worth falling into tautology?
May the rating answer these questions.
Tragically, this is a first Arthuriana book I struggled to finish, disappointed as I am familiar with Powys's literary criticism where he is clearly at his strongest.
The mythos is strong here, with countless gems of Arthurian and Welsh lore, just my cup of tea, but to read it is to drag ones feet through the deep swamp that is Powys's writing style, which isn't my cup of tea.
I kept thinking of Borges bragging that he reads books whilst others brag about writing them: ought one over-write only because one can? Is it worth falling into tautology?
May the rating answer these questions.
September 9, 2018
this book is set during the dark ages in wales, and you may notice that it's very long. this is because the characters don't just do things like in a regular book, they start to do things and then spend like 10 pages looking at some moss or mist or an insect and thinking about what it makes them think of. theres a lot of stuff about religious division and the socio political formations of dark ages britain, but this isn't really a 'historical novel' either because he does things like casually say that survivors from the lost continent of atlantis settled in britain at one point. its also got a bunch of arthurian stuff in it but with his own take on things, like for example merlin in this book is an earthly incarnation of the titan chronos who wants to enact a anarchistic golden age where all animals and people are equal. very cool stuff all around but it only gets four stars because i didn't think the writing was quite as good as a glastonbury romance.
January 9, 2016
“Endure to the End”
Tungerong larry ong — endure to the end — is both a rallying cry of the main character of this incredible, and incredibly complex, book, and a much-needed encouragement to readers. At 762 pages, each filled with epic, breathless sentences crackling with mystical subtext, unpronounceable Welsh names and a gargantuan cast of characters, this is not a book one should enter into lightly.
It took me almost three months to finish, but the journey was worth it. Porius is gripping and challenging and dense and impenetrable and layered with swirling currents of meaning. It is an insane mix of history and magic, action and romance, and philosophy and religion. There are giants and magicians (including Merlin), scheming druids and savage forest people with poisoned arrows, the foppish court of King Arthur and grim-faced Saxon invaders, owls that become women, nature worship, magic rivers, enchanted mists, old curses, ancient myths and even more ancient burial grounds and all manner of petty, squabbling gods and their slavish worshipers — from Saturn to Mithras to Yahweh.
The set up is simple: across a week, Porius, son of the ruler of Edeyrnion, finds himself caught between opposing armies, religions and lovers with the fate of Wales, Britain and perhaps the entire world at stake. On the surface, it is a fictionalized history of the people, events and myths that shaped the British Isles, but the true power of Porius is the deeper, timeless excavation of what it means to be human — to think, to feel, to experience the world through constraints of our own senses, to be in love and lust, to question our own existence and to carve out purpose and find meaning in the indifferent chaos around us.
Porius (the character) has two peculiar attributes. One is almost unnatural strength — clearly on display when he uses the corpse of an enemy to batter more enemies to death. The other is a mental state he cultivates called “caviosengiarizing.” It defies a simple definition, but I think it means something along the lines of being able will his executive mental functions — the “I-am-I” part of his brain — into the background in order to let the experiencing part of his brain have full control and, in that process, allow the external world to flood in as it wants to be experienced. I think.
Through the constant, meticulous examination of the smallest details of life around him — a leaf, a spider, a pile of feces — and his constant rumination on the act of examining these details, Porius (courtesy of author John Cowper Powys) lays open history, time, space and the human experience — especially as filtered through the physical and emotional act of love.
It was an exhilarating, bewildering and mind-altering read that left me feeling like Porius when, “he had begun to feel as if the inmost pith of his being was being nibbled away by the rats of purposeless dissolution…”
I bought this edition of Porius years ago when the fully restored version (adding 500-plus pages cut by the editor from the original final draft!) first came out, but could never bring myself to set aside the time. Powys is known for elevating place to a near-mystical status and, fittingly, I started reading it on a recent road trip to Yosemite. Sharing the world of this brooding forest prince, this mighty warrior and natural philosopher, while wandering through the towering sequoias and craggy mountains of Yosemite only deepened the magic and the mystery.
Tungerong larry ong — endure to the end — is both a rallying cry of the main character of this incredible, and incredibly complex, book, and a much-needed encouragement to readers. At 762 pages, each filled with epic, breathless sentences crackling with mystical subtext, unpronounceable Welsh names and a gargantuan cast of characters, this is not a book one should enter into lightly.
It took me almost three months to finish, but the journey was worth it. Porius is gripping and challenging and dense and impenetrable and layered with swirling currents of meaning. It is an insane mix of history and magic, action and romance, and philosophy and religion. There are giants and magicians (including Merlin), scheming druids and savage forest people with poisoned arrows, the foppish court of King Arthur and grim-faced Saxon invaders, owls that become women, nature worship, magic rivers, enchanted mists, old curses, ancient myths and even more ancient burial grounds and all manner of petty, squabbling gods and their slavish worshipers — from Saturn to Mithras to Yahweh.
The set up is simple: across a week, Porius, son of the ruler of Edeyrnion, finds himself caught between opposing armies, religions and lovers with the fate of Wales, Britain and perhaps the entire world at stake. On the surface, it is a fictionalized history of the people, events and myths that shaped the British Isles, but the true power of Porius is the deeper, timeless excavation of what it means to be human — to think, to feel, to experience the world through constraints of our own senses, to be in love and lust, to question our own existence and to carve out purpose and find meaning in the indifferent chaos around us.
Porius (the character) has two peculiar attributes. One is almost unnatural strength — clearly on display when he uses the corpse of an enemy to batter more enemies to death. The other is a mental state he cultivates called “caviosengiarizing.” It defies a simple definition, but I think it means something along the lines of being able will his executive mental functions — the “I-am-I” part of his brain — into the background in order to let the experiencing part of his brain have full control and, in that process, allow the external world to flood in as it wants to be experienced. I think.
Through the constant, meticulous examination of the smallest details of life around him — a leaf, a spider, a pile of feces — and his constant rumination on the act of examining these details, Porius (courtesy of author John Cowper Powys) lays open history, time, space and the human experience — especially as filtered through the physical and emotional act of love.
It was an exhilarating, bewildering and mind-altering read that left me feeling like Porius when, “he had begun to feel as if the inmost pith of his being was being nibbled away by the rats of purposeless dissolution…”
I bought this edition of Porius years ago when the fully restored version (adding 500-plus pages cut by the editor from the original final draft!) first came out, but could never bring myself to set aside the time. Powys is known for elevating place to a near-mystical status and, fittingly, I started reading it on a recent road trip to Yosemite. Sharing the world of this brooding forest prince, this mighty warrior and natural philosopher, while wandering through the towering sequoias and craggy mountains of Yosemite only deepened the magic and the mystery.
February 6, 2019
Well...where to begin. Having finally finished, I think of moss and dankness and the kinds of creatures who live in moss and dankness. I loved so much in this book. Because there is no other book like it...utterly and wonderfully and brilliantly unique. But long. Really long. And sort of smelly... in the best way. I love Porius and Rhun and Morfydd and especially Teleri. You will too...if you have what it takes to lose yourself in the Gaer. No one writes about the interplay of male and female like Powys. No one.
March 16, 2009
One week in the life of a British prince in the year 399. A huge sprawling epic. I've read it three times and I'll read it again. No-one writes like John Cowper Powys.
September 1, 2010
Holy cow! This book took some time to finish. I enjoyed it but I doubt I knew what was really going on. Everything was so symbolic and so thought deeply about and motivations changed constantly and I have no idea why some characters did what they did. But it isn't like I'm going to go back and read a 750 page book again just to try and catch those distinctions. This book took place in 499 AD so it was very earthy. The swearing consisted of the characters taking the Lord's name in vain but it was because Christianity was so new and most of the characters didn't believe in it. There was tons of sex but without any details, only deep thoughts. I don't know. I just wasn't offended by anything because the characters were so primitive.
October 4, 2018
FTFT. Finished this fucking thing. Never have I rated such a terrible piece of writing so highly. Woe betide the person who prefers "he shook his head" to something like he rotated his skull back and forth upon his bony spine. Or the person who doesn't need the characters physically described, again, every 10 pages. Or who is troubled by the fact that the men are painstakingly pointed out to be of surpassing ugliness while the women are passingly described as quite beautiful but seemingly don't mind the ugliness of their men (see how he did that?).
After all this painstaking explanation and description I still have NO IDEA who the forest people are, vs the Picts and the other people starting with G, and the G-Picts, and the Brythons, and the Romans, and the Romano-Brythons, and that other group starting with C. Not to mention the giants. The "forest people" seem to be someone else, but I wasn't sure.
I didn't buy any of the origin stories for any of these groups, but I sort of think Powys did.
I also don't understand what happened to Myrddin at the end, or why it was up to Porius to rescue him... I mean, why have Nineue put him there for such a short period? What was the whole point of that? And why all the delay with Porius talking to his friends for so long? Why did his friends even come up on the mountain to delay the rescue... seemed odd... Also what was Medraut suddenly going on about with God and the Devil..... did he have a conversion? Earlier he was in the side of the pagans. Seemed like just an excuse for Powys to have Porius go off on Powys's ideas.
Porius is the most ADD character ever... he's going through the forest with a billion poisoned arrows pointed at him, with all kinds of lives at stake, and he daydreams for ten pages with every step.
ALL THAT SAID, the vividness of this ridiculous novel is unaccountable. I remember pretty much all of it... I couldn't even skim because you wound up missing something that somehow you didn't want to miss. This was enormously frustrating when as one reviewer said the characters were looking at some moss or mist or an insect and then spending 10 pages on whatever this made them think of. Especially as I doubted this really reflected the mindset of a 5th century warrior culture. Somehow, though, I couldn't get out of the grip of this novel.
So there you are. 4 stars, I guess.
Oh, crap... in addition to fixing some typos, I'm adding that I am a little tired of the standard presentation of Christians of this time period as frothing, cruel fanatics. Is that any way to make friends? And don't you suppose they needed to, out there in the hinterlands, in the 5th century? Constantine converted in the 4th century. Britain was way the hell out there. St. Patrick was roughly mid-5th, and that's as early as you get for Ireland. St. Columba on Iona--not till the 6th, and that's as early as you get for Scotland. St. Mungo, Glasgow, late 6th. So... not enough of a foothold to go around inciting mobs and pointing fingers. Generally religions spread by evangelists helping *solve local problems,* telling awesome stories that resonate with those already being told (Powys is a bit onto something with the trinity), and performing miracles. Fire and brimstone, at least at first, doesn't work well. So, Powys, Cornwell, Zimmer Bradley... letting their prejudices oversimplify a much more interesting situation. It's true that the pre-St. Benedict monastic rules could be quite narrow and mean, but that's different from how proselytism works. And we're not talking about monasteries out there in remote Wales before Wales even knew it was Wales.
After all this painstaking explanation and description I still have NO IDEA who the forest people are, vs the Picts and the other people starting with G, and the G-Picts, and the Brythons, and the Romans, and the Romano-Brythons, and that other group starting with C. Not to mention the giants. The "forest people" seem to be someone else, but I wasn't sure.
I didn't buy any of the origin stories for any of these groups, but I sort of think Powys did.
I also don't understand what happened to Myrddin at the end, or why it was up to Porius to rescue him... I mean, why have Nineue put him there for such a short period? What was the whole point of that? And why all the delay with Porius talking to his friends for so long? Why did his friends even come up on the mountain to delay the rescue... seemed odd... Also what was Medraut suddenly going on about with God and the Devil..... did he have a conversion? Earlier he was in the side of the pagans. Seemed like just an excuse for Powys to have Porius go off on Powys's ideas.
Porius is the most ADD character ever... he's going through the forest with a billion poisoned arrows pointed at him, with all kinds of lives at stake, and he daydreams for ten pages with every step.
ALL THAT SAID, the vividness of this ridiculous novel is unaccountable. I remember pretty much all of it... I couldn't even skim because you wound up missing something that somehow you didn't want to miss. This was enormously frustrating when as one reviewer said the characters were looking at some moss or mist or an insect and then spending 10 pages on whatever this made them think of. Especially as I doubted this really reflected the mindset of a 5th century warrior culture. Somehow, though, I couldn't get out of the grip of this novel.
So there you are. 4 stars, I guess.
Oh, crap... in addition to fixing some typos, I'm adding that I am a little tired of the standard presentation of Christians of this time period as frothing, cruel fanatics. Is that any way to make friends? And don't you suppose they needed to, out there in the hinterlands, in the 5th century? Constantine converted in the 4th century. Britain was way the hell out there. St. Patrick was roughly mid-5th, and that's as early as you get for Ireland. St. Columba on Iona--not till the 6th, and that's as early as you get for Scotland. St. Mungo, Glasgow, late 6th. So... not enough of a foothold to go around inciting mobs and pointing fingers. Generally religions spread by evangelists helping *solve local problems,* telling awesome stories that resonate with those already being told (Powys is a bit onto something with the trinity), and performing miracles. Fire and brimstone, at least at first, doesn't work well. So, Powys, Cornwell, Zimmer Bradley... letting their prejudices oversimplify a much more interesting situation. It's true that the pre-St. Benedict monastic rules could be quite narrow and mean, but that's different from how proselytism works. And we're not talking about monasteries out there in remote Wales before Wales even knew it was Wales.
June 18, 2023
Now I get to “fangirl” and gush about my love for this epic book, which John Cowper Powys (JCP) believed to be his masterpiece. I’ll try to keep this short—which is hard because JCP writes these big, deeply contemplative books about human journeys. The main reason that I enjoy JCP’s books so much is the way he writes is very much like how my brain works. Attention to detail in the smallest things and looping ruminations about the bigger things, and connecting the dots—big things with little things—from little things, big things grow. The polyphonic narrative puts the reader into each character’s point of view of the way things are—there are more sides to every story—and, at times, it's heartbreaking. They all feel they are right in the way they see things and are firm in their beliefs.
Anyway—the book—I’m quite partial to it because it’s that kind of human condition book that has everything and the kitchen sink that skips through your mind on any given day. The beauty of this novel is steeped in the landscape of North Wales, mountains, rivers, lakes, and marshes, serving as a backdrop to the legends, history, philosophy, the myriad of religions of the region, and tribalism that is the backbone of this epic.
Porius is a young man moving through eight days of his life, October 18-25 in 499 AD (aka Common Era, CE.) Big things are happening for him—he’s getting married, the Saxons are invading, his family members are at odds, the Romanized Britons, the forest people, the Druid, and the local Catholic priest are partaking in their versions of unrest, and King Arthur has requested Porius to join him in the fight to expel the Saxon barbarians. He also finds himself mystically bound with Myrddin Wyltt (Merlin). Porius is thirty years old, described as Herculean in size and strength, with small bear-like yellow-green eyes. Physically, he is slow, described as lethargic, as if his muscular body and brute strength are an impediment; however, he’s handy as a war machine (he once walked into the midst of the enemy unarmed, killed the first man to come at him with a spear he found, then used the corpse as a weapon to kill and disperse the rest of the fighters.) With that said, he’s not stupid at all, his thoughts are extremely animated, a force of nature within him. He daydreams in this fascinating manner; to quote from page 414:
“…he gave himself up to his old secret trick, that peculiar embrace of the material elements and objects that happened to be around him at the moment, for which, through his boyish awareness of a chance-occurrence when searching the hills with the elder Porius, he had invented the odd verb cavoseniargize.”
This cavoseniargizing is a strong connection between himself and nature, and it’s very pleasurable for him to pause and get lost for a time. Who doesn’t need to “step away” for a spell to pass the time—to process the tempest and peace that flows in life’s currents. Focus, refocus.
His self-awareness—even as a child—was evident from a memory on page 841: “The child seemed unable to explain to her the cause of this rapturous trance—that the child had felt inexpressible delight in the idea that small though he was, there was something in him…different from everybody else in the world...”
Also from page 841 continued: “The thing in me that says I am I can divide itself into two and yet be the same. It can say ‘you’ to itself when there is nothing but itself there.”
Porius is running the gauntlet of emotions, contemplations of self, life, death, spirituality, and philosophy while absorbing his world—his place in it, family, history, and legends, and pondering the most minute details of sights and sounds, the moss on a rotted stump or the nasty pile of poo—human excrement dropped at the crossing of paths covered in bronze colored dung flies. (I’m astounded that no one stepped into it with all that was going on at that spot! And I took note that Porius never once warned anyone to watch their step.)
The life journey of gaining insight, perspective, and a new awakening of self—is relatable, we all go through changes—it’s a common human experience, change happens! Some changes are gradual, some are as sudden as being hit by a train, and sometimes we go kicking and screaming, while other times it is surprisingly natural like it was always there and we’re just noticing it through the clutter of other people and their expectations.
Page 633: “Never had Porius’s mind raced round and round its case of the moment’s fatality with a more savage fastidiousness. He had no wish to change everything, but he had a great wish to enjoy the “status quo” more than seemed possible just then.”
(Been there.)
I could go on and on about this book, but I promised to keep it short—I’m not compelled to write a book about a book that I’ve read three times (not counting the multiple times I’ve opened it randomly to read a passage here and there.) I will likely read it again as I come away with something new every time I’ve read it, and there’s sure to be something I failed to notice during the previous reading. It seems to be every ten years I revisit this one.
Tungerong larry ong— Endure to the end.
Website of interest:
The Lecturn, Porius by John Cowper Powys, July 29, 2011
http://thelectern.blogspot.com/2011/0...
The Guardian, Margaret Drabble, review: The English Degenerate, August 11, 2006
https://www.theguardian.com/books/200...
Robin Wood, ‘A quest for “feminine consciousness” in John Cowper Powys’s Porius’, International Journal of Welsh Writing in English, 9 (2022), 1, DOI: 10.16995/wwe.3375
https://ijwwe.uwp.co.uk/article/id/3375/
The Powys Society, links to articles, websites, etc. about JCP and family members.
https://www.powys-society.org/Links.html
Here is a helpful website that explains the Welsh language’s phonetics and history.
https://www.go4awalk.com/fell-facts/w...
Anyway—the book—I’m quite partial to it because it’s that kind of human condition book that has everything and the kitchen sink that skips through your mind on any given day. The beauty of this novel is steeped in the landscape of North Wales, mountains, rivers, lakes, and marshes, serving as a backdrop to the legends, history, philosophy, the myriad of religions of the region, and tribalism that is the backbone of this epic.
Porius is a young man moving through eight days of his life, October 18-25 in 499 AD (aka Common Era, CE.) Big things are happening for him—he’s getting married, the Saxons are invading, his family members are at odds, the Romanized Britons, the forest people, the Druid, and the local Catholic priest are partaking in their versions of unrest, and King Arthur has requested Porius to join him in the fight to expel the Saxon barbarians. He also finds himself mystically bound with Myrddin Wyltt (Merlin). Porius is thirty years old, described as Herculean in size and strength, with small bear-like yellow-green eyes. Physically, he is slow, described as lethargic, as if his muscular body and brute strength are an impediment; however, he’s handy as a war machine (he once walked into the midst of the enemy unarmed, killed the first man to come at him with a spear he found, then used the corpse as a weapon to kill and disperse the rest of the fighters.) With that said, he’s not stupid at all, his thoughts are extremely animated, a force of nature within him. He daydreams in this fascinating manner; to quote from page 414:
“…he gave himself up to his old secret trick, that peculiar embrace of the material elements and objects that happened to be around him at the moment, for which, through his boyish awareness of a chance-occurrence when searching the hills with the elder Porius, he had invented the odd verb cavoseniargize.”
This cavoseniargizing is a strong connection between himself and nature, and it’s very pleasurable for him to pause and get lost for a time. Who doesn’t need to “step away” for a spell to pass the time—to process the tempest and peace that flows in life’s currents. Focus, refocus.
His self-awareness—even as a child—was evident from a memory on page 841: “The child seemed unable to explain to her the cause of this rapturous trance—that the child had felt inexpressible delight in the idea that small though he was, there was something in him…different from everybody else in the world...”
Also from page 841 continued: “The thing in me that says I am I can divide itself into two and yet be the same. It can say ‘you’ to itself when there is nothing but itself there.”
Porius is running the gauntlet of emotions, contemplations of self, life, death, spirituality, and philosophy while absorbing his world—his place in it, family, history, and legends, and pondering the most minute details of sights and sounds, the moss on a rotted stump or the nasty pile of poo—human excrement dropped at the crossing of paths covered in bronze colored dung flies. (I’m astounded that no one stepped into it with all that was going on at that spot! And I took note that Porius never once warned anyone to watch their step.)
The life journey of gaining insight, perspective, and a new awakening of self—is relatable, we all go through changes—it’s a common human experience, change happens! Some changes are gradual, some are as sudden as being hit by a train, and sometimes we go kicking and screaming, while other times it is surprisingly natural like it was always there and we’re just noticing it through the clutter of other people and their expectations.
Page 633: “Never had Porius’s mind raced round and round its case of the moment’s fatality with a more savage fastidiousness. He had no wish to change everything, but he had a great wish to enjoy the “status quo” more than seemed possible just then.”
(Been there.)
I could go on and on about this book, but I promised to keep it short—I’m not compelled to write a book about a book that I’ve read three times (not counting the multiple times I’ve opened it randomly to read a passage here and there.) I will likely read it again as I come away with something new every time I’ve read it, and there’s sure to be something I failed to notice during the previous reading. It seems to be every ten years I revisit this one.
Tungerong larry ong— Endure to the end.
Website of interest:
The Lecturn, Porius by John Cowper Powys, July 29, 2011
http://thelectern.blogspot.com/2011/0...
The Guardian, Margaret Drabble, review: The English Degenerate, August 11, 2006
https://www.theguardian.com/books/200...
Robin Wood, ‘A quest for “feminine consciousness” in John Cowper Powys’s Porius’, International Journal of Welsh Writing in English, 9 (2022), 1, DOI: 10.16995/wwe.3375
https://ijwwe.uwp.co.uk/article/id/3375/
The Powys Society, links to articles, websites, etc. about JCP and family members.
https://www.powys-society.org/Links.html
Here is a helpful website that explains the Welsh language’s phonetics and history.
https://www.go4awalk.com/fell-facts/w...
April 11, 2020
Reading the novels of John Cowper Powys will always perhaps be a minority taste, despite a resurgence of interest in him from the 1970s when the Village Press republished many of his works. Powys regarded Porius as the greatest of his novels, but it was not until 2007 that the full text of Porius, which no publisher would take on during Powys's lifetime, finally saw the light of day.
The full version is much, much longer than the truncated Porius first published in 1951 following the author's drastic revisions, and which I read nearly 50 years ago. But what struck me about the novel I have just read is how much the Powys magic, which does make this the greatest of his novels, is there on almost every page - and hence how terribly difficult (and perhaps painful) Powys's task in making drastic cuts must have been. My memory of the originally published work is too remote - despite my having dipped into it occasionally over the years following my initial reading - for me to be able, as I was reading, to detect portions which had been excised. I made a couple of guesses as I went along: the lengthy reveries which interrupt the preparations for the interment of Porius's father, and the scene between Porius, Rhun, Medrawd and Afagddu in the final chapter; and it turns out that those were indeed omitted from the original published version. But there were not many which offered themselves as possible candidates for omission. This seven hundred and fifty page work with close type is one that, for this reader at any rate, holds the attention from first to last.
What did appear in this full version is that (perhaps more than the one revised for publication) it is a novel very much about Powys himself and his acute interest in the minutest processes of everyday mental existence. Porius, in other words, is a reflection of Powys himself, as is that other of his eponymous heroes, Wolf Solent. And it is these delicate and infinitely complex processes of his mental existence which are most directly treated, without a fictional sheath, in Powys's Autobiography.
The greatest of his novels with a contemporary setting - I would suggest Wolf Solent and A Glastonbury Romance - are, like Porius, very much concerned with the immediate daily interaction of particular men and women with one another, with their immediate environment (both animate and inanimate) and with their own internal psyches. But Porius is much more than this, in that it engages with broad movements of history and with nothing less than the destiny of mankind since the dawn of civilisation. Hence the imaginary identification of Myrddin Wyllt (King Arthur's counsellor Merlin) with Chronos, which enables Powys to tap into a rich tradition of ideas about paradise, a golden age, the rise of tyranny and oppression, polytheism and monotheism, to mention but a few of the concepts which recur to inform the thought and action of many characters in the novel. Some of the more imaginary flights - and the identification of Myrddin with Chronos is one of these - may strain the credulity of some readers. But for me, it is the lack of solemnity with which these are handled, the way that they are bound up in Powys's narrative with the trivial, the everyday, the humorous, which are their saving grace. With every reason, then, Powys pronounced this novel to be his "masterpiece and by far the most original and exciting I've ever written."
The full version is much, much longer than the truncated Porius first published in 1951 following the author's drastic revisions, and which I read nearly 50 years ago. But what struck me about the novel I have just read is how much the Powys magic, which does make this the greatest of his novels, is there on almost every page - and hence how terribly difficult (and perhaps painful) Powys's task in making drastic cuts must have been. My memory of the originally published work is too remote - despite my having dipped into it occasionally over the years following my initial reading - for me to be able, as I was reading, to detect portions which had been excised. I made a couple of guesses as I went along: the lengthy reveries which interrupt the preparations for the interment of Porius's father, and the scene between Porius, Rhun, Medrawd and Afagddu in the final chapter; and it turns out that those were indeed omitted from the original published version. But there were not many which offered themselves as possible candidates for omission. This seven hundred and fifty page work with close type is one that, for this reader at any rate, holds the attention from first to last.
What did appear in this full version is that (perhaps more than the one revised for publication) it is a novel very much about Powys himself and his acute interest in the minutest processes of everyday mental existence. Porius, in other words, is a reflection of Powys himself, as is that other of his eponymous heroes, Wolf Solent. And it is these delicate and infinitely complex processes of his mental existence which are most directly treated, without a fictional sheath, in Powys's Autobiography.
The greatest of his novels with a contemporary setting - I would suggest Wolf Solent and A Glastonbury Romance - are, like Porius, very much concerned with the immediate daily interaction of particular men and women with one another, with their immediate environment (both animate and inanimate) and with their own internal psyches. But Porius is much more than this, in that it engages with broad movements of history and with nothing less than the destiny of mankind since the dawn of civilisation. Hence the imaginary identification of Myrddin Wyllt (King Arthur's counsellor Merlin) with Chronos, which enables Powys to tap into a rich tradition of ideas about paradise, a golden age, the rise of tyranny and oppression, polytheism and monotheism, to mention but a few of the concepts which recur to inform the thought and action of many characters in the novel. Some of the more imaginary flights - and the identification of Myrddin with Chronos is one of these - may strain the credulity of some readers. But for me, it is the lack of solemnity with which these are handled, the way that they are bound up in Powys's narrative with the trivial, the everyday, the humorous, which are their saving grace. With every reason, then, Powys pronounced this novel to be his "masterpiece and by far the most original and exciting I've ever written."
November 15, 2012
Whew...tough going so far, but damn'd intriguing. John Cowper Powys, apparently, was a Modernist about whom no one felt mildly. Many critics seem to think he's a logorrheic with unhealthy views on sex and mysticism - fair point - while dudes like Henry Miller adored him. Whatever the case, "Porius" is, so far, a very weird book. I have the pre-unabridged version - found it at Myopic Books in Chicago, and it appears to be printed sometime between 1968 and 1979.
I'm only into the second chapter, but it's unlike anything I've ever read before. It takes place over one week in October, 499 AD, and has something to do with primitive pre-Christian religious traditions (The Cult of Mithras FINALLY shows up in a work of fiction!) in Wales and King Arthur figures in there somehow too. In terms of the prose stylee, I catch pre-echoes of Tolkein, the breadth of Homer, the interiority of Woolf, and some sort of troglodytic wild-assed ragged Brit-isles poetic tradition that evidently begs its paragons to speak almost entirely in blunt-primitive similes and metaphors. There's symbolism at work, and if you ain't schooled in yer early Chrisitianity history, you ain't gonna get far. An incident in the opening pages which would have taken possibly 45 seconds in real time took 19 pages to describe. All of the characters have severely unpronounceable names. Porius, the "hero," never seems to actually DO anything - he thinks, he thinks, he thinks. This all sounds bad yet I'm compelled to march forward...
I'm only into the second chapter, but it's unlike anything I've ever read before. It takes place over one week in October, 499 AD, and has something to do with primitive pre-Christian religious traditions (The Cult of Mithras FINALLY shows up in a work of fiction!) in Wales and King Arthur figures in there somehow too. In terms of the prose stylee, I catch pre-echoes of Tolkein, the breadth of Homer, the interiority of Woolf, and some sort of troglodytic wild-assed ragged Brit-isles poetic tradition that evidently begs its paragons to speak almost entirely in blunt-primitive similes and metaphors. There's symbolism at work, and if you ain't schooled in yer early Chrisitianity history, you ain't gonna get far. An incident in the opening pages which would have taken possibly 45 seconds in real time took 19 pages to describe. All of the characters have severely unpronounceable names. Porius, the "hero," never seems to actually DO anything - he thinks, he thinks, he thinks. This all sounds bad yet I'm compelled to march forward...
Want to read
February 29, 2008Why I want to read it (from the Atlantic):
Porius
by John Cowper Powys (Overlook Duckworth)
In this novel, first published greatly abridged in 1951 and now painstakingly restored, the eccentric Powys produced a vision of northern Wales in the Dark Ages, specifically one week in October 499 A.D., so packed with characters, their inner lives, and their side stories that it threatens to burst its covers despite its now-ample (more than 700) pages. Part historical novel, part magic realism, part romance, the book, told mostly from the point of view of the son of a Welsh prince of mixed blood, brings together Romans, Picts, Celts, Saxons, Scots, and shadowy forest folk—along with their customs and cults—in a time of intense flux, when Christianity is beginning to edge out older religions. Tolkienesque in its setting of wooded hills and mysterious mountains and its incorporation of sorcery and martial alliances, Porius is far more historically based than Tolkien’s fantasies (if still often inaccurate) and far more realistically human, and is therefore far messier.
Porius
by John Cowper Powys (Overlook Duckworth)
In this novel, first published greatly abridged in 1951 and now painstakingly restored, the eccentric Powys produced a vision of northern Wales in the Dark Ages, specifically one week in October 499 A.D., so packed with characters, their inner lives, and their side stories that it threatens to burst its covers despite its now-ample (more than 700) pages. Part historical novel, part magic realism, part romance, the book, told mostly from the point of view of the son of a Welsh prince of mixed blood, brings together Romans, Picts, Celts, Saxons, Scots, and shadowy forest folk—along with their customs and cults—in a time of intense flux, when Christianity is beginning to edge out older religions. Tolkienesque in its setting of wooded hills and mysterious mountains and its incorporation of sorcery and martial alliances, Porius is far more historically based than Tolkien’s fantasies (if still often inaccurate) and far more realistically human, and is therefore far messier.
July 11, 2009
I actually read the OP Colgate version, the first uncut edition. Definitely my favorite book. Not a single wasted character, and the pace of this large novel is pleasurably slow, the way one would eat at a five-star restaurant. It's a no-pretense story set in the dark ages, subtly philosophical, rich in unique situations that reflect history, local Welsh mythology, and human nature both tragic and humorous.
If there is just one book to read in the world...
If there is just one book to read in the world...
September 21, 2008
What can I possibly write about this book in this itty-bitty space and unleavening atmosphere. Porius is the magnum opus no one has ever heard of. Read Porius. Here are more reasons why.
May 13, 2020
It's hard for me to rate this one, but I know I definitely didn't enjoy it. I found it profoundly hard to follow, and while it looked like it was starting to pay off about halfway through, that drifted away. Kinda wish I'd DNR'ed it, which I almost never do.
August 13, 2016
Not a worse book than Owen Glendower, and Owen Glendower is probably my favorite novel.
November 19, 2021
Nobody writes like Powys. The question is whether that's a good thing or not.
This is the complete, unedited (posthumous) version of a book that had earlier been published in an extremely abridged version. The latter is now, or should be, obsolete. Nevertheless, this could have used some revising or editing for any but the most patient readers.
It's worth slogging though the slow parts. The description of places and characters from the distant past are, in my opinion, virtually unrivalled (Naomi Mitchison's "The Corn King and Spring Queen" comes to mind as another thorough immersion in a distant time and place, but without the brilliance of Powys's prose). Most notably, the character or personage whom we would call Merlin has gone from a two-dimensional stereotypical magician to a completely fleshed-out, living, breathing being, part human, part divine, flawed and dirty, yet awesome.
The author's psychological approach to the novel, dwelling on the characters' thoughts, is a little old-fashioned (like Henry James era), but in this book it's part of the milieu: any story that can convincingly plunk the reader into fifth-century Wales and make us feel that we're there, and show us that world through the eyes and thoughts of those who lived there ands then, has accomplished a great deal.
This is the complete, unedited (posthumous) version of a book that had earlier been published in an extremely abridged version. The latter is now, or should be, obsolete. Nevertheless, this could have used some revising or editing for any but the most patient readers.
It's worth slogging though the slow parts. The description of places and characters from the distant past are, in my opinion, virtually unrivalled (Naomi Mitchison's "The Corn King and Spring Queen" comes to mind as another thorough immersion in a distant time and place, but without the brilliance of Powys's prose). Most notably, the character or personage whom we would call Merlin has gone from a two-dimensional stereotypical magician to a completely fleshed-out, living, breathing being, part human, part divine, flawed and dirty, yet awesome.
The author's psychological approach to the novel, dwelling on the characters' thoughts, is a little old-fashioned (like Henry James era), but in this book it's part of the milieu: any story that can convincingly plunk the reader into fifth-century Wales and make us feel that we're there, and show us that world through the eyes and thoughts of those who lived there ands then, has accomplished a great deal.
March 3, 2024
You'll either love it because it's long, or hate it because it's long... set in the time of King Arthur, populated by Saxons, shadowy forest people, and a hidden race of endangered giants, John Powys's magnum opus follows the odyssey of Porius (heir to the throne of Edeyrnion, and student of Merlin) as he struggles to gain maturity, wisdom, and personal freedom.
Filled with references to (and appearances by) Arthurian favorites like The Lady Of The Lake, Creiddylad (the giantess daughter of King Lludd) and even Blodeuwedd (the girl of Welsh legend who was transformed into an owl), this romance of the Dark Ages is a treat for bibliophiles, using words instead of thread to weave a vivid, engaging, and complex tapestry that details the psychological and moral growth of a man preparing to become a ruler.
As in all of Powys's novels, the descriptions are immersive and hyper-real, transporting the reader to a world that the author must've seen with crystal-clarity in his mind's eye... it's an exhilarating and mind-altering triumph that will leave readers both impressed and enriched!
Filled with references to (and appearances by) Arthurian favorites like The Lady Of The Lake, Creiddylad (the giantess daughter of King Lludd) and even Blodeuwedd (the girl of Welsh legend who was transformed into an owl), this romance of the Dark Ages is a treat for bibliophiles, using words instead of thread to weave a vivid, engaging, and complex tapestry that details the psychological and moral growth of a man preparing to become a ruler.
As in all of Powys's novels, the descriptions are immersive and hyper-real, transporting the reader to a world that the author must've seen with crystal-clarity in his mind's eye... it's an exhilarating and mind-altering triumph that will leave readers both impressed and enriched!
February 4, 2017
A strange and majestic culmination of this eccentric genius' life work. As rough and heavy going as the primitive mountain landscape in which it's set, this massive novel repays the reader's effort in passages of transcendent beauty and wisdom. Certainly uneven, but at its best Powys' last major novel is an indisputable masterpiece.
July 26, 2023
Peerless. A living book, alive as none other. It accompanies you. It is the Time that swallows the Space of you. Impossible without Powys having accessed primordial knowledge via exhaustion of the conscious mind. Magic. This book changed my life, validated my entire existence, and healed my heart. It increased me. This is one of the Keys.
Want to read
October 29, 2022"Due to the demands of publishers and a paper shortage in Britain, Powys was forced to excise more than 500 pages from the 1951 version. It wasn't until 2007 that the full novel, as Powys intended his magnum opus to be, was published both in Britain and America."
March 9, 2022
This is astonishing. There are so many reasons why it shouldn't work, but it does. Powys' ability to present a large cast of strange characters, make them into memorable individuals, hold the multiple threads of his narrative and keep it moving, while stopping to describe mould or light, or speculate upon God, good and evil, without ever becoming boring or frustrating, is remarkable.
As a version of 5th century Britain this is one of the most imaginative and, within its own story world, credible I've read. His use of early Welsh material is fascinating, but it never becomes pedantic or forced. The fact that Taliesn is a master chef is one of the minor delights of the story, and the return of Blodweud is worth the price of admission.
I read the Kindle version, but I will track down a hard copy and reread it.
As a version of 5th century Britain this is one of the most imaginative and, within its own story world, credible I've read. His use of early Welsh material is fascinating, but it never becomes pedantic or forced. The fact that Taliesn is a master chef is one of the minor delights of the story, and the return of Blodweud is worth the price of admission.
I read the Kindle version, but I will track down a hard copy and reread it.
July 26, 2013
Whew, done! I finished this book in agitation, simply to say that I've read it.
First off this gigantic behemoth of a book is so full of thought, that I couldn't think what that last thought was all about. I'm not even entirely sure I know what the gist of the book meant. I don't like that much.
Symbolism,.. I guess, but I don't find symbolism in cups and swords or chance encounters/circumstance.
Second its so primitive in its Christ beginnings, so as to misconstrue the whole Christian faith.. it was massacred! Didn't care much for that.
The only character that I really enjoyed and could somewhat relate was Morfydd. She had courage and a gusto that just made her do what needed to be done, no matter what it cost her. I admired that. Poor Porius was just lost and didn't do much of anything throughout the whole huge outpouring of words, he didn't do a single thing. . other than be portrayed as a cheat, however noble, still a cheat.
SO I "liked" it, gave it "3" stars and am so glad its over.
First off this gigantic behemoth of a book is so full of thought, that I couldn't think what that last thought was all about. I'm not even entirely sure I know what the gist of the book meant. I don't like that much.
Symbolism,.. I guess, but I don't find symbolism in cups and swords or chance encounters/circumstance.
Second its so primitive in its Christ beginnings, so as to misconstrue the whole Christian faith.. it was massacred! Didn't care much for that.
The only character that I really enjoyed and could somewhat relate was Morfydd. She had courage and a gusto that just made her do what needed to be done, no matter what it cost her. I admired that. Poor Porius was just lost and didn't do much of anything throughout the whole huge outpouring of words, he didn't do a single thing. . other than be portrayed as a cheat, however noble, still a cheat.
SO I "liked" it, gave it "3" stars and am so glad its over.
June 23, 2015
This work has it's fantastic, Powys moments. It just has 100ish page periods of writing scattered throughout that don't do much to reach any sort of these precious heights...This work was more like Atlantis than Glastonbury Romance. The enigmatic Merlyn (can't remember if it has a different spelling in this work) and the likewise elemental Porius are definitely landmark characters in Powys's corpus. That's where you can get the most out of this tome. I'd like to return to the work and delve through their layers, but as a reading experience, this work does meander. Definitely for the Powys experienced, but not a hard read or anything.
April 24, 2013
A six month effort for me...and indeed, a very challenging read. There is all of the raw material for a great novel here, and many episodes of superb historical, psychological, and philosophical literature, but Powys cannot sustain these very long. The most difficult aspect is the sleepwalking narration and easily distracted internal monologues that dominate the entire narrative...everything is many times clouded and shrouded over with very foreign symbolism. Porius reads like the Eumaeus episode of Ulysses, but without having earned the reader's full attention at any step of the way.
August 24, 2012
The strangest book I've ever read... A dark-age epic with a writing style that calls to mind James Joyce (my un-expert opinion)... If you like history and philosophy and have a long attention span by all means go for it... However, if you aren't prepared to be as confused when you finish Porius as you were at its beginning then steer clear... Ultimately though, a book that deserves to be read and pondered
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