The House On The Borderland And Other Novels by William Hope Hodgson. Fantasy Masterworks No. 33
01/01/2003 . Source: Eamonn Murphy 
Pub: Gollancz. 637 page enlarged paperback. Price: £ 6.99(UK). ISBN: 0-575-07372-1. Buy from Amazon US - Buy from Amazon UK
nb: US titles may only be available from Amazon US, and UK titles from Amazon UK. Check out website: www.orionbooks.co.uk
And so I fell to reading the books of William Hope Hodgson, the which I had not hitherto encountered, and in this way passed many a long hour, for there are four novels in this mighty tome, all written in the prose of yesteryear.
The first, 'The Boats Of The Glen Carrig', concerns brave sailors lost in a sea of thick weed populated with strange and terrible monsters. They make their way to an island and find that another ship has been trapped in the weed for months.
There are girls on board! It's a good story of the same ilk and era as Arthur Conan Doyle's 'The Lost World'. Fun!
Presently, having made an end of the first novel I started the second. 'The House On The Borderland' is set in the west of Ireland. In the ruins of an old mansion, shunned by the locals, two friends discover the journal of an old man. It tells of his soul journeys to the far future where he sees many strange and wondrous things.
Cosmic, man! And pretty cosmic it is too, for 1908. Lovecraft is generally known as the originator of this kind of thing, yet he was an admirer of Hodgson. Bob Heinlein once pointed out that Doc Smith's stuff all seemed hackneyed now because everyone has spent thirty years copying it. Hodgson must be read with this in mind. That's not an excuse. It doesn't need an excuse. It's good.
Of the three short novels, I most liked 'The Ghost Pirates.' Jessop, the narrator, joins the good ship Mortzestus in 'Frisco, despite some strange rumors about it. At first there are small incidents, odd events. No one will talk openly about them. No one wants to be thought a fool. Things get worse. Hodgson builds the tension slowly, with King-ly skill, in a genuinely suspenseful and sometimes scary tale.
And so to 'The Night Land', which is as long as the other three put together. In her introduction, China Mieville says: 'If a committee had been set up to design an unreadable book they'd probably have come up with 'The Night Land'.' I couldn't agree more. Had I not been contractually obligated to finish the damn thing I would have given it up a hundred times. The world created is brilliant. The story is interesting.
The writing is a cod-biblical nightmare.
Here is a sample sentence: 'And there also to come presently a change and a seeming of thinness into the air; and the Maid to remark upon this, and likewise that the water powder now to be that it not to fizz so plentiful.'
There are about 180,000 words arranged in this fashion. There are also original and wonderful ideas. The first part of the book where the narrator and his True Love meet in our time or rather Hodgson's time is a bit blah.
Then we move to the far future where he dreams of this past life and lives in the Great Redoubt, a mighty fortress and sanctuary where millions exist on a dying Earth, surrounded by terrible forces. The history, culture and organisation of this society are well defined. It's real Science Fiction.
The narrator is a kind of telepath and becomes aware of another group of humans out somewhere in the Night Land. He sets off to find them. His outward journey is fairly gripping despite the awful prose.
His return journey with the Maid, who is the reincarnation of his former Love just as he is the reincarnation of hers, is tedious beyond measure. I would like to recommend it to feminists, just to hear the sound of a million teeth grinding throughout the western world.
The book costs 699 pennies. The three short novels are worth 233 each and if you are ever on a very long journey with nothing to read - Earth to Alpha Centauri in a steamboat, say - you can tackle 'The Night Land'. Failing that wait for the film. Someone's bound to make it one day.
Eamonn Murphy |
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