E. R. Eddison

Keith Henderson

"The greatest and most convincing writer of 'invented worlds' that I have read." J. R. R. Tolkien. Written in the best traditions of Homeric epics, Eddison's masterpiece recounts compelling tales of warriors and witches. "

The Worm Ouroboros

Sarah Sammis

Read because ouroboros was mentioned in something else I was reading at the time.

Rjyan C Kidwell

No joke watch this dude invent Gollum and both Lannister brothers, in 1922, and make them all 1 character. This book is so great that it's kind of hard to deal with. The faux-Jacobean language is great-- feels pretty impeccable, hits a lot of the highs of Philip Sidney, but ER keeps sentences to very manageable proportions and it's not really necessary to reread passages like you might expect to in a faux-Jacobean sitch. And it is awe-inspiringly tough that this is being pulled off while everyone's name is silly as hell--like Jack Vance on weed at a sleepover silly-- and that instead of being called "The French" or "Gondorians" or whathaveyou, the countries are "Witchland" and "Impland" etc. I have read that ER started building this world as a child and as an adult refused to change any of the names-- I can think no greater flex in the history of fantasy. Of course it wouldn't work if the story wasn't legit, and it's very legit. There are a couple climactic moments that brightened the whole rest of my irl day. Pretty impressive, too, that there are quite a few female characters and that every single one of them is a hardass--not something I'd necessarily expect in a fantasy book from 1992, much less 1922. Some dweebs might try to say many of the characters are too similar and not flawed enough, but I found ER's vision of an aristocracy bereft of self-pity to be a pretty awesome use of the imagination, and it never felt like it was supposed to be a moralistic allegory at any point. 

I'm really shocked this isn't talked about more--Lord of the Rings would clearly not have ever happened if Tolkien hadn't loved this book-- and I'm pre-emptively disappointed at any premium streaming network executive who could argue that the viewing public is too immature to handle a fantasy series where dudes named "Lord Spitfire" and "Brandoch Daha" extol the beauty of Demonland in beautiful Shakespearean language. It's probably for the best though because I'd really want David Milch to be the one to adapt it for the laptop screen, and I guess he's kind of out of commission for henceforth. Anyway this book will surprise you.

The Worm Ouroboros

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