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New Tales from the Mabinogion #4
The Dreams of Max and Ronnie
Iraq-bound young squaddie Ronnie takes something dodgy and falls asleep for three nights in a filthy hovel where he has the strangest of dreams. He watches the tattoed tribes of modern Britain assemble to speak with a grinning man playing war games. Arthurian legend merges with its twenty-first century counterpart in a biting commentary on leadership, individualism and the divisions in British society. Meanwhile Cardiff gansta Max is fed up with life in his favourite nightclub, Rome, and chases a vision of the perfect woman in far flung parts of his country.
- GenresFictionFantasyRetellings
167 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 1, 2010
72 people want to read
About the author
Niall Griffiths
33 books98 followersNiall Griffiths was born in Liverpool to a Welsh/Irish/Romany lineage. He’s been a labourer, a barman, a server of fish and chips, a burglar, a farmhand, a tree feller, a factory worker and many other things too tedious to relate. Now, he’s a full-time writer, living at the foot of a mountain in mid-Wales, with seven novels published, several works of non-fiction and more short stories and radio plays and travel pieces and reviews than he cares to, or possibly even can, count. His fourth novel, Stump, won the Wales Book of the Year Award. A film adaptation of his third novel, Kelly+Victor, won a BAFTA. He’s now working on the screenplay for his sixth, Wreckage. His latest novel is Broken Ghost.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
September 2, 2022
Ronnie, a young squaddie on his way out to Iraq takes a bad pill and has a dream of a new England eager to be awakened and Max, the King of the Cardiff Gangsters, sets a challenge to find him the perfect woman.
As befits these tales, there is a dreamlike quality to the writing and Griffiths does a good job of updating these two similar stories from the Mabinogion.
As befits these tales, there is a dreamlike quality to the writing and Griffiths does a good job of updating these two similar stories from the Mabinogion.
November 22, 2019
Inventive satire.
December 26, 2010
Niall Griffiths retells two dream stories from the Mabinogion in The Dreams of Max & Ronnie. The first and longer of Griffiths’ novellas, ‘Ronnie’s Dream’, is based on the Mabinogion story of Rhonabwy, whose dream was a vision of King Arthur and a vast gathering of knights. Griffiths’ Ronnie is a squaddie about to set off for Iraq; the leader he meets in his dream is not Arthur, but an analogue of Tony Blair. Reading ‘Ronnie’s Dream’, I felt the limitations of not having read the Mabinogion; a synopsis is fine, but it can’t give me the sense of the original tale. Griffiths’ version is a satire, primarily on the Iraq war, but it doesn’t quite work for me on that level. For one thing, it feels like a bit of a grab-bag – mostly stuff on the war, but it also squeezes in some swipes at celebrity culture and some social stereotypes – which dilutes the focus somewhat. For another, as targets of satire, these issues seem to me quite well-worn, and I’m not sure that this tale says much about them that is fresh.
This is not to say, though, that ‘Ronnie’s Dream’ has no bite. Some aspects certainly have, such as the Blair-figure’s stock speech (‘By my actions have I answered questions. The time has come for an end to talking…’ [p. 68]), which is repeated until ground down into empty rhetoric. In addition, the contrast between the poetic style of Griffiths’ narration and the more modern, colloquial dialogue is very effective; and there’s general interest in seeing how the author adapts details of the myth for the present day.
Griffiths’ second novella is ‘The Dream of Max the Emperor’; originally the story of Maxen Wledig, a Roman emperor who goes (or sends his men) in search of a beautiful woman he saw in a dream, here Max is a Cardiff crime boss. He eventually finds his beauty in north Wales, but all is not as it seems; for example, the castle in his dream turns out to be a film set. This theme goes deeper into the story; one of Griffiths’ best effects in the novella is the way he portrays the Wales outside Cardiff as a place that’s as strange to Max’s men as any land of myth would be:
Something that both Griffiths and Gwyneth Lewis manage to do in their respective books is evoke a true sense of fantasy, the disquieting and disorienting sense that (at least within the pages of the book) the world is not as you thought. In doing so, they show just how much vitality these myths still have.
This is not to say, though, that ‘Ronnie’s Dream’ has no bite. Some aspects certainly have, such as the Blair-figure’s stock speech (‘By my actions have I answered questions. The time has come for an end to talking…’ [p. 68]), which is repeated until ground down into empty rhetoric. In addition, the contrast between the poetic style of Griffiths’ narration and the more modern, colloquial dialogue is very effective; and there’s general interest in seeing how the author adapts details of the myth for the present day.
Griffiths’ second novella is ‘The Dream of Max the Emperor’; originally the story of Maxen Wledig, a Roman emperor who goes (or sends his men) in search of a beautiful woman he saw in a dream, here Max is a Cardiff crime boss. He eventually finds his beauty in north Wales, but all is not as it seems; for example, the castle in his dream turns out to be a film set. This theme goes deeper into the story; one of Griffiths’ best effects in the novella is the way he portrays the Wales outside Cardiff as a place that’s as strange to Max’s men as any land of myth would be:
They travel out of the city limits and each one feels a small falling-off as they enter a land they don’t recognise, through valleys between dark slag-mountains and past heaps of refuse and rotting industrial machinery, past rusting pitheads and smelters and quarries and all of it a-crumble. Over a plain. Across big green bumps on the world’s face. (p. 127)
Something that both Griffiths and Gwyneth Lewis manage to do in their respective books is evoke a true sense of fantasy, the disquieting and disorienting sense that (at least within the pages of the book) the world is not as you thought. In doing so, they show just how much vitality these myths still have.
November 28, 2010
If "revenge is a dish best served cold" then satire is a dish best served piping hot. There are two stories in this book both modern day adaptations of stories from the Welsh Mabinogion a knowledge of which is really not necessary to enjoy the tales but finding out where the source material comes from in a bonus; synopses of both original stories are included in the book. The best of the two pieces is ‘Ronnie’s Dream’, a biting satire of contemporary British values; ‘The Dream of Max the Emperor’ felt like an adaptation – it’s probably suffers unfairly in comparison to the first piece which is exceptional.
You can read my full review on my blog here.
You can read my full review on my blog here.
December 12, 2012
I'm afraid me and Niall Griffiths are never going to get on. I love the original stories of Macsen Wledig and Rhonabwy, but Niall Griffiths manages to make them so full of grossness that I couldn't even be bothered doing more than skim. I was hopeful when I started it, because there is some gorgeous writing at the beginning -- and actually, running through the dream of 'Ronnie', there's some interesting satire on the Iraq war and so on -- but Niall Griffiths' work is just not for me.
As with Sheepshagger, it gets more stars because I usually respect what he's doing (more so in the retelling of Rhonawby's dream than Macsen Wledig's), but I can't honestly say I enjoyed it by any measure.
As with Sheepshagger, it gets more stars because I usually respect what he's doing (more so in the retelling of Rhonawby's dream than Macsen Wledig's), but I can't honestly say I enjoyed it by any measure.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews