Figures of Earth

The Biography of Manuel #2

by James Branch Cabell

The story of Manuel the swineherd, who rises to power by playing on others' expectations -- his motto Mundus Vult Decipi , meaning "the world wishes to be deceived."

Genres: Fantasy, Fiction, Humor, Novels, Speculative Fiction, Science Fiction, Comedy

262 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1921

About the author

James Branch Cabell was an American author of fantasy fiction and belles lettres. Cabell was well regarded by his contemporaries, including H. L. Mencken, Edmund Wilson, and Sinclair Lewis. His works were considered escapist and fit well in the culture of the 1920s, when they were most popular. For Cabell, veracity was "the one unpardonable sin, not merely against art, but against human welfare."

Reviews

[Warren Fournier · Rating 5 out of 5]

Though "Jurgen" is James Branch Cabell's most famous work, it is "Figures of Earth" that is the center of Cabell's literary universe. From this groundbreaking fantasy comes the character of Dom Manuel, from whom all of Cabell's most important characters are related.

But Manuel is more than just Cabell's Kevin Bacon. He is one of the most important archetypes, a Christ figure, the embodiment of the human lifecycle, a realistic hero, and the father of modern fantasy.

He starts off as a lowly pig farmer. His mother has placed a "geas" on him, which is a magical obligation, to make something of himself. Well, what she actually says is "to make a figure in this world." He takes this quite literally, as he is not the brightest bulb. So he sits in the mud of the mire making clay figures. But despite his lack of any particular talent, selflessness, or cleverness, his mother's magical binding drives him into various situations and adventures that advance him in life. He stumbles and bumbles his way to becoming the Count of the land of Poictesme, Lord of the castle of Storisende, and his legendary rule as "The Redeemer" is long remembered after his death.

The story reads as a comedic allegory for every life's journey, from the innocent stupidity of youth, to the invincible recklessness of young adulthood, to the disillusionment of middle age, to the wisdom and serenity of old age. It is a tale told with rich symbolism in a land filled with bizarre creatures and colorful personalities. I am challenged to name many books that are more beautifully written or which touch on so many emotions. There are scenes where I laughed out loud and others that brought a tear to my eye.

Cabell writes his characters with both humor and pathos. You will never forget the wizard Miramon and his wife, one of the greatest couples in literature. And your heart will break for the women in Manuel's life and how he treats them, from the boyish but clever Niafer to Queen Freydis who gives up her immortality for him. Outstanding characters for an outstanding book.

Though written after Cabell's infamous novel, "Jurgen," this book inspired Cabell to fulfill his dream of a truly comprehensive story of human being. Therefore, he revised many of his previous fiction, poetry, and essays to tie in with the world he created in "Figures of Earth," and he also wrote more original material to carry on the epic. The resulting "Biography of the Life of Dom Manuel" extends through over 20 books and seven centuries, with the book "Beyond Life" serving as a prologue and with several shorter works serving as epilogues and compendiums.

One of the most fascinating things about the Biography is how it combines high fantasy and grounded reality. For fans of Doctor Who, the Biography does some "timey-whimey" stuff later in the series that rewrites time from 1294 to 1897. This requires the Norns to rewrite the narrative of time, and their second version isn't as interesting. As a result, there's history as we know it, and then there's an alternate timeline that we only "remember" as myth and fable, full of dragons and giants and witches and magic. Thus, "Figures of Earth" kicks off the first earnest attempt to build a modern mythology for the West. It is part of the more obvious fantasy storyline of the series while the remainder of the Biography takes place in a more "real" 20th Century America. Or does it?

You really never know what to expect from this series, and Cabell was so well read that he placed many epigrams, puzzles, hints, and clues to his themes which pointed to the direction of the narrative. This is one of the joys of reading Cabell. You can't help but wonder why he threw in a certain drawing, or quoted a certain minor poet, or why he suddenly falls into verse, or why he chose a particular character name. You start seeing details in the illustrations by Frank C. Papé. You start seeing patterns throughout all of his works. You start to look things up. You start to translate certain phrases from Latin or Middle French. You get rewarded when you uncover a clue and you start to get chills up your spine. With each subsequent reading, you uncover more, and the works take on deeper and richer meanings for you. For example, in Peter Koch's map of Poictesme, which is often included in copies of "Figures of Earth," there is a cartouche with the Latin inscription: "Mundus Vult Decipi," which became Cabell's motto, which means "The World Will be Fooled." Now, there are numerous layers of ways to interpret this. In "The Line of Love," we get a potential further clue to the quote in yet another quote, this time by Robert Burton. And with each book, we find even more ways to interpret it. Where is the ultimate secret of reality? In the library of John Charteris (Cabell's alter-ego)? The magic mirrors and the poetry of the Musgraves and Robert Townsend? Or in a mystical sigil with a secret message that has been split in two? But you'll have to read about all of this in other books.

Intrigued? If you are, I strongly encourage you to start your Cabell journey here. If you like it, then move on to "Jurgen." If you get hooked like I hope you will, then start at the beginning of the series with "Beyond Life" and read all the entries through to "Sonnets of Antan." You can come back after each entry and check out my reviews, as I plan to revisit each book myself and review them here on Goodreads. I'll be happy to be your guide as best I can.

Though Cabell is surely an odd writer, and not to everyone's taste, "Figures of Earth" is one of those books I think everyone should read. I am not a big fantasy otaku in the slightest, so I assure you that you can enjoy this book without having played D&D as a kid, or having your shelves stacked with Piers Anthony books, or having "The Rings of Power" queued up on your smart TV. Give it a try. It receives my highest recommendation enthusiastically.

[Terence · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mundus vult decipi - the world wants to be deceived - and the happier man is one whose desires remain unfulfilled inform all of Cabell's writing. As the chroniclers write of Poictesme's redemption:

"For although this was a very heroic war, with a parade of every sort of high moral principle, and with the most sonorous language employed upon both sides, it somehow failed to bring about either the reformation or the ruin of humankind: and after the conclusion of the murdering and general breakage, the world went on pretty much as it has done after all other wars, with a vague notion that a deal of time and effort had been unprofitably invested, and a conviction that it would be inglorious to say so." (p. 183)

And as Manuel tells Sesphra:

The devil of it was that these proud aims did not stay unattained! Instead, I was cursed by getting my will, and always my reward was nothing marvelous and rare, but that quite ordinary figure of earth, a human woman. And always in some dripping dawn I turned with abhorrence from myself and from the sated folly that had hankered for such prizes, which, when possessed showed as not wonderful in any thing, and which possession left likable enough, but stripped of dear bewitchments." (p. 210)

What saves Cabell's work from sinking into the unrelieved and brutal cynicism of more recent works like Joe Abercrombie's The Blade Itself The First Law: Book One or Terry Goodkind's Wizard's First Rule Sword of Truth Book 1 is the author's sharp wit and humor. And, above all, Cabell's acceptance that things aren't all that bleak despite people's foolishness and the futility of desire:

So you waste time, my friend, in trying to convince me of all human life's failure and unimportance, for I am not in sympathy with this modern morbid pessimistic way of talking. It has a very ill sound, and nothing whatever is to be gained by it." (p. 283)

This is the most enjoyable of Cabell's work I've read so far, but I hesitate to recommend him only because he's such an idiosyncratic writer - I've never read anyone quite like Cabell, though I would encourage anyone to try him. Figures of Earth is a good place to start, but Jurgen or The Silver Stallion are also representative and readable examples of his work. And, though they're all linked by theme and many common characters, they're also standalone novels; you can read them in no particular order (Jurgen was my first Cabell novel).

[Wreade1872 · Rating 5 out of 5]

"But I cannot put aside the thought that I, who for the while exist in this mortgaged body, cannot ever get out to you. Freydis, there is no way in which two persons may meet in this world of men: we can but exchange, from afar, despairing friendly signals, in the sure knowledge they will be misinterpreted.
So do we pass, each coming out of a strange woman's womb, each parodied by the flesh of his parents, each passing futilely, with incommunicative gestures, toward the womb of a strange grave: and in this jostling we find no comradeship.
No soul may travel upon a bridge of words. Indeed there is no word for my foiled huge desire to love and to be loved, just as there is no word for the big, the not quite comprehended thought which is moving in me at this moment. But that thought also is a grief—"

Wow that was depressing, amongst many other things. An early fantasy comedy satire, but also heavily allegorical. This is the closest of Cabells works to his famous book Jurgen (great novel, even if it did have a bit of a limp, insider joke :P ) which was banned for indecency but cleared after a trial.

I hadn’t checked the dates of the work so assumed this was an early one but it became clear from the plot that this was written after Jurgen. Indeed you could see it as a direct response to that work. Now that i think about it there’s a bit where Manuel becomes old really quickly and that might be a reference to the trial over Jurgen, maybe it prematurely aged the author.

Anyway aswell as a great bit of fantasy as i mentioned it has a lot of allegories going on and certainly didn’t decipher all of them, only close friends of Cabell could work them all out not that you need to decipher them. You can read this on many levels.

However the main allegory is pretty obvious. This book is about what do you do after you become successful? And related topics. What should an artist sacrifice for their art? How do you react to the growing obligations of life and family and the expectations of others?

There’s so much here and its a real delight, but also really depressing (for me) because its so truthful. But that's just me, if your an optimist this will probably just be delightful for you.

I think this might actually be better than Jurgen, but not quite as fun :) . Oh and this one isn’t naughty, in fact its very unnaughty.
I don’t think Cabell censored himself out of fear of another obscenity trial but rather because he wanted to rebel, against the rebels. His audience wanted him as the poster child for naughtiness so he did this (mostly) very clean book instead, at least that's my theory.

Almost exhausting in its brilliance.

[The Usual · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are people on this site - sane and sensible people who know how to juggle with words and such - who have written screeds about James Branch Cabell. They have written actual, proper, honest-to-god, impassioned and informative reviews (and this is not one, this is just showing off); so I feel a touch of guilt over what I'm about to say. It is this:

Don't read their efforts: read the book.
Don't read my drivel: read the book.

You know that pile on your shelf? The one that makes you feel guilty each time you look at it? The one that, hydra-like, spawns three extra titles every time you clear one, and that you will - no really, you will - get to in due course? Forget it. Shove them in the spare room, close the door and read this one instead. If you have to evict the ironing board, the Christmas decorations or your own grandmother to make the space, then do so. It's that good.

Now, if you insist on reading any more of this (don't read my drivel, I don't know what I'm doing: read the book), you are going to have to put up with me flailing about, failing to explain just what it is about the style, structure and content of this neglected glory that so appeals. You are going to have to put up with my addiction to the tricolon, my erratic punctuation and my tendency to become horribly overexcited by a wonderful piece of writing. You are going to have to put up with my inserting two clauses merely to make up the set, because that's what the rhythm requires; and that's because, unlike me, unlike most people who actually write for a living, unlike the overwhelming majority of the human race, James Branch Cabell knew exactly what he was doing with language.

Don't be insulted: it's a rare gift.

Oh, you can - if you are diligent and have a good memory - teach yourself the figures of rhetoric. You can read something like Mark Forsythe's (excellent) Elements of Eloquence, commit to memory a list of multi-vowelled Greek terms, and become one who can tell his epistrophe from his elbow. You can swallow a dictionary, bone up on the classics, have a loved-one whisper Shakespeare to you in your dreams. All of that will help you to appreciate fine language when you see it, and to recognise the tricks that make it so - possibly it will even make you a better writer - but it won't necessarily mean you know what you are doing. Few people do.

Because it's a rare gift.

G.K.Chesterton had it; Mervyn Peake had it; James Branch Cabell had it in spades.

Now, Chesterton was a romantic who knew the absurdity of romanticism, and Cabell a cynic in romantic plumes; Peake was an artist whose gorgeous sentences make the unreal real, and Cabell was devoted to making the unreal as unreal as possible. Chesterton's works are stylish, Peake's works are stylish, but Cabell's writing is the apotheosis of style... well, in this book, at least.

It's highly structured and artificial writing, and if you think that's a bad thing you haven't thought it through.

A digression, because Dumbarton Grange and Dumbarton Oaks are not so very far apart (a mere hundred-odd miles as the crow flies).
There is, in music, a thing called neo-classicism. Put dryly it is a style reacting against the excesses of Romanticism, characterized by lightness of orchestration, coolness of approach, and a return to earlier forms. Put prettily it is music in stockings and a powdered wig, smoking an insouciant cigar and sticking its tongue out at passers-by. And that's where Cabell comes in.

Cabell is the closest I think I've come to finding that in text. There is something of the eighteenth century about him - the century that loved style, wit and detached irony; the century that loved a good talker...

... and if you have trouble with Sterne - as well you might - try reading him aloud...

... and valued order, elegance and symmetry; the frilly, frothy, frivolous enlightenment. And there is something unmistakably twentieth century about him as well, in that he is reacting against those Victorian hangovers, the dreadful dreary demons: realism, prudism, and heavy romantic text.

And I say again: his text is highly structured, deeply artificial, and utterly delicious; a wonderful confection; a syllabub of words.

Jurgen is a fine thing, and delicious, of course. Figures of Earth is also delicious, but there is poison in the sugar, there is poison in the wine, there are truths enough to make a grown man weep. That's what makes Figures of Earth, just fractionally, the better book.

Now, symbols are like chainsaws: you juggle with them at your peril, and I'm apt to cut myself quite badly at this point, but I think Figures of Earth is not just a book of fine illusions that deals with disillusionment - though it is that - or Jurgen's dark twin and necessary shadow - though it is that too. Nor even is it merely a book about the creative process and a settling of scores. For what it's worth the score-settling is the least effective aspect. No, it seems to me what this is about, truly about, is Jurgen itself. It's the mirror-polished rage of a man whose public do not quite understand him, or perhaps understand him too well.

"Oho, you think you understand me?" He seems to say. "You do not. No-one can reach another across a bridge of words."
"You think this is escapism?" He seems to say. "There is no escape."

And that's enough drivel from me.

[Wastrel · Rating 5 out of 5]

is the sequel to the celebrated Jurgen, and it took me a long time to work out what that meant. Early on, I thought that that Cabell was simply trying to repeat himself and failing, frankly even falling into self-parody, and lacking the brilliance of the earlier book.

Then I hit the final third and everything almost made sense to me. This isn't a copy of Jurgen, it's a mirror of Jurgen. Everything the same, but everything is backward. And yes, it probably is self-parody, and it's probably intentional. And if you came to this novel looking for more of Jurgen... well, "here, have some more!" cries the author, luring you toward the trifle placed 'accidentally' beneath the guillotine.

There are three big technical differences from the earlier novel here: Jurgen's personal quest was a quest for a pleasurable and fulfilling life, while Manuel's is a quest to do what is expected of him; Jurgen's is fundamentally written from the point of view of a man at a particular point in his life, whereas Manuel's story spans a much greater length of time; and Jurgen's story is seen through his own eyes, whereas Manuel's is constructed so that our protagonist is a cipher, whose inner thoughts are never exposed to the reader's view. These differences are very important. Jurgen is A Comedy of Justice. This is A Comedy of Appearances, and that name isn't accidental. It took me a long time to really appreciate that. Oh, it appears obvious from the beginning why it's called that. But... well, that's the point, isn't it?

More important than these technical differences, however, is a difference in sentiment. Because Jurgen tried to show you a good time, with a pleasantly bittersweet tang for an aftertaste. Figures of Earth wants to rip out your eyes and spit in the sockets, and if possible persuade you to kill yourself into the bargain, and decorates that with some ironically pleasant sugary confections that come across by the end less as consolations than as mockery of the reader. Feel like giving up after a few pages when you feel you're on the verge of choking to death on all the icing he's force-feeding you? "Ha!" says the book, "good riddance to you!" - faced with unexpected fame after Jurgen, it's almost as though Cabell is passive-aggressively giving his audience exactly what they want, in a way that makes it exactly what he knows they don't want'.

It's a more ambitious book, I think, than Jurgen, and when it gets everything right it's spectacular. It's frankly less enjoyable, however - in part because of the difference in intent (I half-believe that most of the irritating flaws of the first half of the novel are put there on purpose), and in part simply because the higher degree of difficulties opens up more room for failure. The novel lacks the ebullient perfection of Jurgen... but in exchange, it strikes into largely uncharted territory of brilliance. Jurgen, there were analogies - Wilde, Chesterton, Wodehouse, Pratchett, T.H. White. Figures of Earth is something indigestable and lingering and quite defiantly, even mockingly, its own thing. I kind of wish it weren't - I liked Jurgen!

I've got a fuller review up over here. It uses descriptions like "In the end, we are left with a defence of anonymity, of emptiness, as its own form of heroism against in the bitter specificities of existence."

But perhaps I should be clearer here about some of its virtues: it takes a superficially pleasing prose style and distorts it into such an extreme form that it becomes unrepentently, challengingly literary - dear gods, the man throws in paragraphs of classical hexameter and dialogue that's actually a sonnet with the line breaks in the wrong places - while still throwing up some achingly beautiful lines; it's as piercingly inquisitory about big questions of The Meaning of Life as you could possibly ask for; it is both completely of its time and utterly transcendent of time at the same time; and actually, once things really get going, it's a good little story too. You have to read the whole thing, to be fair, to really get what it's trying to do. But it's worth it. Or not, if you, for example, don't want an entire novel of unremitting negativity and despair. You know, each to their own.


I still think Jurgen is not just more accessible and more enjoyable, but also a genuinely better novel than this sequel. In that, I agree with H.L. Mencken and Louis Untermeyer, and almost the entire original audience. But James Branch Cabell disagrees with that assessment, and he's a damn sight better writer than any of us are, so don't take our word for it. Read Jurgen first. But read Figures of Earth too. Only... maybe wait until your soul is feeling particularly resilient...

[Derek · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's a lot to chew on here, from the technical marvels of Cabell's writing to the themes of self-determination, especially as they collide with the expectations of others. Like _The High Place_ I suspect that each reread will reward.

And much in that is the interplay of husband and wife, as to who is in charge and how two people move through their relationship long term, accepting the other's foibles.

[Bryan--The Bee’s Knees · Rating 2 out of 5]

Figures of Earth is the story of Dom Manuel, the first count of Poictesme: how he rises from his lowly position as swineherd to being the most fortunate man in the land, how he redeems his beloved Niafer from death, and how he became the inspiration for legend and myth down through the ages. As such, he has several fantastic adventures, a few of which are breezily sketched in the book: that is not, however, the focus of Cabell's satire, and even though this is nominally a book of fantasy (and even published under the Ballantine Adult Fantasy imprint back in the late 60s), one should rather expect a gentle drubbing of the institution of marriage, and of how the relationships between men and women are perceived. There are also a few other points which Cabell is interested in making--mostly about religious belief--but what I picked up on most was the men and women thing.

If I were to guess, I would have said that Cabell was hammering some nails into the coffin of Victorian idealism: first published in 1921, I don't know if Figures of Earth was early or late to the wake, but it seemed to me Cabell was saying, 'Romantic love is a lot of rubbish, and happiness is ephemeral.' That he does so in a charming and pleasant way saves his story from being a downer though it is a bit melancholy near the end. But life can be a bit melancholy, when looking back over life and discovering that you don't have as much fire in you as you once did, and that certain notions that you may have held very dear at one time are no longer with you. But that pretty much seems to be how it's shaping up to me. There are trade-offs, of course, and they are not to be discounted, and Cabell doesn't. But still...

I have had Cabell's works queued up for years and years--I read his Cream of the Jest quite some time ago, though I'm not really sure how well I absorbed it--and I'm glad to have finally started, though I have to admit to being a tad disappointed with this first attempt. My thought was to read the Poictesme stories in chronological order rather than in published order, which I will probably still continue, though I don't know if it matters all that much--the point of these books is less the advancement of plot and more the skewering of certain ways of thinking. In order to do that, Cabell often eschews any action at all, or simply reports it offstage, until he can get back to the real point, which is that men and women have decidedly different outlooks on life, and that happiness, once attained, doesn't quite look the same as it did when you were still chasing it. I think my disappointment stems from the idea that I had built the stories up to be a bit more deep. They are clever though, so there's that.

I suspect I might have enjoyed these stories if I had encountered them a little earlier in life. A couple time while reading, I thought, 'You ain't telling me nothing new here, bub,' and while it may not have been entirely new to me a decade or two earlier, it would have been fresher, and I think the cleverness would have been sharper. But I liked the book, even if it sounds like I'm damning it with faint praise--I certainly enjoyed it enough to look forward to reading its sequel, The Silver Stallion, which I have in one of the various stacks of books around my desk that I mean to get to sooner rather than later.

[Ashley Lambert-Maberly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Let's start with this: I love this book, I love Cabell (usually), I love the Biography of Manuel, and although it can be read in several orders I can't imagine not starting with this book, given the opportunity. He is my pick for most unjustly undiscovered Great Writer. (He's somewhat discovered, but not nearly as known as he deserves to be).

Cabell's style was idiosyncratic even back then: when he's good, he's very very good, but he can meander, which in some books makes him nearly unbearable, but thankfully they are few. This is one of his best ones. I read it at 13, and was astonished at how funny, moving, clever, and (especially) how different it felt from the many Tolkien imitations. Well, of course: it predated Tolkien by years. And yes, this is fantasy, but it's not a fun bit of genre fiction, it's Literature in the fantasy vein. But (especially if you're 13) it can be read as a fun bit of genre fiction, which is nice.

In my opinion his most accessible books are this, The High Place, Jurgen, and The Silver Stallion, and everything else might only appeal to those who genuinely love his style. But I strongly urge all to give at least this one a try: it was my gateway drug, and it worked.

Cabell prided himself in being "urbane," so keep that in mind and you might have some forewarning of what you're about to get into! He's certainly very chatty, with his characters often giving way to philosphical venting—and a little of that goes a long way. But despite that he manages to do some pretty miraculous things, and I say miraculous because I can't quite figure out why they have the effect they do. It's incredibly moving: it's largely about loss: the loss of a first love, then the loss of one's youth, one's dreams, and finally death. It's also humorous—witty—never depressing, largely due to Manuel's optimistic character.

He also creates this sumptuous world, filled with characters who seem as if they ought to be part of our Western mythology but, so far as I know, largely aren't, or if they are, they're transformed into something novel, but without ever belabouring it: they remain mysterious, and more interesting as a result. (Nowadays hardly a thing can happen without a long character exposition sequence, or at least a good paragraph or two in Appendix B). So you wonder: who are the Leshy? What is Suskind? (She's mentioned at the beginning, but you believe her to be a local maiden who meets Manuel for twilight romps in the woods: not so). You can guess, but you never really know, and that's a good thing.

He's sui generis, in the best possible way. And this, I think, is his most profound work. I wouldn't recommend it to everybody: but if you liked Jack Vance, there's a good chance you may like this as well.

(Note: I'm a writer, so I suffer when I offer fewer than five stars. But these aren't ratings of quality, they're a subjective account of how much I liked the book: 5* = an unalloyed pleasure from start to finish, 4* = really enjoyed it, 3* = readable but not thrilling, 2* = disappointing, and 1* = hated it.)

[Dfordoom · Rating 5 out of 5]

Published in 1921. Delightfully cynical and cynically delightful, and wickedly ironic. It's about the great heroic figure Manuel the Redeemer of the mythical land of Poictesme, and the very unheroic truth about him. Very funny.

[Kerry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Figures of Earth by James Branch Cabell was first published in 1921, two years after Jurgen and five years before The Silver Stallion, which together form a kind of fantasy trilogy. Before Jurgen, Cabell's output was not true fantasy, although perhaps some readers would classify his earlier medieval romances as such. These three books are certainly Cabell's best work, in my view, and of them I would select Figures of Earth as the most significant.

Lin Carter revived Figures of Earth in 1969 as the eighth volume in the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series, with cover art by Bob Pepper. The edition that I actually read was published by Robert M. McBride in 1925, the first large-format edition with artwork by Frank C. Papé. (My page references below are to the McBride edition.) The McBride original contains photogravure prints, and the quality is much better than the reproductions in the Ballantine paperback edition.

Figures of Earth is the second volume in the Biography of the Life of Manuel, following Cabell’s philosophy of life and literature in Beyond Life. However, Figures of Earth is the real beginning of the Biography, as it chronicles the rise of swineherd Manuel to High Count Manuel of Poictesme, including the start of the cult of Manuel the Redeemer.

The book begins with Manuel beside the pool of Haranton, taking a break from his pigs and fashioning the image of a young man out of clay, because his mother "... was always very anxious for him to make a figure in the world" (p. 4). Miramon Lluagor, "lord of the nine kinds of sleep and prince of the seven madnesses" arrives, gives Manuel the charmed sword Flamberge and sets him on a quest.

Miramon Lluagor will play a large role also in The Silver Stallion. He is one of the so-called Léshy, along with Death, his brother. Interestingly, Miramon Lluagor mentions Manuel's namesake, the famous Count Manuel, who has just died in the south—presumably in Poictesme, though this location is not specifically identified. At the end of the book, Manuel will accompany Death on the final journey, to the river of Lethe, where Death lets lose the swine of Eubouleus, and Manuel's memories of his life and adventures are carried away in the water. At the end, therefore, the book cycles back to its beginning, with Manuel again beside the pool of Haranton accompanied by his pigs. Is the book about nothing more than the dreams of this peasant? I think so.

Also interesting is that the book mentions in several locations that Manuel is the son of blind Oriander the Swimmer and the grandson of Mimir. Manuel spends a month serving Misery, and giving up his youth in consequence, as a payment for returning his wife-to-be Niafer from the pagan paradise. Cabell suggests that Mimir is another name for this "Misery of earth, whom some call Béda, and other Kruchina" (p.156).

Horvendile appears twice in Figures of Earth, once close to the start, where he divulges to Manuel the secret of success in life. I think this is the origin of the motto of Poictesme, "mundus vult decipi," the world wants to be deceived, though Cabell is not specific on this point. When Manuel later meets up again with Miramon Lluagor, who will help him recapture Poictesme, Miramon establishes Horvendile as Manuel's overlord. (Horvendile will appear also in The Silver Stallion to send the members of the Fellowship of The Silver Stallion on their various quests.)

Horvendile, I believe, is an alter-ego for Cabell himself. As part of his advice to Manuel concerning success, Horvendile says, "... at its uttermost this success is but the strivings of an ape reft of his tail, and grown rusty at climbing, who yet feels himself to be a symbol and the frail representative of Omnipotence in a place that is not home" (p. 37). Horvendile is expressing very Cabellian sentiments.

Cabell has very much his own cynical, elegant, urbane style of writing. However, in many places in Figures of Earth as well as in some of his later books, he reminds me of Lord Dusany. For example, he writes,

Out of the void and the darkness that is peopled by Mimir's brood, from the ultimate silent fastness of the desolate deep-sea gloom, and the peace of that ageless gloom, blind Oriander came, from Mimir, to be at war with the sea and to jeer at the sea's desire. (p. 16)

And then, for example, close to the end of the book, Manuel is lamenting his departed youth as he and Niafer listen to a violin:

Yes, but the long low sobbing of the violin, troubling as the vague thoughts begotten by that season wherein summer is not yet perished from the earth, but lingers wanly in the tattered shrines of summer, speaks of what was and what might have been. A blind desire, the same which on warm moonlit nights was used to shake like fever in the veins of a boy whom I remember, is futilely plaguing a gray fellow with the gray wraiths of innumerable old griefs and with small stinging memories of long-dead delights. Such thirsting breeds no good for staid and aging men, but my lips are athirst for lips whose loveliness no longer exists in flesh, and I thirst for a dead time and its dead fervors to be reviving, so that young Manuel may love again. (p. 227)

A window in Manuel's study in his castle at Storisende opens out not into the fields of Poictesme, but into "a limitless gray twilight wherein not anything was certainly discernible, and the air smelt of spring" (p. 245). I think this window opens to regions where Manuel may find his lost youth. He tricks his clerk into passing through, who returns quite mad, and who says that through the window may be found "All freedom and all delight ... and all horror and rebellion" (p. 242). Indeed, also to be found through this window is Suskind, Manuel's first love from his swineherd days, now Queen Suskind. Again, in this manner, Cabell is cycling back to the beginning of the book.

Figures of Earth is brilliant pure fantasy, but also great literature, in my view. To summarize well the meaning of the book will no doubt elude me, no matter how many times I read it—but isn't it true of all great art that it reaches beyond what can easily be described in any other manner than through itself?

[Zibethicus · Rating 5 out of 5]

A shimmering, pseudo-fantastical fable on the price of 'success' - provisionally defined in the text as "but the strivings of an ape reft of his tail, and grown rusty at climbing, who yet feels himself to be a symbol and the frail representative of Omnipotence in a place that is not home."

Manuel, the 'hero' of the story, set in an imaginary medieval France, rises to the apex of this 'success' with the aid of powerful women, each of whom he uses and then betrays in one way or another. Eventually, he willingly serves the personification of the Misery of the world in order to win back his first partner, whom he allowed Grandfather Death to take away in preference to himself. A month of days thus spent pass as years for Manuel, so that in due course his young love Niafer, returned sans ageing from the pagan paradise, is presented with a much older-looking and -thinking and -acting Manuel...

"Well, well, dear snip," said Manuel, the first thing of all, "now it is certainly a comfort to have you back again."

Niafer, even in the rapture of her happiness, found this an
unimpassioned greeting from one who had gone to unusual lengths to recover her companionship. Staring, she saw that Manuel had all the marks of a man in middle life, and spoke as became appearances. [...] Then, after a moment's consideration of this tall gray stranger, Niafer also looked graver and older."

But, while Niafer is dismayed, one of Manuel's political allies is "delighted by the change in Manuel's looks, and said that experience and maturity were fine things to be suggested by the appearance of a nobleman in Manuel's position."

Enough written. If you can appreciate prose like this, then you are highly likely to find Figures of Earth to be an unfailing, lifelong delight (and consolation) in all its five parts. Read it, and pass it on to those you feel might also be lucky enough to appreciate it...

[Thomas · Rating 4 out of 5]

not as good as jurgen but i like how all of his protagonists are amoral dullards who start complaining endlessly about their wives as soon as they get married

[Tama · Rating 5 out of 5]

Where Manuel and Alianora go to the Court of the Birds I am wheezing on the top floor of Lighthouse on my break.

So this first clay image given life has the youth of early Count Manuel, and the looks of Alianora. Let us say he convinced her to shave her head and planted or sewed fine golden hair in this clay head. But with the masculine body and idyllic penis for the sculptor. As Alianora is as close to him as a woman would be. This amalgam creation is perfect for him. This may be my favourite passage.

The opening relationship was homoerotic for me. Niafer was a smug, dirty man until it is revealed she is a woman. Let’s say Manuel was thinking “oh thank goodness I’m not gay.” Until he loves his creation, as described above.

Many whimsical things like a Princess loving a spindle dicked wizard whom crosses his arms behind his head in bed and whistles.

Totally wise book but I just made it way more carnal than it would appear.

[Jordan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an absolute gem of a book. Full of magic, wisdom, droll wit. It's no wonder Lin Carter included it in the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series, that Neil Gaiman has praised Cabell and this book.

[Lise · Rating 4 out of 5]

Actually, this is a first edition, but I don't think I can add that to the database.

This was a book I'd forgotten I owned, an old, battered hard back which belonged to my father. Kind of hard to rate, because I'm not sure how much the reaction I had was too the book itself. Like all of Cabell's works, it's both well written and depressing. This one is about youthful dreams and the misery of aging. Now I have to re-read Jurgen, because I'd somehow conflated them in memory. A very similar theme, I believe.

[Stephen Simpson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty much a combination of Don Quixote and Candide, with quite a bit of the likes of Ivanhoe, Dunsany, Mencken, and chivalric romance thrown in.

I'm pretty sure a lot of the intent behind this was to satirize classical romance, but a lot of that won't be so obvious to modern readers (if you haven't read the subject of a satire, it's tough to get the satire...).

In any case, it turns a lot of heroic conventions and cliches on their head, to generally interesting effect. I wouldn't say it's better than Don Quixote, et al, but still well worth a read.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very interesting and unique. I never expected it to be so good.

[Richard Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

James Branch Cabell has a clean and clear style that entertains and enlivens.

[Jacob Howard · Rating 5 out of 5]

this book is basically like if the song "I Never Play Basketball Now" by Prefab Sprout was a satirical fantasy novel written in the 1920s

[mkfs · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fantastic novel. I mean that in two ways: it is a fantasy, by genre and nature, and you are unlikely to have read anything like it. It has the tone of a fairy tale, but the cynicism of an Edward Albee play. All of those Pixar-style movies that smuggle adult humor into a cute children's tale are just a watered-down and dumbed-down version of what Cabell is doing. It's irreverent, it's funny, it's poignant, and it's brilliant, despite having demons and witches and magicians and whatnot all in it.

This novel is the first installment, from the chronology of the narrative, and ignoring the non-novel Beyond Life, of the Biography of Manuel, and it covers Manuel's life from his start as a lowly swineherd to his eventual globe-straddling success. This could be the only Manuel novel and it would stand alone and complete, though as becomes evident in the followup, the tale does grow in the telling.

Manuel is not a hero, nor an anti-hero. His behavior is clearly not to be emulated, but it is just as clear that emulating his behavior is a sure road to success, so long as women find you attractive.

There is a fair bit of sexism in this book, but rather than explain it away as "a product of its time", I will say instead to enjoy it, for it cuts both ways: the females are faulted for having stereotypically female characteristics, and the males are faulted for having stereotypically male characteristics, and generally it is a character of one faulting a character of the other. A sort of even-handed scathing, if that can be used as a noun, and why not, we're an informal bunch here.

I am of the opinion that everyone should read this, or at least give it the hundred-page try. In defense of such a broad recommendation, I defer to the ever-quotable Cabell: "I have my reasons, you may depend upon it, and if I do not talk about them you may be sure that for this reticence also I have my reasons."

A few more choice quotes.

Incomprehensible shouts of rage:
The faces of those ten became angry, and they shouted, "Blaerde Shay Alphenio Kasbue Gorfons Albuifrio!"

On marriage:
"Now, Miramon, I marvel to see a great magician controlled by a woman who is in his power, and who can, after all, do nothing but talk."
Miramon for some while considered Manuel, rather helplessly. "Unmarried men do often wonder about that."

On another marriage:
I wonder, as I am sure all husbands wonder, why Heaven ever made a creature so tedious and so unreasonably dull of wit and so opinionated. And when I think that for the rest of time this creature is to be my companion, I usually go out and kill somebody. Then I come back, because she knows the way I like my toast.

Upon the end of a relationship:
Therefore let us bury our dead, and having placed the body in the tomb, let us honestly inscribe above this fragile, flower-like perished emotion, "Here lieth lust, not love."

On domestic life:
Dom Manuel found that his rooms had been thoroughly cleaned and set in such perfect order that he could lay hands upon none of his belongings

On combatting the temptress Freydis:
Manuel was of stalwart person, but his strength availed him nothing until he began to recite aloud, as Helmas had directed, the multiplication tables. Freydis could not withstand mathematics.

Of masculine traits:
Dom Manuel was so constituted as to value more cheaply every desire after he had attained it.

Men are so made that they must desire to mate with some woman or another, and they are furthermore so made that to mate with a woman does not content their desire.

There is no hour in my life but I go armored in reserve and in small lies, and in my armor I am lonely.

On maturity:
All the godlike discontents which ennobled my youth had died painlessly in cushioned places.


Postscript: It interests me that I used "uglily" quite naturally in light-hearted conversation recently, and I had apparently highlighted it in the ebook of this novel: "still bleeding uglily there at his feet".

[Stef · Rating 4 out of 5]

what a strange book. very deep and remarkable in places and not very interesting in others. lots of quotable parts. worth reading

[Mike Franklin · Rating 3 out of 5]

3/5 stars

Figures of Earth by James Branch Cabell

It took me a while to get into the writing which I found very stylised and reminiscent of the likes of Le Morte d’Arthur or Ivanhoe, but there the similarity ends. Cabell manages to be both serious and, at the same time, poking fun at the genre. The humour is mostly very very dry, so much so that I wasn’t even sure it was intentional until coming across passages like this:

One day, toward autumn, as Manuel was sitting in this place, and looking into the deep still water, a stranger came, and he wore a fierce long sword that interfered deplorably with his walking.

Once I had settled into the writing style I thoroughly enjoyed this book; quirky and humorous but at the same time moralistic. Much of that moralism is in the style of the Emperor’s New Clothes; everyone believes Manuel to be more than he is simply because they want to. A goats feather makes a king believe he is a saint and, because his subjects also believe so, he becomes a saintly figure. Another feather makes another king believe he has achieved wisdom and, because his subjects believe it too, he does indeed become wise. Our hero Manuel, who only wants to “… follow after my own thinking and my own desire, without considering other people and their notions of success,” really wants to be left alone to do just that, but events always conspire against him. However this most selfish (though not necessarily bad) desire, which remains his driving force throughout, is rarely fulfilled, though does inspire some truly reprehensible behaviour. As I say a moralistic story but somehow never judgemental.

Although I did enjoy it, I’m not sure I’m inspired to search out more from Cabell. It’s just not quite my thing.

[James Sundquist · Rating 4 out of 5]

A companion masterpiece to Jurgen, this is rather different because of a rather more serious protagonist. Though the theme (lost youth) is the same, Manuel's approach is quite different, and his stoic, accidental heroism is a contrast to Jurgen's vainglory. Also like Jurgen, it is a book where you might well want cliff-notes or some sort of glossary by your side (also, one time when a Kindle's search function would be very welcome!). I also thought that in the classic fantasy format of the story of a legendary hero and the less-heroic truth of some of his deeds, that it is the direct ancestor of lauded modern works like The Name of the Wind (rather than the epic-quest tradition of J.R.R. Tolkien).

[Richard Swan · Rating 5 out of 5]

‘Mundus vult decipi.’

If you like that, you’ll love Cabell.

Footnote: Eddison, Cabell and Dunsany are the Trinity of early fantasy; without them, modern fantasy wouldn’t look the way it does. Cabell is the most idiosyncratic and beguiling of them all, with a very dry sense of humour and distinctive style. Try Figures of Earth or Jurgen first (the latter was prosecuted for obscenity, if that helps). Alianora, Freydis, Koshchei the Deathless, Horvendile (=Eärendil); they’re all there. Set in pseudo-historical Poictesme, Figures of Earth itself, the sort-of opening sort-of novel in the more-or-less 18 volumes (Storisende Edition) of the so-called Biography of the Life of Manuel, features the exploits and geases of Manuel the Redeemer.

[Lynn · Rating 4 out of 5]

really interesting take on high fantasy... I could see why Neil Gaiman lists this as one of his influences. Both humorous and poking fun at the genre and classically high fantastical happenings.

[Christopher Tookey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like Jurgen, this is one of the greatest fantasy novels, all the better for being funny (and wise).

[Nathan Dehoff · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read Jurgen before, years ago, and this is actually a prequel to that although it was written later. Cabell wrote a whole series of loosely connected books about the French province of Poictesme and its legendary ruler Dom Manuel, and this one actually uses Manuel as the main character. Cabell has a wordy, pretentious style that can be kind of dense, and often veers into long philosophical discussions. I get the impression he was aware of this and made fun of himself for it, but I can see how it would be off-putting. There are a lot of references to mythology and folklore, always a plus for me. Manuel is a swineherd who spends a lot of his time making clay figures, due to a misinterpretation of his mother's dying words. He has a series of adventures that lead to his becoming Count of Poictesme, and with his winning the hearts of three different women whom he doesn't treat very well once he has them. Generally, he's a rather unlikeable character who regularly succeeds anyway, but doesn't even seem to enjoy his success. But when he dies, he's mythologized as a great ruler and savior figure.

[Siddharth Mitra · Rating 3 out of 5]

The english is fairly verbose, slightly antiquated. This meant it would have been much better to read this book rather than listen to the audibook(while doing other things like biking).
In general you have to put a lot of attention otherwise you miss the main plot. There were certain parts which i found really funny, mostly tongue-in-cheek humour.
I will perhaps try and pick the adventures of Don Manuel in a written form and i'm sure i'll be able to squeeze a lot more joy out of this. There was a lot of philosophical profoundness hidden behind silly homour and a lot of questioning what was conservative thought at that time.

[Lauksme · Rating 2 out of 5]

Poor poor Manuel...

[Greg B · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the introduction to Figures of Earth, written to Sinclair Lewis (another early 20th-century writer with whose work I'd like to get better acquainted this year), James Branch Cabell provides an explanation of his own writing that's rather...un-Cabellian. Rather than his usual wry exhuberance, Cabell sounds almost apologetic for the novel he's about to drop in your lap, and with good reason. Figures of Earth is an alright novel that suffers from two huge problems:

1) It's not quite as good as Jurgen.

This would not normally normally be a problem - there are a great number of novels that are not as good as Jurgen. However, this is complicated by the second issue:

2) It's very, very similar to Jurgen.

Figures of Earth is ostensibly the biography of Dom Manuel, a character who appears frequently in the shared history of Cabell's Poictesme, but his journey is similar enough to Jurgen's (down to the trio of magical babes he loves and leaves and the picaresque encounters with gods and monsters) to verge on self-plagiarism. It's by no means a bad book, and there's a good dozen highlighted quotes sitting on my Kindle for future unleashing as witty Facebook statuses, but it highlights the unfortunate tendency of Cabell to put building the shared world of Poictesme over telling a good story - an unquenchable urge that eventually ended up throwing salt on his career.