The Great Gormenghast Read discussion

Chapters 71-80 discussion and any final thoughts relating to Gormenghast as a novel. Kyle will start our next discussion of Titus Alone!

I have mixed feelings about the ending of the book. Much of it (the flood, the Countess, the hunt for Steerpike), is Peake in his strength. But he also drops the ball on a number of occasions.

Peake goes back to the early chapters by bluntly telling us the meaning of some of the symbols - particularly the Thing. I found this not only unnecessary, but arresting. It's like reading the author's own built-in Cliff's Notes, when I want to read the full book.

Equally unfortunate is the treatment of Fuchsia's death. Peake has made a point of understated death before now (as with the Earl), but for such a key character to just slip and fall is disappointing in the extreme. Not the mere manner of her death, but the fact that it's treated as a minor point. Again, it feels like evident authorial intervention - Peake thinking 'I need to make Titus angry. I know! I'll kill Fuchsia.'

Steerpike's death is happily more in character than his previous actions. He's logical, capable, but nonetheless trapped. I can't recall where his swordstick went, and it seems it could have played a part here, but overall, he goes out as he comes in - cold, calculating, and somehow brash at the same time.

Titus' departure from Gormenghast didn't make that much impact. I think the Countess' parting words undercut the scene. She's more believable as the indomitable figure searching out Fuchsia's gravesite. As a mysterious oracle, she's not credible - she's far too grounded for that, even when speaking about the inevitability and centrality of Gormenghast.

You take her parting shot as prophetic? I've always thought of it as a mildly threatening truth, perhaps akin to saying how cold we'll be when it snows, or living on the slopes of Vesuvius and saying it will erupt one day.

Keeping in mind that I haven't read Titus Alone for a very long time, I took it as both prophetic and threatening. It could, of course, be just a product of her extremely limited worldview - a statement of what she believes to be true. But I'm not sure I can see her even acknowledging an 'Outside' enough to make such a statement.

B. wrote: "...I'm not sure I can see her even acknowledging an 'Outside' enough to make such a statement."

Interesting thought. We know nothing about where she came from: is she an outsider who has deliberately blotted all knowledge of that from her mind, or is she an insider, elevated by marriage?