Luke of Winchester, We Wish We'd Never Known You

(For the previous post on this trilogy, click here.)

A well-wrought adventure trilogy follows a standard format: introduce the protagonist and central quest in the first volume, use the second book to enlarge the setting and cast of characters, and make sure the finale goes off with a bang. Ideally, the middle book should leave the protagonists in some peril, raising the stakes for the reader right before the start of the concluding volume. John Christopher's Sword trilogy breaks with this pattern, but does so to powerful effect. The series's second installment, Beyond the Burning Lands, plods along, slowing the plot in order to expand the setting and introduce new characters (Cymru, Blodwen) or develop old ones (Peter). It ends, however, with a decisive fight that moves Luke Perry to the height of his fortunes: master of his home city of Winchester, betrothed to the beautiful Blodwen, and ready to resume his father's conquest of the south. If the author so dramatically raises Luke's hopes and fortunes, however, it is only to dash them more thoroughly in the final chapter, The Sword of the Spirits.

As in many tragedies, Luke is author of his own downfall. We receive a premonitory glimpse of his hubris early in Sword, when the young prince violates the rules of war to subdue a rebellious city. Luke succeeds in this campaign, and it only feeds the recklessness and willfulness he has displayed throughout the series. Shortly thereafter Blodwen comes to Winchester, and Luke learns that his fiancee was serious about a remark she made in volume two, that she was the mistress of her own mind and heart. When he jails his betrothed for thwarting him in his own city, the people of that city prove that they are not his playthings either: Luke's captains depose him and cast him out. 

A different character might learn humility in that figurative and actual wilderness, and in fact Christopher does offer Luke a chance at a different life, in the form of a village of “savages” who live happily together and hold all property in common. A wounded Luke takes shelter with the villagers, and one of their spokesmen urges him to remain with them longer and recover from the "sickness" of "jealousy and pride." Their guest refuses.

Instead the former Prince of Winchester heads into his past, to the sanctuary of the Seers and across the Burning Lands to Klan Gothlan. Now all of the plot elements Christopher introduced over the previous volumes – the Seers' technical knowledge and lack of scruples, the Wilsh love of novelty and machines, and Luke's own bloodlust and desire for vengeance – come crashing together with explosive effect. The Seers make twentieth-century weapons, the Wilsh provide soldiers, and Luke supplies tactical leadership to an army that marches into England and re-enacts A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. In the end, however, Luke does not get the outcome he desired. Rather than give away the trilogy's denouement, I will note that the title of volume three has at least three meanings. The “Sword of the Spirits” is an actual sword Luke received from the Seers; it is also a metaphor for Luke, whom the Spirits – or, rather, their human interlocutors – have turned into their means of reunifying England. It additionally refers to a force that can prove stronger than fury and cold steel, a force Luke cannot understand.

The big surprise of this trilogy isn't the climax of its plot, but the outcome of Luke's character development. Many fantasy stories allow their main character to develop into a wiser, stronger, more mature version of their once-callow selves. Christopher shows Luke no such mercy: the princeling begins the series as a narcissistic lout and ends it as a soulless, rage-blinded killer. By the midpoint of Sword of the Spirits, it becomes obvious to more mature readers (this is why I enjoy this novel so much more as an adult) that Luke is not the hero he thinks he is, that his foes and foils are actually the more noble and progressive characters. Blodwen "betrays" her betrothed because she falls in love with someone else, and because she has repeatedly told Luke she is her own woman, not his property. Winchester's captains depose Luke because he has become a tyrant and the monarchy a liability. A forward-looking young prince, Eric of Oxford, wants to become Luke's friend but turns his back on him when he sees what bloody work Master Perry has done to recover his throne. And Luke's oldest friend, Martin, renounces his position with the Seers and demonstrates to Luke that there are powers at least as effectual, and as revolutionary, as the technology Luke thinks he understands. At the very end of the story, Luke only understands that he has helped unleash changes he cannot control, changes that will create a new society with no place for him. Sad news for Luke, but good news for nearly everyone else in his milieu - one doesn't want a happy ending for the man who turns out to have been the story's villain.

A Future of Blood, Fire, and Monsters

John Christopher, whose work I’ve blogged about here before, achieved his fame as a writer of dystopian fiction for young adults, several decades before it became cool. His most famous books, the Tripods novels, have been translated into eight languages and adapted into a BBC series. His best works, however, are almost certainly the three volumes of the Sword of the Spirits trilogy (1970-72), which while written for teenagers have enough plot-layering and thematic sophistication to appeal to the most literate adults. I am pleased to see that Simon and Schuster has recently brought the series back into print.

Like the Tripods books, the Sword trilogy (The Prince in Waiting, Beyond the Burning Lands, and Sword of the Spirits) offers the reader a world where all is not as it seems. Luke Perry*, the trilogy’s viewpoint character, lives in what resembles a medieval fantasy kingdom, a cold and violent land of warring walled cities, of brave knights and dwarf craftsmen and deformed mutant servants, and of mysterious Seers with arcane powers. At the edges of this barbarous civilization prowl horrible monsters and tribesmen with savage customs. To the north, fearsome volcanoes light the skies and block explorers from the southern cities.

It all sounds rather like a Robert Howard novel, but gradually Christopher reveals that he is telling not a fantasy story but a post-apocalyptic one. Two centuries before Luke’s time, a global natural disaster destroyed the industrial civilization of our own era, and solar flares flooded the world with radiation, producing the dwarves, mutants, and monstrous animals that make the new world a fantastic distortion of the old. The survivors of the disaster, believing it the result of nuclear war, turned against the machine civilization they blamed for producing it. One group, however, retained knowledge of the age of machines, which it kept hidden in hopes of one day reintroducing science and industry to a more stable society. Savvier SF fans will have already figured out that this group was the Seers, ostensibly the defenders of the new era’s religious faith and of its people’s animus against technology. Like the rest of Luke’s world, they have a double identity; they also have a secret plan.

Luke, who at the start of the trilogy is mainly interested in ice-skating and in winning his home city’s annual tournament, learns only gradually that the Seers intend to use him and his father to advance their agenda.With their help, the elder Perry mounts a coup that puts him on the throne of Winchester, with Luke his Spirit-nominated successor. Later, Perry Sr. turns his attention to conquering neighboring cities, with the goal of creating a unified kingdom - one into which the Seers can reintroduce the old civilization. The new order, however, is jealous of its privileges and customs, and it has strong defenders, including the princes of other cities and Luke's amiable but ambitious half-brother Peter. When the ensuing storm of fire, blood, and treachery subsides, much of the Perry family lies dead and Luke finds himself in exile, hiding with the Seers in their Wiltshire sanctuary.

By the end of Prince in Waiting, more perceptive or mature readers will have noticed that there is something seriously wrong with Luke. He is short-tempered, prone to deep depression, and terrified of humiliation, which drives him to stupid risk-taking and stupider fights. One could lay some of the blame for this on Luke's parents, on his self-destructive father and his vapid, narcissistic mother. However, the violent social environment in which Luke matures gives him little opportunity for self-reflection, and rewards some of his dumber risk-taking, like his near-suicidal fight with the flesh-dissolving bayemot in Beyond the Burning Lands. 

If that second novel of the trilogy is less engaging than the first, it probably stems from Christopher's turn away from Luke's inner life and struggle with his personal demons. The author instead uses the middle novel of the trilogy to advance the series's plot and enlarge its setting. Luke reconciles himself with Winchester's new ruler, accompanies a diplomatic party across the volcanic Burning Lands, and visits the city of Klan Gothlan in the land of the Wilsh. He and his southern companions express their wonder at and disgust with these odd people who prefer good food and art to fighting, who use simple machines and accept polymufs as equals. Dumb luck allows Luke to defeat the bayemot, and the Wilsh king, Cymru, takes a liking to this strange little wolverine in human form, and even offers him the hand of his daughter Blodwen. (Blodwen, one of Christopher's few decent female characters, expresses an ambivalent opinion of the match.) At the book's end, pressed to the wall by a treason conviction, Luke wins the crown of Winchester by combat, and reaches the peak of his fortunes.

And then everything goes to hell.

(To Be Continued...) 

* No relation to the actor, as far as we know.