Declare Books In Favor Of The Complete Compleat Enchanter (The Incompleat Enchanter #1-5)
| Original Title: | The Complete Compleat Enchanter |
| ISBN: | 0671698095 (ISBN13: 9780671698096) |
| Edition Language: | English |
| Series: | The Incompleat Enchanter #1-5 |
| Characters: | Harold Shea |
L. Sprague de Camp
Mass Market Paperback | Pages: 532 pages Rating: 4.06 | 1206 Users | 37 Reviews
Identify Based On Books The Complete Compleat Enchanter (The Incompleat Enchanter #1-5)
| Title | : | The Complete Compleat Enchanter (The Incompleat Enchanter #1-5) |
| Author | : | L. Sprague de Camp |
| Book Format | : | Mass Market Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | First Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 532 pages |
| Published | : | March 1st 1989 by Baen Books (first published January 1st 1975) |
| Categories | : | Fantasy. Fiction. Science Fiction |
Description To Books The Complete Compleat Enchanter (The Incompleat Enchanter #1-5)
This omnibus volume brings all five of L. Sprague de Camp and Fletcher Pratt's "Compleat Enchanter" tales together in one nearly 500 page volume -- a good thing or bad thing depending on one's perspective, since each one of them is short, and really, light enough, to tempt one towards perusing on into the next story.Each of the narratives was told previously in the pages of the SF/Fantasy magazine UNKNOWN, as the "Harold Shea stories," named after one of their most central characters, and he seems a reasonable enough feature to begin with, in rattling off reasons why this volume deserve the mantle of speculative fiction classics.
Shea starts off in the first story, "The Roaring Trumpet," as a fairly unappealing character -- a psychologist by trade, reflective enough to understand his own neurotic need to impress others, unsure of what he wants -- except that he's up for adventure. Quickly enough though, thrown into do-or-die situations, he finds untapped resources of skill, strength, cunning -- and most important -- resolve within himself, catalyzed through demands imposed by, quite literally, a world of gods and heroes, in this story, the gods of Norse myth. Precisely because he must -- both for his own sorry sake, but also, with growing awareness, in order to turn the tides against impending evil -- he experiments with magic, calls back his previous acumen as a fencer, and puts psychology into actual practice.
A digression here by way of explanation might prove helpful. One of the basic premises of the five novellas is that parallel worlds exist and can be accessed -- magic of various sorts working in many of those worlds, analogously to science and technology in our own plane of existence, in each world whatever principles governing it following the internal and intelligible logic of that world. As Reed Chalmers, the elder psychologist who will, from the second book on, become a full-on enchanter -- the intellectual who originally develops the hypothesis to explore -- frames the matter:
"the world we live in is composed of impressions received through the senses. But there is an infinity of possible worlds, and if the senses can e attuned to receive a different set of impressions, we should find ourselves living in a different world"
An epistemologically and metaphysically interesting notion, sort of putting Kantian idealism into play without ever mentioning that great philosopher or (thankfully!) introducing any of his crabbed and at times obscurantist terminology -- not only would attuning the senses of a person allow that person to perceive a different world indexed to those sense-impressions, the person perceiving would literally enter that world and leave this one, no longer being able to be perceived by those in this world -- also becoming vulnerable to all sorts of fates in the other worlds.
It gets still more interesting -- though if one actually follows out the metaphysics involved, unfortunately implausible (so perhaps better not do so!) -- when Chalmers discusses how one actually carries out this transposition from one world to the other:
". . . the method consists in filling your mind with the fundamental assumptions of the world in question. Now, what are the fundamental assumptions of our world? Obviously, those of scientific logic." "Transference to any world exhibiting such a fixed pattern is possible. . . we merely choose a series of basic assumptions. . . To contrive a vehicle for transportation from one world to another, we face the arduous task of extracting from the picture of such a world as that of the Iliad its basic assumptions and expressing these in logical form."
Shea does this, aiming at the world of Irish legend, but winds up instead in the land of Norse myth, close to the end of the world, Ragnarok -- running first into Odin, who he follows to an inn, traipsing through the frozen north, then quickly meeting Thor, Loki, Frey, and Heimdall. Shea almost loses his life, not least by smarting off without considering the contexts in which he's landed, before gaining his bearings -- then finds himself dragged into the adventure he thought he'd been seeking, trying to locate and win back the legendary weapons needed by the gods in their coming battle with the giants.
Sent back to his own earthly plane of existence by one of the denizens of the Norse world, and confirms Chalmer's hypothesis -- a new, much more confident man, quick with his wits, tongue, and sword, and even a bit experienced with magic. The two of them, then travel off together in "The Mathematics of Magic" to the land of Faerie, based on the logic of Spenser's Faerie Queene, where Shea meets and falls in love with the woodswoman and archer Bephelbe, bringing her back to Earth.
I'll not try to even summarize the plots of the various stories, but just mention the "worlds" which "the Castle of Iron," "The Wall of Serpents", and "The Green Magician" introduce: those of Coleridge's Xanadu, Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, the Finnish Kalevala, and finally the land of Irish legend. Several other characters get introduced, and well-developed in these stories as well.
There's two traits of these stories that are particularly striking. The first is that the depictions of each of the worlds are surprisingly rich, without ever lapsing into fantasy world-developing for its own sake. The characters are interestingly sketched and explored, social customs and mores come into play in important ways, even the rules and workings of magic vary from world to world. The second feature is that, for stories written in the 1940s and 1950s, they remain very fresh, unconfined by environing assumptions from their own epoch -- precisely why these stories comprise a classic.
Rating Based On Books The Complete Compleat Enchanter (The Incompleat Enchanter #1-5)
Ratings: 4.06 From 1206 Users | 37 ReviewsCriticism Based On Books The Complete Compleat Enchanter (The Incompleat Enchanter #1-5)
Pretty good book if a bit sexist but I guess you have to look at the time it was written.The Compleat Enchanter (I have a different edition than the one pictured.) is not a novel, but five novels/novellas with a recurring cast of characters. Subtitled, "The Magic Misadventures of Harold Shea," this collection has the unique idea of presenting a psychology professor at a private university (endowed by one particularly generous donor) as the protagonist. Harold Shea is neither the chairman of his department not the most prestigious member of the faculty, but he has not yet become so
This is a set of five stories, with the premise that a couple of academicians figure out how to use logic to transport themselves to a fantasy world where magic works but modern technology doesn't. They meet interesting people and have adventures, using their newly-developed magic skills to get out of various scrapes. The first story was fun. The rest were okay page-turners, but kind of repetitive. If you pick up this book and just read the first story, you won't be missing that much.
The funniest fantasy ever! Could not stop laughing - in same places for minutes.
This book contains all 5 of the adventures of the wanna-be-wizard, Harold Shea.Escapism at its finest, and, I was sad to see this book reach its end.
Oh so smart academics have figured out time-travel and proceed to bounce from time to time and world to world, each time trying to show how much smarter and civilized they can be than that world's inhabitants. It is well written. The stories are interesting. I am a fan of satire but unfortunately the layer of 1970's gender stereotyping muddles this and the other plot devices and dates this book.
Entertaining mid-century fantasy about characters travelling to various mythologies and classic literature (e.g., Norse mythos, Spenser's Faerie Queene, the chansons de geste). While the dialogue is dated, and the plotting and characters sometimes thin, it's a light, humorous romp that deserves not to be forgotten. Extra points for portraying Heimdall racing cockroaches and swaying madly on a broomstick like a cartoon.
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