Be He Ever So Humble....

The Book of Three by Lloyd Alexander

Dear Saralinda*:

Come take my hand. There are worlds that demand companionship and reveal their magic to those who travel hand-in-hand. And there is much magic to be discovered in the world of Prydain.

What sort of magic, you might ask?

It is not the magic of stage magicians who entertain us with their flashy sleights of hand or their false-bottomed gadgets. It's not even the magic of Harry Potter's world, where delightful witches and warlocks study to weave their complex and amusing spells.

This is a magic of the heart. It's the sort of magic that you feel on Christmas Eve when your family is gathered together to celebrate the miracle of Christ's birth. It's the sort of magic that fills your being when you make the jump on the ice that just a few short months ago seemed an impossibility.

It's the magic of companionship, the magic of accomplishment, the magic of discovery.

Will you come with me and discover this world?

Prydian and its Author

I'll confess that I'm a little jealous that you will discover this world so much earlier than I have. Yet, it is also good to have joy rationed through one's lifetime, so I'm not really complaining.

The Book of Three is the first book in a series called the Prydain Chronicles. The author, Lloyd Alexander, has written approximately 24 other books as well-including a few that are classified as "adult fiction." I found a fascinating biography of Alexander. As a child, he was a voracious reader, but he hated school. He joined the army and became a part of army intelligence and counter-intelligence. He met his wife in Paris and then worked in a variety of jobs: cartoonist, copywriter, layout artist, and associate editor. It wasn't until he was 39 that he started writing for children and young adults.

He's been quoted as saying that writing for young adults was "the most creative and liberating experience of my life. In books for young people, I was able to express my own deepest feelings far more than I could ever do in writing for adults."

Of course, writing as great as Alexander's doesn't appeal only to young adults. He may have people your age as his target audience, but that doesn't keep people my age from enjoying the book as well. Perhaps, though, that's because Alexander shows such great respect for his readers. He doesn't try to talk down to you from a pinnacle of "adult" knowledge. He doesn't try to force-feed you his morals-even though his tales are highly moral and filled with great character.

No, instead he has a story to tell you and he tells it with great care and simplicity. In what I thought was a wonderful quote (I'm thinking about plastering it somewhere where I can see it frequently), he said, "Fantasy is hardly an escape from reality. It's a way of understanding it."

The foundations of Prydain rest upon Welsh mythology and history, though Alexander is quick to point out in his prologue that the chronicles are not a retelling of Welsh tales. He used a book of mythology and legends called the Mabinogion to provide names and particular elements, then from that storehouse assembled the events and personalities of Prydain.

Time for Introductions

If you're joining me in a visit to this magical land, allow me to introduce you to some of the characters we'll meet in our journey.

First, we'll meet Taran, the Assistant Pig Keeper. How's that for a title? It doesn't sound very dignified, until you learn more about the pig (whose name is Hen Wen and is an Oracular Pig). Then again, even after learning about the pig, his occupation is still pretty humble. That's part of the point. We needn't be born to greatness to do great things.

The book opens with this line:

Taran wanted to make a sword; but Coll, charged with the practical side of his education, decided on horseshoes.

From the word go, Alexander paints a picture of a boy who is impatient with his training and eager for adventures. He doesn't always see the value in the more practical steps and forgets that glory and heroism are in the simple, useful things we do as well as the more noteworthy and dangerous actions.

The other person mentioned there, Coll is the head Pig-Keeper but we don't get to know him very well in this book. I don't know whether we will in the rest of the series. We can discover that together.

Taran is awed when he meets his first "real hero," Gwydion. He's a little surprised that Gwydion doesn't look the way he expected and voices that opinion to the amusement of the warrior-king. Gwydion is a wise king who is committed to rescuing Prydain from the evil it is facing.

I fear to give too many more details of the other characters you'll meet, for I don't want to spoil any surprises about who will be helpful and who will be an enemy. But I will briefly tell you that you'll meet the chattering, winsome, red-haired Princess Eilowny, the ward of the evil sorceress, Achren.

You'll also meet Gurgi, who is half man, half beast. He smells of wolfhound, and talks in a poetic rhyming that sounds in my ears long after putting the book aside. In a chat transcript at Talkcity.com, Alexander was asked how he came up with the character Gurgi. He said:

Gurgi came about three o'clock one morning when I had been trying to imagine him to see what he looked like in my own mind and to hear his voice, and I had been trying to do that for almost two weeks. I'd get up early every morning and sit there utterly hopeless. I was absolutely stuck. I began feeling very sorry for myself. I began whining and sniveling, moaning and groaning, holding my poor tender head, full of misery and self-pity. I was about ready to give up until all of a sudden, I heard in the back of my mind a miserable pitiful voice that said "Crunchings and Munchings." All of a sudden I knew that was Gurgi. There's no question where he came from and there's no question that his personality was very close to the author's that morning. But, once I heard that pitiful dismal voice, there he was, and I had no more difficulty and indeed went on to finish "The Book of Three." It may well have been that if I had not felt so sorry for myself and moaned and groaned so much, I might never have finished the book at all. So Gurgi is indeed an invention, but an invention very close to parts of my own personality. I still moan and groan a lot!

You'll meet the bard-king from Fflam, Fflewddur, whose harp strings break whenever he stretches the truth. There is a grumpy dwarf named Doli who can't manage to turn himself invisible, even when he holds his breath.

About now, you're probably thinking the names are rather on the challenging side. I would agree with you. It would be a difficult book to read aloud, though I hear that newer versions of the book include a pronunciation guide. Alexander himself acknowledges that the names are difficult at first, but he also insists that they add a flavor to the book that makes it unique. He suggests that his readers make up their own way of pronouncing the names. "If it sounds good," he said, "It is good."

Of Questings and Purpose

I'm never very satisfied with plot summaries. They tell what actions take place in the book (and in this one, Taran, the Assistant Pig-Keeper, is forced into a series of adventures when a great evil threatens the land and the oracular pig runs away) but they don't really say what the book is about.

This book is about a lot of things. It's about the choices people make and the striving to become something more than they are. It's also about learning our place in the world and what we are able to contribute-even if that contribution doesn't seem glorious or worthy at the time.

At times I grew frustrated because Taran and Eilowny seemed unable to see beyond the surface of the words that were spoken and were constantly getting in snits with each other. But then, I'm not sure that's all that different from the way most people are.

This is a book that pits evil against good in a very black and white way. The evil side is very evil and leaves you no doubt that they are in sore need of defeating. The good side is immensely human and vulnerable, but completely dedicated to finding the right thing to do. They don't always succeed, but they always strive. They also recognize that because the evil is so great, that there is a high cost to failure. Therefore, they have to keep striving even when their goal seems impossible and they are at the height of discouragement.

Although this book does contain some minor amounts of violence, there is a commitment among the heroes and heroines that violence is a product of evil and something that they should avoid.

When asked to describe what his books are about to someone who has never read them, Alexander said, "In a way the books try to show what it takes and indeed what it costs to become a genuine compassionate human being. The books are fantasies in a technical sense, but actually they're about ourselves; not there and then, but here and now."

I couldn't have said it better. So, will you make the journey with me and together we can learn more about ourselves, about compassion, and about being genuinely human?

Love,
Aunt Bridgette

* I've changed my niece's name to protect her identity. Saralinda is a name I borrowed from another beloved children's book. She's the princess in James Thurber's The 13 Clocks.