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The Knight
by Gene Wolfe
(Tor, $25.95, 430 pages, hardcover; published in January 2004.)
Gene Wolfe's The Knight, book one of  his
diptych, The Wizard Knight, recalls filmmaker Quentin Tarantino's Kill
Bill, Volume 1, also half of an epic story. Their similar lack of
a conclusion offers an almost welcome pause to savour and ponder the
relentless excitement, the density of intriguing ideas, and the bold
storytelling.
Both creators mine the dreams of childhood, mythologizing them with
verve and audacity. But in lieu of Tarantino's effervescent concoction
of samurai assassins, gangland culture, and 1970s exploitation films,
Wolfe delivers a strange and melancholy brew of Norse mythology, Arthurian
legend, Captain Marvel, and The Wizard of Oz.
In The Knight, a lonely American boy wanders from his family
cottage and into a magical universe of giants, shapeshifters, and talking
animals. Like L. Frank Baum's Dorothy, he yearns for home but is enchanted
by this weird new land.
And like Wolfe's own Latro (from Latro
in the Mist), his memories have been tampered with by godlike
beings. Echoing Billy Batson's meeting with the wizard Shazam, who gave
the boy the power to become Captain Marvel, Wolfe's young teen encounters
the seductive Aelf queen Disiri, who endows him with the body of an
adult knight, Sir Able of the High Heart. Subsequently, through a series
of bizarre adventures, Able discovers the hero within himself.
Wolfe's erudite and playful use of language accentuates the tender
eroticism that suffuses this often heartbreaking and always profoundly
mysterious saga.
As is typical in Wolfe's fiction, The Knight suggests questions
but eschews answers. In this first person narrative, composed in the
form of a lengthy letter to the protagonist's long-lost brother, readers
are left swimming in a fragrant ocean of subtle allusions, unreliable
narratives, and tantalizing clues. Wolfe invites readers to apply their
imaginations to his complex canvas.
Ineffable wonders and riches abound within these pages.
Originally published in
The Montreal Gazette, Saturday, 28 February 2004.
Claude Lalumière's Fantastic Fiction
is a series of
capsule reviews first published in the Saturday Books
section of The Montreal Gazette.
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