Thrones, Robes, Swords, Games

Attentive readers may have noticed a reference or two to real-time strategy games on here. I don't play them as much as I used to - for reasons of time and hardware, among other things. (Incidentally, I wonder if there's something about an RTS that lends itself to a desktop over a laptop.) But I keep up with some of what's going on - as someone who remembers Age of Kings, the series of expansions to Age of Empires II since The Forgotten has been boggling - and will put on a YouTube video on the subject now and again. 

I did so the other day while in the middle of another task, and was surprised to find my attention drawn by an early look at Game of Thrones: War for Westeros. Not because the game looks good, or that it hooks my attention; it looks rote, predictable, and dispiriting; however polished some aspects of it are and however positive that video may be (although that final section with the 'I hope...' passage is pretty direct about highlighting some potential disappointments) I could not encourage anyone to buy a copy. 

The choices made by War for Westeros are downstream of HBO's television adaption of George R. R. Martin's series of books; I've passed comment on Game of Thrones before now elsewhere. But it still raised the question - why do it that way? 

What I focused on here was the levels of variation involved. I referred to these levels of variation:

• Football-Strip Variation (as different paint schemes)
• Plurality Variation (as a sub-faction)
• Cap-à-Pie Variation (so different as to become a different faction)

in an earlier post when discussing tabletop miniatures. 

The factions in War for Westeros are presumably balanced for gameplay purposes and seem to have some mechanical similarities but are otherwise show Cap-à-Pie Variation. This despite two of them being the aristocratic Houses of Stark and Lannister - who exist on the same continent, in the same polity, participating in the same sorts of institutions. However much they choose to emphasise their cultural differences and however strong their regional identities, it seems odd to have them be so very different - especially in a story that indicates the ignored commonality and very real shared interests of squabbling Westerosi nobles in the face of devastating climate change and a rogue state equipped with the equivalent of nuclear arms that bears a grudge against Westeros. 

So, is it right to take the difference between Stark and Lannister to the level of Cap-à-Pie Variation in their design? I'd say that it isn't, not that it makes any difference to War for Westeros by this stage. But it does raise a question: when is a particular kind of variation appropriate?
  [As well as the question 'How would you lay out RTS Factions in a war for Westeros?'. But I'll save answering that for the end. ]

From the 2018 production of Handel's Giulio Cesare at Glyndebourne.

Consider the illustration above, or see this video. Both are from the 2018 production of Handel's Giulio Cesare at Glyndebourne. The forces of Caesar's Rome are in costume largely taken from British Imperial military gear; the forces of Ptolemaic Egypt are in something reminiscent of nineteenth century Egypt. There's some connection between the two - high-collared military tunics, say, and similar arms. But otherwise they are quite different - as the forces of Rome in the last days of the Republic and Ptolemaic Egypt should be. (Not that one imagines that Handel and everyone else behind the original production was very concerned about historical accuracy). This also fits the medium; it is an opera, performed live. We can't zoom in on a detail of military uniform to show you that one khaki-clad soldier wears the cap badge and tactical recognition flash of the Royal Corps of Halberdiers and one khaki-clad soldier wears the badge of the Duke of Glendon's Light Infantry, however good your particular opera glasses may be.

What would we call this? Cap-à-Pie Variation between main characters and Plurality Variation between members of the chorus, I think. We readily distinguish Rome and Egypt, as we do Cesare and Tolomeo - while communicating things about the characters of the latter. An excellent set of variations.

Compare the Command and Conquer series of RTS games; the Tiberian games set the Global Defence Initiative against the Brotherhood of Nod; the former being a near-future UN-centred military industrial complex clad in ochres and tan against the insurgent religious cult decked out in black and red with a little grey when they want to be subtle. The warfare is asymmetric, the styles of play are different - and the Variation is Cap-à-Pie. We may heartily approve of this. 

Age of Empires II was mentioned above. Way back in 1999, several campaigns were available in the original. One was centred on the life of Joan of Arc; one on the Third Crusade and Saladin. The civilisations available to make these campaigns included the Britons, the Franks and the Saracens; the Britons and Franks shared the Western European architectural set, the Saracens used the Middle Eastern architectural set. Individual soldiers looked the same wherever. Thus, the Joan of Arc campaign showed Football Strip Variation between armies and the Saladin Campaign showed Plurality Variation. The nature of the medium made the vivid colours differentiating a Briton knight or tower and a Frankish knight or tower quite apparent; the limitations of software in the 1990s meant that Cap-à-Pie Variation while maintaining a reasonable resemblance to historical dress was highly unlikely - and the expectations of the audience led them to accept that crossbowmen, labourers and men-at-arms on a given team would wear striking tangerine tabards.

Speaking of Saladin, I have recently read Walter Scott's 1825 novel The Talisman. I'm inclined to agree with Adam Roberts that it rather sets the tone for fiction on the Crusades going forward; as another review by Roberts has it 'chivalry set against realpolitik, pigheaded and even brutish Christian knights, elegant Saracens adept at disguise, healing and courtesy, Saladin valorised.'  The variation between Christian and Moslem here is, of course, is Cap-à-Pie. The first few chapters introduce our (Scottish) protagonist by contrast with a Saracen noble; the two even go unnamed initially - merely Knight and Emir, Frank and Saracen, Christian and Moslem - exemplars of their respective worlds. Roberts makes the case that dress and disguise are not merely well-worn mechanisms for the plot or the usual sumptuous trappings of the genre but an essential element of theme.* Of course, it all builds to a scene where Saladin and Richard the Lionheart meet face to face and demonstrate the respective worth of their swords - a scene famous enough that the Ladybird History of Richard felt it necessary to mention and portray it, while labelling it as definitely fictional. If I felt particularly bold, I might even argue that the contrast of oppressive blunt-force Templars and subtle sneaky Assassins in the Assassin's Creed games can be traced here.

From said Ladybird History.

[Saladin as a virtuous unbeliever goes back at least to Dante, of course. But the contrast of quarrelsome prideful Christians and self-contained devoted-to-the-cause Muslims seems something of an exaggeration - I might suggest Lyons and Jackson's 1982 Saladin: The Politics of the Holy War as a source for counterexamples. Shajar al-Durr is another show of internal intrigues, rises and falls, and other divisions from the Islamic world. A film like 2012's Lincoln that showed Saladin as a manipulator and politician (gasp) would perhaps be genuinely unexpected in East or West.]

***

Anyway, I have offered the critiques of others on Game of Thrones more often than my own, but here's the reverse. War for Westeros and Game of Thrones make a clash of aristocratic houses with regional affiliations in the same empire into Team Wolf versus Team Lion in Beastland Arena. Men-at-arms become emanations of some main character's fighting spirit rather than the product of a region, a system of governance and a way of life. Granted, some poor pikeman is going to die in dragon-wrought flames either way - but if I'm meant to be reflecting on the course of human affairs, the proper work of the state and so forth, the former is a better work than the latter.

More to the point, this was achieved successfully elsewhere. Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings films ('Good with distinctive flaws', if you were wondering) might skip over the Fiefdoms of Gondor and trample the downward arc of Denethor, but soldiers fighting under the banner of the Silver Tree or the White Horse are shown fighting for a way of life best expressed by a monarch rather than the whim of tyrant. This is along with, yes, survival in the face of an invasion by Mordor. They might die by ork-shot or troll's-hammer but you know 'Why We Fight'. 

What is the 'Why We Fight' in Westeros? The Northerner has the execution of Eddard Stark and the death of his entourage as a casus belli; the Westerlander has...the kidnap of Tyrion Lannister? Perhaps that's enough to get some troops in the field, enough to convince hawkish Westerlands nobles of the need for the best defence being a good offence. But after that - well, I can't imagine Northern secessionism being a great concern - and from what I recall of the television series, there are fewer efforts to convince the world of the barbarism of the North. 'The Starks are werewolves' is viewed as a transparent lie and no-one makes much of their worship of different gods. 'The Faith of the Seven, sound law, prosperity and peace!' could be a powerful (and vaguely Whiggish! Cf. Roberts again.) rallying cry from the Lannisters: given the events of later seasons, one can't even regard this as an implicit appeal. 

Anyway, we managed it on film with Viggo Mortensen, Bernard Hill, Karl Urban and Sean Bean. Why, then, can we not manage it on the television with Peter Dinklage, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Charles Vance ... and Sean Bean. I suspect that part of the problem was that people who wanted to make I, Claudius also had to make Waterloo with dragons.

***

Anyway, what's my preferred means of making a version of a Game of Thrones RTS with the adequate levels of variation? It's Age of Empires II (the medieval historical RTS goes to make the medieval-inspired fantasy RTS? You don't say) - but with an element from the Total War games, to whit: the variation of soldiers in factions to offer subtle gradation. As we may see, the Greeks look very different from the Parthians, but the Seleucids are mainly Greek units with some Eastern ones, and Pontus is a complete mix of Greek and Eastern. Behold, a spectrum. 

Westeros can be chopped into three different culture blocs, giving three different architecture sets, three different assortments of soldiers. You could get away with two-and-a-half architecture sets, I suspect.

• Northern Westerosi (not quite 'First Men')
• Southern Westerosi (not quite 'Andals')
• Rhoynar & Post-Valyrian; NSLC
      That is ... Dorne, elements of the Crownlands about Dragonstone (thanks to Valyrians other than Targaryen and strong east-facing trade links) and a pool of mercenaries from the Free Cities (largely of Valyrian foundation). We could call this 'Western Essosi' which is a mouthful (and wrong) so let's go for 'Narrow Sea Littoral Culture' - Enessellsee, if you like. **

This would enable a portrayal of warfare in Westeros from around (say) a century or so before Aegon's Conquest until the 'present day' of A Game of Thrones. 

Good fortune smile on A Wiki of Ice and Fire; further details to be seen on individual articles.

Troops could be be produced singly (as Age of Empires) or in groups (as Dawn of War or Battle for Middle-Earth). Presumably there would be some duplication in the different assortments of soldiers (Northern Spearmen, Southern Pikemen, NSLC Halberdiers) - though they wouldn't be a perfect match. We can picture a greater choice of 'Knightly' units, heavy cavalry or footmen, in the Southern Westerosi overall list. As Age of Empires II, flavourful unique units could be added to each faction - likewise, faction bonuses (Lannisters get more money, and so on).

Westeros might have Seven Kingdoms - but there are, of course, nine roughly comparable political units (Dorne, the Reach, the Vale, the Westerlands, the Stormlands, the Riverlands, the Iron Islands, the Crownlands, the North) within it and the stateless region north of the Wall. Which brings us to some worked examples.

So, the North, as ruled by House Stark has a Northern Westerosi architecture set and variety of soldiers that is around Nine-Tenths Northern and One-Tenth Southern. 

The Vale, ruled by House Arryn has a Southern Westerosi architecture set and a military split of Seven-Tenths Southern and Three-Tenths Northern.

Dorne, ruled by House Martell has an NSLC architecture set and a military split of Six-Tenths Southern and Four-Tenths NSLC.

The Crownlands ruled by House Targaryen would have an NSLC architecture set and a military split of Five-Tenths Southern and Five-Tenths NSLC. But a Crownlands force under House Baratheon would have a Southern Westerosi architecture set and a military split of Seven-Tenths Southern and Three-Tenths NSLC. (With the Stormlands being even more Southern).
  A pre-Targaryen Conquest Crownlands - not that that seems to have been an independent entity - would be perhaps pure Southern, with Dragonstone soaking up the Free Cities trade. (It may be that the Crownlands would be best saved for a narrative campaign.)

That's hopefully enough to establish a pattern, to indicate a capacity for showing each level of variation - with similarities and differences enough for a continent entire - and an ability to create campaigns in several different periods. You may fill in any appealing blanks yourselves.

*There's a little exception to these contrasts; in Ch. XXIV of The Talisman we encounter the troops of Marquis of Montserrat: 

...a gallant band of twelve hundred Stradiots, a kind of light cavalry raised by the Venetians in their Dalmatian possessions, and of which they had entrusted the command to the Marquis, with whom the republic had many bonds of connection. These Stradiots were clothed in a fashion partly European, but partaking chiefly of the Eastern fashion. They wore, indeed, short hauberks, but had over them party-coloured tunics of rich stuffs, with large wide pantaloons and half-boots. On their heads were straight upright caps, similar to those of the Greeks; and they carried small round targets, bows and arrows, scimitars, and poniards. They were mounted on horses carefully selected, and well maintained at the expense of the State of Venice; their saddles and appointments resembled those of the Turks, and they rode in the same manner, with short stirrups and upon a high seat. These troops were of great use in skirmishing with the Arabs, though unable to engage in close combat, like the iron-sheathed men-at-arms of Western and Northern Europe.

**Which rather flattens the Dornish character for convenience, but they're hardly alone - as the Iron Islanders (Northern) might tell you. In any case, claims of PROUD DORNISH EXCEPTIONALISM or cries for SOCIALISM WITH IRONBORN CHARACTERISTICS are likely to fall on stony ground when directed at a supporter of GLORIOUS TULLY HEGEMONY.

(Were I the sort of person that made tee-shirts, I would put all of those on tee-shirts.)

July-August Miscellany 2026: Minting Imperials

An Empire in Waiting, an Empire in Exile, an Empire of Story Tellers, and an Empire Ended.

***

What is your impression of Napoleon III? Marx's 1851 conclusion is inevitably going to be mentioned:

Hegel says somewhere that all great historic facts and personages recur twice. He forgot to add: "Once as tragedy, and again as farce." Caussidiere for Danton, Louis Blanc for Robespierre, the "Mountain" of 1848-51 for the "Mountain" of 1793-95, the Nephew for the Uncle. 

This extends to appearances, with the vigorous and slightly beaky Napoleon I of David's paintings (or anything earlier) contrasting with the fussy moustache and goatee of Napoleon III, even where the pose is quite similar.

By Franz Xaver Winterhalter, 1853

Napoleon III was vaguely on my radar - I could have told you he went from President to Emperor, but not much more. I elected to remedy this, starting with Fenton Bresler's Napoleon III: A Life supplemented with a few other sources. This is a biography I can recommend as a starting point, though at times you really can tell that it was written by a barrister; it is sometimes breaks things down in a manner seemingly calculated to appeal to a jury.

First: Napoleon III is nephew to Napoleon I. His mother was the daughter of Josephine Bonaparte by her first husband (Alexandre de Beauharnais); his father Louis Bonaparte (younger brother of Napoleon,  later King of Holland for a time). Bresler does consider the question that Napoleon I may have been his father, and discards it; it is enough that Napoleon I was around Napoleon III in his youth and rose as high as he did, taking the Bonapartes and Beauharnaises with him. 

You know what happens to Napoleon I; if not, Ridley Scott is keen to tell you. What happens to the many Bonapartes who got made crowned heads of several bits of Europe or who made advantageous marriages? Hefty pensions and exiles from France, which suits most of them pretty well. This means that Napoleon III gets a thorough education in a variety of settings, and can later move at the heights of society. More to the point, the elder generation - who saw the rise and fall of the First Empire - are sort of content to either live out their days in luxury or raise their children. The money keeps them subdued, but it doesn't really work with the restless young - and actively means that they can eventually launch themselves out on adventures; a young Napoleon III will get involved with Italian revolutionaries and has escape the Austrians.  Later, he will use that money to print pamphlets, support himself while writing and launch a few coup attempts (first in Strasbourg, then in Boulogne; Bresler notes that no-one in either place cares to remember this).

There's a lot of 'X was imprisoned / under house arrest for six months, then via an impassioned plea by relative Y or ambassador Z, is released / is given exceptionally lenient treatment'. This is slightly frustrating, from one point of view, and I find myself asking how this happened. There's some cases of it with French generals in WWII, who are released via Vichy intervention and then go and join de Gaulle. 'X intervened' is efficient for a biography, but it does make me wonder about the mechanics of it. There's also a sort of aristocratic liberality to this, both in the relative ranks of those involved and in the sense of generosity and freedom offered. That it persists (in certain cases) past WWI and into an age of totalitarian ideology and total war is something I need to tease out. I dare say there's a Marxist analysis of class or caste loyalty.

It helps that while there is an anti-Republic/Napoleon reaction in France, it doesn't really stick, because Napoleon's reforms and ability to marshal all of France against Europe seem to have actually worked (or at least, enough people were convinced they did). Thus you get the government of Louis Phillipe, the Citizen King, repatriating his remains to be buried at Les Invalides and the completion of the Arc de Triomphe. Which makes bringing down the hammer on his heir awkward.

So, while Napoleon III gets monitored and tracked an awful lot, he gets treated pretty leniently. Even when he's imprisoned after the second coup attempt, he gets the opportunity to write essays and pamphlets and articles for newspapers and do scientific experiments. Also, his prison guard at the Chateau of Ham (near the river Somme, blown up by the Germans in 1917) made sure he got a mistress while he was there. Napoleon III has lots of mistresses.

Anyway, Napoleon III escapes the Chateau of Ham in disguise, then returns to France in the aftermath of the Revolution of 1848. His coups aren't exactly held against him by this point, though he lets some other Bonapartes run for elected office before he tries himself. The fact that he has had to build his reputation by the press is useful at this point - he's not a decent public speaker (for all that he can apparently charm his way through High Society). 

By this point Bonapartism has to have a theoretical basis rather than just being Napoleon I's supporters. 

It looks like a combination of elements: 

• Appeal to revolutionary sentiment while avoiding any Reign of Terror -Political and national unity 
• A sort of radical (as in, back to the radix, the root) monarchism that has the monarch as keenly aware of the popular need and will 
• Jobs all round - one popular pamphlet in 1844 is L'extinction du pauperisme 
• Military strength, though Napoleon III does at one point stress that there's a carefully separate set of civil posts/honours/etc in the Napoleonic Code rather than a sprawling aristocratic mishmash. It's not government by soldiers.   

Bresler quotes Alfred Cobban's History of Modern France.  'Napoleon III never forgot that he had been brought to power by the masses of the people. His authority had not been created by, nor did it depend on, the army. There was no great party machine*, as in modern fascist and communist dictatorships, to hold the people down. His was a personal and plebiscitary dictatorship and what the people had given the people might take away.'

*Though see Zeldin's Political System of Napoleon III, which indicates that there are quite a few trails of influence and patronage out to provincial France in order to provide, shape or vet candidates. And come the 3rd Republic, there is still a Bonapartist Party.

So, what does this self-promoter and trickster do when he's elected with a startling majority? Well, he chooses the title 'Prince-President', faces a divides National Assembly - and the occasional revolutionary attempt. Then eventually he imitates his Uncle and there's a coup - who could have foreseen it? - and there's a Second Empire, a new constitution, a plebiscite and a wave of swift repression (which lessens fairly promptly, but never precisely wanes).

And then? Intervention in the cause of Italian unification - which does help Cavour and the House of Savoy get the ball rolling. In return, Nice and Savoy itself become part of France. Napoleon III will later fight to keep Rome and the Pope independent of a unified Italy

There's more playing the Great Power game through joining the British in the Crimean War (the Sardinians get involved too), intervention in Lebanon, the construction of the Suez Canal, the defence of French missionaries in Indochina - which will eventually produce a French Vietnam, and wider consequences than the bánh mì. He also helps set up Maximilian as Emperor of Mexico, which goes poorly. 

All this taken with defeat (and personal defeat in battle, at that; Bresler concludes that he was really quite ill, and should have stayed at home) in the Franco-Prussian War doesn't exactly paint a picture of Napoleon III as a ruler you'd want - though it's difficult to deny the vigour of his early years, when he could have become a mere playboy. He at least seems to have had higher aims than many a caudillo. Those eighteen years of secure personal rule and a stable government were probably quite useful for France in the wake of a revolution. 

It's a story that could do with telling more widely, I suspect. Three and half years ago I wanted a dynastic radio series on the Bonapartes - and nothing I've read in the course of this little spree changes that.

***

De Gaulle: L'Âge de fer (2026)

First as tragedy, then as farce then as...Quixotism?

Released in English-speaking markets as De Gaulle: Resistance but the titles still clearly show 'Age of Iron'. (Not De Gaulle: Iron Age - which is a piece of time-slip fan-fiction I am not worthy to write). This is the first half of a two-parter, with the second half still to come. It's the story of Charles de Gaulle, 1939-1944. You likely know some of it, but this is a pretty decent rendition of things. 

The bulk of the plot is the formation of the Free French as a meaningful force. De Gaulle has a dubious authority, limited resources, truculent comrades, infirm allies and an enormous task in the shape of the liberation of France. Scenes in France - either German-occupied or Vichy - round out the story, and we sometimes drop into the perspective of the Free French forces on the ground - as at Bir Hakeim. 

The great contrast and clash of wills is (of course) not de Gaulle and (say) Rommel, but de Gaulle and Churchill. Both are thoroughly obstinate and awkward types - but Churchill is the face of a kingdom at war. British decisions are made to keep fighting, to deny the enemy, to garner American support - they are, however flamboyant Churchill may be personally*, the practical decisions of a nation in arms with all the capacities and qualities of a state bureaucracy**. De Gaulle is without all these things - and still insists on himself as France (a subtle contrast with Churchill, who is Prime Minister and not monarch). His small personal following is made smaller as he is cut out of decisions - learning about the attack on the French Fleet at Mers-el-Kébir only after the fact - or as he interferes with vital decisions - as at Dakar. I make no claims for the accuracy of the film.

Yet he remains stubborn, and (with a certain amount of nerve and daring) his forces manage to gain a foothold in the backwaters of France's empire - the latter is on full display, with multiple segments in Chad involving Félix Éboué. The Free French Brigade that finally fights at Bir Hakeim is clearly international - all in contrast to the polished presentation of Vichy Forces. Allied victory is - with, as ever, hindsight - inevitable, so de Gaulle is also contrasted with French admiral François Darlan. Darlan worked with the Vichy Government (until he didn't) and would have been a fairly plausible choice as a leader for Free French Forces.

Anyway, this isn't (necessarily) a very interesting film as a film. But it will probably get you to go out and look up a dozen of the people and place involved, so well done Pathé.

As for the Knight of the Rueful Countenance, the Knight of the Lantern Jaws, the most admirable Don Quixote of La Mancha....the comparison is made explicitly by characters in the film. But the comparison with Napoleon III is inevitable under the circumstances of this post. It probably doesn't go terribly far, but that image of driven rulers of France in exile launching doomed operations goes a certain way. More broadly, that France had rebuilt itself from exile before - with two empires, three republics and numerous other circumstances en route - does connect the two again. No Napoleon III, no de Gaulle? A little stronger than I'd put it.

*Though rewatching a trailer or two for this post, Churchill (played by Simon Russell Beale) is made to sound more callous than his portrayal necessarily ends up being.

**The French being more plucky and obstinate than a Churchillian wartime image of British pluck and obstinacy is slightly funny, in a vaguely meta way.

***

Kalpa Imperial, Angélica Gorodischer (1983) tr. by Ursula K LeGuin (2003)

Not a new book, or a new translation, but Penguin have recently done a new edition. 

This is used as the cover art - Ad Minoliti “Carrier Bag Theory - after Ursula K. Le Guin”, (2025). 

 

'In city squares and glittering palaces, a series of storytellers recount the many deaths and rebirths of the greatest empire that never was; a history in which beggars rise to the Golden Throne, mad emperors raise cities and murderous empresses plot against their own children.'

The blurb's description of 'The greatest empire that never was' together with the mention of Italo Calvino in the acknowledgements probably makes one think of something like 'Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius'; that Borges and Gorodischer were both Argentines doubtless helps. But there's never that Borgesian sense of making a world (at least, I didn't get it) only of shaping one .... give or take some of the reframing elements in the last story. 

The story feel very LeGuin, surprisingly enough. The themes and elements are repeated so often that you could probably make a pastiche quite readily; that's not a mark against Kalpa Imperial per se, but it does have a very clear niche.* I also have to wonder how much of what I've read is LeGuin and how much Gorodischer, which is the trouble with such a famous author as your translator, especially where fields overlap.

These stories are worth reading, if you've an interest in the sort of world that can be conjured from overlapping snapshots of a fictional history, or accounts of scattered locations in a far-off empire - and if you're on a blog of this kind, you likely do.

*And any parody of it would get tired PDQ. I've often thought that a mirror image parody of Mills's Slaine would be hilarious - maybe an ultraviolet female hero of a developed civilisation creating and defending elaborate hierarchies in honour of the Sun God, roundly beating and humiliating all her enemies, accompanied by a loyal, stoic and chaste giantess - but it could probably only last thirty pages or so. The heroine will be called Elnaise.

***

After London, Richard Jefferies (1885) 

What if William Morris's News from Nowhere was also a coming-of-age story? And really depressing? And what if the new world were brought about not by a revolt, but by a strange astral body?

We don't quite know how it happened, but the Britain of the 1880s collapsed, after a 'dark body' in space passed by, causing torrential rain and (perhaps) some strange influence on the minds of men, possibly related to biomagnetism. A century later and cities have collapsed; the state is no more, replaced by dozens of petty kingdoms. The south of England has become dominated by a great lake, with an entrance to the sea at the former Bristol and a dividing strait formed of the Chilterns. 'What was once Oxford and is now Sypolis' is a major port. A marsh sits at the eastern end of the lake:

At the eastern extremity the Lake narrows, and finally is lost in the vast marshes which cover the site of the ancient London......

Thus the low-lying parts of the mighty city of London became swamps, and the higher grounds were clad with bushes. The very largest of the buildings fell in, and there was nothing visible but trees and hawthorns on the upper lands, and willows, flags, reeds, and rushes on the lower. These crumbling ruins still more choked the stream, and almost, if not quite, turned it back. If any water ooze past, it is not perceptible, and there is no channel through to the salt ocean. It is a vast stagnant swamp, which no man dare enter, since death would be his inevitable fate.

There exhales from this oozy mass so fatal a vapour that no animal can endure it. The black water bears a greenish-brown floating scum, which for ever bubbles up from the putrid mud of the bottom. When the wind collects the miasma, and, as it were, presses it together, it becomes visible as a low cloud which hangs over the place. The cloud does not advance beyond the limit of the marsh, seeming to stay there by some constant attraction; and well it is for us that it does not, since at such times when the vapour is thickest, the very wildfowl leave the reeds, and fly from the poison. There are no fishes, neither can eels exist in the mud, nor even newts. It is dead.

The flags and reeds are coated with slime and noisome to the touch; there is one place where even these do not grow, and where there is nothing but an oily liquid, green and rank. It is plain there are no fishes in the water, for herons do not go thither, nor the kingfishers, not one of which approaches the spot. They say the sun is sometimes hidden by the vapour when it is thickest, but I do not see how any can tell this, since they could not enter the cloud, as to breathe it when collected by the wind is immediately fatal. For all the rottenness of a thousand years and of many hundred millions of human beings is there festering under the stagnant water, which has sunk down into and penetrated the earth, and floated up to the surface the contents of the buried cloacæ.

Many scores of men have, I fear, perished in the attempt to enter this fearful place, carried on by their desire of gain. For it can scarcely be disputed that untold treasures lie hidden therein, but guarded by terrors greater than fiery serpents. These have usually made their endeavours to enter in severe and continued frost, or in the height of a drought. Frost diminishes the power of the vapour, and the marshes can then, too, be partially traversed, for there is no channel for a boat. But the moment anything be moved, whether it be a bush, or a willow, even a flag, if the ice be broken, the pestilence rises yet stronger. Besides which, there are portions which never freeze, and which may be approached unawares, or a turn of the wind may drift the gas towards the explorer.

So far, so Mordor. There are later more even nightmarish descriptions of it than that. 

England has become, as said, a great many petty kingdoms and republics - prone to squabbling and raiding one another. Slavery is commonplace, under a thin veil of debt bondage. The Welsh and the Irish mount sea-borne raids on all these in revenge for past wrongs (the Scots are too far off to care.) From the limited view of the narrative, being either an in-universe document from Southern England or from the point of view of a resident Wales and Ireland appear united, or united enough to be capable of playing Viking; goodness knows why they didn't collapse into petty kingdoms - and let's not ask what happened in Ulster.

New breeds of beast stalk the renewed forests: black wood-dogs, the thorn-hog, the white hog, the hill-hog However, men maintain some domesticated beasts - draft horses or hill-ponies; 'The poodle is extinct, the Maltese terrier, the Pomeranian, the Italian greyhound, and, it is believed, great numbers of crosses and mongrels have utterly disappeared....We still have, among tame dogs, the mastiff, terrier, spaniel, deerhound, and greyhound, all of which are as faithful to man as ever.'

Also in the woods lurk Bushmen (apparently descended from tramps); seemingly vicious, squalid and secretive. The southern plains are populated by 'gipsies, those who are now often called Romany and Zingari' - nomads, raiders and prone to vendettas, if more willing to parley than the Bushmen.

All this is laid out in the first section of After London in an in-univese text. The second section details a young man moving through it: the eldest son of a Baron, a sensitive and educated youth - but still trained in arms. Our hero is Felix Aquila, who (through a variety of circumstances, including an upset in the course of love) travels the great lake in a canoe. It is through his eyes that we see the world, knowing just enough of the past to see what was lost, being young and idealistic enough to feel the sting of present woes. 

For the collapse of London - a London spoken of in terms of 'the rottenness of a thousand years and of many hundred millions of human beings' - has not led to a gentler, kinder land. Scarcity, close-mindedness and competition reign and stifle regrowth. It is, on the whole, a dispiriting vision. I found a second-hand edition with an introduction by John Fowles:

Particularly pertinent to After London is what Jefferies often called 'villadom' in the Notebooks (and Butler Ygrundism, Grundyism in Erewhon); conformity, apathy, smug narrowmindedness. It is associated with London there; yet it continues to infest the survivors of the annihilation of London in the novel, and plainly in Jefferies' view it would not die with the urban, or suburban, society that especially fostered it. It is the unthinkingness, or rather the unfeelingness, of ordinary mankind, both town and country, both middle and lower class that appals him - the inability to build one's own boat, however home-made, and sail for something better....

 If this sound very favourable to the intellectual and free-thinker, it isn't. We are told that after the passing of the celestial body the 'richer and upper classes made use of their money to escape. Those left behind were mainly the lower and most ignorant, so far as the arts were concerned, those that dwelt in distant and outlying places; and those who lived by agriculture'. 

All this is illustrated by Felix moving through the world - contemplating the culture of the time, such as it is, and the perils of the time, including war, social jostling, envy and the hazards of the material world.

After London is short, neatly crafted and freely available over at Project Gutenberg. Give it a look, see if there's anything you'd care to draw from this melancholy tale of the human quest.

Palaces, Towers and Signs: A Review of Recent Novels

I have done something unusual, and read a string of books in a row all published in the last three-ish years. Might as well write about them.

***

R.F. Kuang, Babel, or the Necessity of Violence, 2022

Chances are you've heard of this: at least around me, it was in lots of shop windows. The second-hand paperback I found drips with comments and recommendations (Blackwell's Book of the Year, New York Times bestseller, The Daily Mail's Best Book of 2022 - which is a reminder of how a given newspaper or broadcaster isn't altogether wedded to an ideology).

Differences in translation form a kind of magic; this has been used to fuel European imperialism. Babel details events in the Royal Institute of Translation in an only-just-alternate 1836 Oxford. A Chinese orphan is brought to Britain and raised there, seemingly solely for the purposes of working as a Translator.

You know how this ends from the title - or the string of excerpts on the inside over talking about revolution, empire and academia. I don't intend to dissect this more than needed.

Babel is engaging enough; it never exactly dragged. But it is a Hedgehog of a Book, not a Fox - in Isaiah Berlin's division. It does one thing, and it does it fairly well, and it keeps doing it.

It has a problem, in that it is a book narrated by an educated, intelligent and well-read woman who thinks you are very stupid. (I would not claim that this reflects Kuang.) Every reference must be spelled out in the footnotes - and most of those footnotes mention something that there's a good chance you've come across in a high middle-brow source somewhere, or express a position you've seen in a post-colonial Jeremiad prominently placed in a bookshop lobby. ("Did you know that British food is bland? What are they doing with all those spices?" &c, &c. More interesting - and perhaps more in line with the thrust of the plot - would be something like an older French response, that Les Rosbifs are unsubtle, undiscerning - indeed, unbalanced - with their use of seasonings.) This is not merely a view expressed by crusty reactionaries or terminally-online culture warriors, incidentally. 

Here is where it nearly trips over its own tail (something which one would have thought afflicted Foxes more than Hedgehogs). It is not merely that Babel makes its argument obviously and forcefully, but that it does so the point of parody. A footnote mentions that University College has produced jurists for British-ruled India; very good. It gives their names as Robert Chambers, Edward West and William Jones; a suitable detail. It then feels obliged to tell you that all three were white - which is something that the reader (who has already encountered several strains of racism and other cultural frictions) had probably worked out for themselves already - they are highly placed men with Anglophone names in a country that was at least ninety percent white in the 1950s, even assuming notable flaws on the part of the surveys of the time. 

This is the sort of thing that turns pathos to bathos quite quickly. 'This is a monstrous and abominable act!' might say the propagandist - which loses effectiveness quickly if the propagandist shows their hand: 'As senior commissar of the 1327th Rifle Company, I must say that this is a monstrous and abominable act!'

Yes, there are exceptions to the rule. A formal announcement of status makes sense to establish legitimacy - 'As a Constitutional Monitor of the Social Federation, I can no longer stand for this. Commander, by authority of Section 29 of the General Military Code, I relieve you of duty!' Likewise, a piece of Rhetoric may play on status: 'As a Constitutional Monitor of the Social Federation, I have studied X, read Y and fully endorse Z - but even the commonest Federal Trooper has seen A, felt B and sensed C - and so will know full well that Z.' And one may think of recommendations: 'The Central Office of the Corps of Constitutional Monitors recommends this motion picture for its high level of research and insight into the problem of M, the issue of N and the contemporary matter of O.' The aforementioned footnote doesn't manage any of these. 

The general high quality of Babel makes flaws of this kind all the more apparent. I've seen this described as a nod to heavy-handed Victorian tomes, to which I can only say - those Victorian authors might have been projecting a world-view, but they weren't fighting a culture war.

Other issues are few, and some - like a 21st century-style Commemoration Ball in 1830s Oxford - are quite deliberate. There are some clumsy uses of language - thus, a reference to a force of soldiers supposed to be somewhat larger than a double-dozen as a platoon. An academic clergyman is referred to as 'Reverend Doctor Frederick Charles Plumptre' and not 'The Reverend Doctor Frederick Charles Plumptre' in a section when the additional word and syllable would have been entirely fitting; Plumptre's rank and status are being emphasised. Kuang has silver used in ways (like cleaning the water in London's canals) that would presumably lessen some of the urban blight and squalor that is later important. Likewise, silver is used for reasons it presumably need not be: silver for bells...which is a splendid passage until you think on it: is there a great convenience or magnificence or saving in using magical silver to keep bells in tune, that a decent bell-foundry couldn't provide? Ditto college towers, though the invocation of Babel makes some towers collapsing inevitable.

If I have to draw some conclusion ... well, the chances are, frankly, that you've read Babel or that you don't need to read it. 

And leaping to another Vulpine dichotomy: Babel might be a lion to scare away wolves, but is not a fox to recognise traps. It is a book of the middle and the mainstream; it would happily confront a right-leaning academic or a classical liberal columnist in a widely-read journal. But I don't think it's ever contemplated the world of literate, articulate, widely-if-inconsistently-read, statistic-wielding (none of those thing are equal to Good, Virtuous or Correct) right wing commentators on, say, Substack. At least, not as a Primary Source. Perhaps Kuang will not object to being a Leonine Hedgehog.

***

Thomas Peermohamed Lambert, Shibboleth, 2025

This one does need a summary. Edward is an Oxford student in his second year; in a bid for social cachet, he starts making rather a lot of a long-dead Muslim grandfather in Zanzibar. Cue plaudits and female attention.

On its own, that sounds predictable: a half-hour sitcom, living or dying by the comedian's skill. Certainly not something that can cover the span of three terms. It is given staying power by Edward's misadventures in love, and the range of human misunderstandings, vulnerabilities and flaws - and by a degree of knowingness on the part of all the characters. They are frequently headstrong or scheming or prideful, but rarely ignorant. 

The other thing that stops this being a one-trick pony is the range of side characters, aiding and abetting Edward's deception - including the Falstaffian Egyptian Youssef, a genuine Muslim. The various social justice activists are powerfully drawn, and get some decent stinging lines and self-awareness. Not that there aren't comic scenes drawing on the well-established (cliché?) image of the campus radical and xenophile. This isn't the only strong to Lambert's bow; the names, especially of minor characters are spectacular; Liberty Vanderbilt-Jackson is normal enough but see also Larry Pfister, Lolly Bunton, Francine Hogmany-Pung and (my favourite) Hepzibah Coulson-von Ribbentrop. The other great running joke is the string of absurdly named academic works: Borges: An Overdue Denunciation, Seas incarnadine: Shakespeare, Macbeth and the menstruating body, The Quality of Mercy is not Stained: Shylock and the Poetics of Bodily Drainage - the trick is to make them only just plausible - which leaves Anus Mirabilis: The Spirit of Freud in the Letters of San Juan de la Cruz out in the cold, alas.

To some extent this is like Waugh's Decline and Fall; Edward's shyness and biddability rather echoes Paul Pennyfeather. But Edward's story is a more personal one for Lambert. 

It is also a more present one; the Trinity Term of Edward's second year begins with a clash between Israel and Hamas. This is intended as a novel of the moment, if with some themes of identity and social status that will last better than a political cartoon. It is present in one more way - Lambert is still writing, and he is even writing about Shibboleth, and has its characters in dialogues with the author. His thoughts on the relative success of his debut and the lack of understanding from his audience involved are interesting (and to some degree anticipated - hence the title), though I hope that this isn't a precedent. E.M. Forster writing about the lives of characters after the end of the novel years later in a little article is fine, but let's not have regular updates from authors.

People liked Shibboleth. I think that you will gain more from reading it than not.

***

Francis Spufford, Nonesuch, 2026

Nonesuch: once a palace, now a novel. The premise: it is 1939; an ambitious young lady in finance - Iris Hawkins - is drawn into a romantic encounter with a BBC television engineer. Unforeseen consequences draw her into a conflict with an equally young Mitford-esque fascist over a series of magical passages through time, and into meetings with angels.

Has Francis Spufford read any Tim Powers? If not, he really should do. Low-ish fantasy, in a historical setting with a veneer of science. Nonesuch isn't Declare, but they're not so very different - mid-twentieth century setting, trippy depictions. Spufford's angelic interventions may be the biggest difference. Other reviewers have noted the likeness to the mysteries of Charles Williams - which get a trifle too tied up in mystical visions to be really reliably good. Nonesuch also isn't Declare in that no-one is treating it as something for the Sci-Fi section of the bookshop; see this fulsome review.

Yes, Nonesuch isn't bad. Vivid characters (if ideas one has encountered many times before), and a beautifully rendered London, City and suburbs alike. Iris Hawkins is a rich and well-rounded figure with interesting flaws, if occasionally one suspects that she is the rich and well-rounded figure with interesting flaws that the Guardian wants her to be rather than the rich and well-rounded figure with interesting flaws that the Telegraph wants her to be. But this impression doesn't crop up too often - the most obvious intrusion was Iris thinking (in 1940) that the War against Germany was a War to extinguish Fascism. She has been established to be well-informed and not exactly apolitical - but she isn't a partisan or steeped in a given political doctrine. My impression is that neither popular attitudes nor government propaganda had brought the latter notion into being in 1940.

There is the occasional similar note of authorial smugness - look how grounded so-and-so is, look how sex-positive this is (there is also one thoroughly predictable reveal about Iris's Jewish boss). This does not always get in the way of carefully sketched emotion (at least, for our protagonists). Perhaps it is a consequence of living in the internet age: it is so easy to dig out a response or a retort or an alternative take - that the lack of one seems so irritating, so half-finished. 

I've seen reviews that get irritated by the poetry - I can't say I was. It does suffer from the fault of many a fantasy that introduces angels, in that none of the main characters even think about picking up any theology after meeting one! A few lines of dismissal would be enough, though perhaps that would only frustrate me.

Nonesuch ends on a cliffhanger: a sequel has been finished, though I don't know if there's a date for publication yet. I suspect that a full assessment will mean waiting for that sequel. 

Punth: City of Compartments III

Why are you in the City of Compartments? If, that is, you aren't an agent of one of the neighbouring powers, or a Hydraulic Dwarf. 

Firstly, it is one of the few places to access the Qryth on vaguely equal terms. That doesn't mean that they will talk to you, or that their incentives and behaviour are so very different from when they are in Punth itself. But for the dilletante Qryth scholar from the Empire, there's no better place to get started. 

Secondly, it is lightly governed. The Masters of the Aqueduct have no brief to prevent drunkenness, dissipation, gambling or prostitution (for instance) in the City, unless they interfere with the supply of Precious Municipal Fluids. This is not to say that everyone else in the City appreciates an incessant Bacchanal, or that religious leaders in one compartment or another might not rouse opinion against them and apply their own preferred solution. 

Thirdly, it is a commercial crossroads. It is one of the few places outside Punth you may find Phahk or other specialist Punthite commodities. Likewise, Dwarven handicrafts, Nirvanite textiles and Mariklyne cattle are all present. It might not be as varied a selection or population as one of the great port cities of the Stained Sea, but it certainly stands out in the region. If nothing else, there is little to beat the Saltire Market, sitting at the intersection of the two aqueducts, lit by numerous hanging metal lanterns to extending trading hours into the night.

Fourthly, it is somewhere that you can be Ka-Punth and not be bound to a quite-possibly bloody, small-minded, manipulated or djinn-haunted society. If a unified Ka-Punth society comes about, it may well  be because of an intellectual renaissance in the City of Compartments.

Fifthly, it is a refuge from the lower levels of law enforcement from both the Empire and Punth. It's not a place you could hide a traitor, but for a thief or an unlucky brawler or a dealer in outlawed minor magics, it's a good spot.

***

There is a subtle difference between those born in the City, and those who are driven there; an ease with the vertiginous tenements and the looming shadow of the aqueducts, the sparing use of water, an impatience with any law not related to bodily necessities. Some of them will in time realise the strangeness of their upbringing - but it is not known how many of them care to leave.

A sketch map of the City of Compartments - as it might have been in at past one period.

Punth: City of Compartments II

 Following on from last time...

Presence

As might be imagined, there are two major groups in the City of Compartments other than the Hydraulic Dwarves. The Nirvanite Empire and the state of Punth both maintain an official presence within the city, though in different fashions. The most obvious thing to note is that the Empire fully occupies the north-most compartment, treating with the Hydraulic Dwarves in the condescending but predictable way that they deal with non-humans. Punth maintains a heavy presence in the two south-most compartments, but does not act out every civic function they might normally do so. 

This is due in significant part to the ways in which Punthite thought must deal with this uncontrollable influence on their borders. Every other foreign power is at something of a distance - over the deep desert, over the sea, over the mountains. A neighbour - especially a neighbour that they must cooperate with - is unthinkable. Therefore, it is asserted that the Hydraulic Dwarves are merely an arm of the Punthite state. Punth possesses and controls the City of Compartments - pardon me, City 37 - therefore why would it duplicate key functions like gate guards or water suppliers? To the Imperial mind, by contrast, Erukha is simply another neighbour to be influenced, courted, implored, threatened, cajoled, persuaded or conquered. 

Structures

Of course, Punth has bowed to certain inevitabilities. City 37 has what is called a Ziggurat in the south-most compartment, but it wouldn't cut make the grade in any other city. But south of the city lies Fort 690: nominally a defensive structure like many another on the highways of Punth. However, Fort 690 larger and better supplied than any of these: it is the Punthite contingency - in case City 37 should be overwhelmed by the madness of foreign merchants abusing the hospitality of the Sky-Princes. Fort 690 would bar - or at least delay - an army passing through the Arcaded Pass and, as needed, would act as a staging ground to retake Punth's compartments. 

The Empire has a similar approach to Punth, and is undergoing the construction of a cathedral on a terrace to the north of the city. Despite the availability of Dwarven labour and craftsmanship, this has been going on for several generations - which gives ample scope for the laying out and resetting of defensive plans, earthworks and the like. Most actual worship by humans of the Faith of the Eight goes on the Church of St Ludmilla in the northern-most compartment (for the Manifest Rite) or that of St Bernard Finisterre in the second northern-most compartment (for the Unified Rite). The protean Cathedral is in theory dedicated to St Berengaria. Their centre of local government is tucked the northwest of the first compartment; it is known as Cornerstone Manse - and is the seat of the Ducal Envoy. 

Both the Empire and Punth have carved out cisterns in their respective compartments. These are secret, highly frowned upon by the Masters of the Aqueduct - and would be in no ways adequate to maintain the respective populations claimed by either state in the City of Compartments. Even restricting water rations to their soldiers, they would struggle to last above a week. 

People

The Nirvanite Empire has as its most notable representatives the Ducal Envoy (Lord Oderic of Saragotha) and the Dean of St Berengaria (Mthr. Ysodor); an assortment of merchants with significant ties to the courts and civic governates of Lameravis and the Novopolis also maintain houses in the City of Compartments. 

The Presiding Magistrate of Ziggurat 37 is the Qryth official Prudent Vanadium. Fort 690 - again, unusually for a fort of its nominal status - has a Qryth castellan, Commander Amorous Cordite. 

Recognition by Punth or the Empire is a different thing to recognition by the Masters of the Aqueduct. The Hydraulic Dwarves will sometimes 'recognise' an Imperial or Punthite subject different to the Presiding Magistrate or Ducal Envoy to act as the responsible party in contracts between them. This has occasionally been a very useful way to sow division between Imperial parties or to goad haughty Sky-Princes. 

The Hydraulic Dwarves regulate entrance to the City, and maintain registers of the Qryth; diligent record-keeping has also enabled them to keep tract of individual Punthites, no matter what badges they wear. Likewise, they note the comings and going of Imperial subjects and groups. They have been quite willing (for instance) to bar admittance to the oft-belligerent Knights of St Castrum or the Order of the Steel Suns. It is for this reason that numerous different knightly orders are encouraged to dwell in the city by the Dean of St Berengaria. Similarly, opportunists and mercenaries regularly trickle into the City - including a few highly-prized Half-Giants of distant Trygvir, who find the old compartment walls curiously familiar. 

Violence

Is, of course, quite common. Tempers run high, cultural clashes are common and neither Punth nor the Empire sends people known for deescalating to their garrisons in Erukha. Clashes are sickeningly swift and bloody, with combatants disengaging before the guards on the Aqueducts respond. 

The Qryth have adjusted their preferred fighting styles to fit the narrow streets of the compartments. One of them may equip themselves as a 'breacher', carrying a vast hammer to cave in the thin tenement walls of the city and enable access for themselves and their gendarmes. A Qryth may also take the role of a 'street fighter' and carry four smaller sabres, with which to cut and jab in many directions.

The men-at-arms of the Empire have likewise adapted. The usual Imperial counter for the Sky-Princes is (laying aside considerations of magic and certain artefacts) the chevalier and the wall of pikes. Both options are impractical in the City. Shorter and more flexible halberds are the norm for Imperial footmen and have some popularity with dismounted knights. If an Imperial group know a Qryth they absolutely must have dead (and there are no Half-Giants to hand), the usual tactic is to draw them into a close, tight combat with well-armoured knights. While thus distracted, a lightly armoured swordsmen runs up onto a tenement roof or balcony and jumps onto the Qryth's back, where they can stab something vital. This has been attempted many times, has been successful often enough - and so there is now a training apparatus for this in the northern-most compartment. Those who use it are known as the Vaulting Squires. 

Next time: non-aligned residents of the City of Compartments. 

I've linked to some very old stuff for Terrae Vertebrae in the above. Such details didn't make it into The Primer - in part to maintain the separate character of Punth. But it's all fairly broad material, and can be swapped out relatively easily.  

Punth: City of Compartments I

The land of Punth is divided from the lands of the Nirvanite Empire to the north by the Dividing Mountains. This is an ancient land, cultural crux of northern Vertebraea: where bankers and artists bustle in the Novopolis, churchmen and courtiers disport themselves in the Estates Immaculate, cavaliers and farmers hone blades in Kapelleron, and sailors and merchants make plans in Lameravis, sweating on the coast of the Stained Sea. It is is these last two regions that lie next to Punth, and which have provided soldiers and material for crusades against the Sky-Princes.

But getting through the Dividing Mountains is rarely easy: there are many passes, but only a few that would suit an army on the march. The best known - and the pass that the traveller would first choose - is the Arcaded Pass, twenty miles south of the Blue Brimstone Mesa in arid Kapelleron. This is dominated by the city Erukha, the city of aqueducts, the city of compartments, special economic zone of the Hydraulic Dwarves.

The City of Compartments dominates the pass, standing on a rise - now more of a tumulus - in the valley. It was not made by the Hydraulic Dwarves, but found by them. The Cyclopean walls had been erected in another age, and outline a roughly oblong shape, divided by a series of almost-as-large walls set in parallel lines across the width of the city. The Hydraulic Dwarves have repaired or patched or retrofitted these, but the ancient bones and vast proportions of these still show through. Their most obvious contribution - and the source of their name - would be the two great aqueducts reaching out of the mountains to cross the city of compartments at one off-centre angle. 

Thus, three colours make up the city: the umber stones of the old walls, the off-white blocks of the aqueduct and the local reddish brick of the tenements within the compartments. 

The Hydraulic Dwarves sell water, regulate entrance to the city, maintain the walls and preserve overall order. They do not chase thieves, chastise vice, sweep streets or arbitrate disputes. Residents of the City of Compartments know them in the following roles, starting with the most prominent. 

• The Sellers of Water A Hydraulic Dwarf will take up the franchise of a certain downspout or conduit from the aqueduct, and then sell water to the inhabitants of the city - paying the Masters of the Aqueduct a portion of his profits. The Sellers of Water have booths in bunkers above their conduits, with jali screens. As custodians of something very like a spring, they are considered as a sort of low-level priest in the Animist customs of the Dwarves; therefore, they are obliged to maintain a level of practical and ritual purity about the conduit house. When about the streets, the Sellers of Water carry finger cymbals to make their presence known and to mark certain times of day as well as staffs topped with a flexible club, like a cosh. 
• The Aqueduct Soldiers The rule of the Hydraulic Dwarves is enforced by control of the Aqueducts. These allow water supplies to be cut off, and also provide a platform to view the beneath. Dwarves will guard the fortified up-ramps and stairways to the aqueduct and the Dwarven settlements above the Arcaded Pass, and defend Hydraulic interests in the City by missile fire and hurled rocks from bartizans and brattices on the Aqueduct - and if need be, from suspended gondolas.
• The Artisans Plumbers, pipe-fitters, gaugers, inspectors: the Masters of the Aqueduct employ them all, and the residents of the city are glad of them.
• The Farmers Refuse collectors and gong-farmers from the City will often come into contact with the Dwarves that help cultivate the terrace farms above the Arcaded Pass. Flowers are particularly prized by the Hydraulic Dwarves; a bloom pinned to the cloak is a symbol of a festive event, and a floral crown is worn by both partners in a wedding, in by elders at a commemoration and at the initiation of certain prominent priests. The expression "Enough flowers to fill a vase" is commonly used to suggest "More money than sense". 
• Miners, Smiths and Masons The Hydraulic Dwarves do mine ore, smelt metal, forge tools and carve stone. These goods do make their way down to the city, though the artisans behind them may not. Such careers are considered safe, respectable and dull by most Dwarves.
• The Masters of the Aqueduct Are rarely seen about the streets of the city. When they do go forth, they were elaborate head-coverings with jali screens over their faces of lightweight carved stone, or are carried in litters with similar such screens. Perhaps these hearken back to their past as Sellers of Water. The Masters of the Aqueduct are those whose wealth or mastery have grown to such an extent that they hold a place on the self-selecting Quotidian Board. The executive functions this wields are buttressed and cross-checked by Examination Quintets of the Occasional Board (which encompasses almost every Seller of Water, and many other prominent Dwarves in the above roles). Punditry and analysis will often refer to these as 'the Channel' and 'the Reservoir'.  

Next time: The lives of the Non-Dwarves in the City of Compartments.

March-April 2026 Miscellany: Raging Wazirs of Angelic Khartoum

I have been reading, writing, and occasionally watching. 

***

I re-read the Mortal Engines Quartet and gave my own particular take on twenty-five years of that series, hopefully improving the grade of TRACTION CITY DISCOURSE. 

***

     Worldbuilding & Woolgathering and
     The Wishstone and the Wonderworkers (1990) and
     The Wazir and the Witch (1990) and
     The Worshippers and the Way (1992)

A return to Hugh Cook. As before, these were read in the wake of the False Machine two-part review of all ten of the Chronicles of an Age of Darkness. For those after a fairly quick introduction to the series, I could do worse than point you towards these two summaries with a smattering of comment by Adrian Tchaikovsky. I also read between posts The Women and the Warlords, The Walrus and the Warwolf and The Wicked and the Witless, but there wasn't the time or impetus for a post on them.

I don't have any new comments on Cook here, or anything much I'd like to add to the linked material. The main thing I would stress about Wishtone, Wazir and Worshippers is that they are set in contrast one to another. Wishstone and Wazir we will treat as one for these purposes, set against Worshippers.

To it: Wishstone is set on the baking, fertile remote island of Untulchilamon (which produces many exotic commodities), far from the centre of power of its nominal imperial ruler; Worshippers is set in Dalar Ken Halvar, city of the Silver Emperor - a notably dusty and infertile place with near-exhausted silver mines. Wishstone's protagonist is the callow youth Chegory Guy, an Ebrell Islander. Worshippers' is Asodo Hatch, a middle-aged man of some experience (thanks to the Combat College, experience and systematised knowledge barely any on the planet could hope to match), and a Frangoni - who have been pitted against Ebrell Islanders on the continent of Parengarenga. Chegory Guy struggles to unite with the object of his affections; Asodo Hatch has a wife, several children - and, in time, a mistress. 

Untulchilamon in Wishstone contains the city of Injiltaprajura, beneath which is the ruined spaceship-arcology of the Below; this is unmapped and poorly understood by those in the city above. Dalar Ken Halvar in Worshippers is home to the Combat College, of the same space-faring civilisation as the Below but intact, utterly familiar to many of the main characters and working sort-of as intended. This extends to the alien entities and machine-minds of the Below and the Combat College. 

Wishstone sees a constant confusion, a chaos of multiple moving parts, deceptions, miscommunications, bluffs, feints and ploys (something added to by the many metatextual elements). It's not that clear what Chegory Guy or Justine Thrug (who we may as well treat as the protagonist of Wazir) actually have to do to come out on top. Worshippers sees Asodo Hatch face off against Lupus Lon Oliver to become Instructor of the Combat College; if he can accomplish this - by fair means or foul - he will become basically secure. There's no ships arriving in harbour with parties of questing heroes or false government officials: his opponents are there and effectively obvious from the start.

At the end of Wazir Justina Thrug and many of the main characters leave Untulchilamon. This is sad - exile and flight from somewhere you once had power, from a bustling and prosperous city in the face of imperial power (as wielded by Ardarch III, Mutilator of Yestron - who sounds charming). But Untulchilamon was always a bit crazy - it could be actively unpleasant if you were an Ebrell Islander  - and Justina didn't really manage to improve the place much. Why not try elsewhere? Asodo Hatch wins the day in Worshippers beating out his opponents in the Combat College, subduing the city, curing his wife and even squaring the AI that has somehow maintained the Combat College through the millennia. But he has given up so much to reach that point that exile could well seem the preferable option - at least, for Hatch personally. 

Just as all that suggests, Worshippers may be the bitterest of the Chronicles since Wizards. In some ways, I'm surprised there weren't more Chronicles in this tone. But taking Wishstone and Worshippers together, we have Cook asking us something like this: Comic Defeat or Tragic Victory. The answer is not an easy one.

As in the previous review, I was interested to read Worshippers by reason of comparison with the setting and backstory of Punth: A Primer. Having done so - they're not as similar as all that. The remnant of a space-faring civilisation warps a society to their will in both, but the Worshippers-analog events in Punth happened centuries (perhaps most or all of a millennium) before the Primer was written. It's also noteworthy that the Combat College is following its original purpose  fairly closely, unlike whatever the Qryth are doing by this stage. 

***

The Rage of Party: How Whig Versus Tory Made Modern Britain, George Owers, 2025

A quite recent book detailing English politics in the last decades of the seventeenth century and the first few of the eighteenth. Some of the highlights were familiar (Titus Oates, Marlborough, The Favourite, the Monmouth Rebellion) as were the broad strokes of nonconformist and Anglican, Jacobite and Hanoverian. But frequently histories dance over all this promptly in time for Queen Anne to die or concentrate on the War of the Spanish Succession, so view of the period firmly addressing domestic politics is welcome.

A warning: this is high-middlebrow history, though it still will occasionally drop in a sensationalist line one-line paragraph to round off a chapter or feel it has to define a halberd or refers to 'Carry-On Antics'. Further, whatever the merits of The Rage of Party, it still is making a bid for Relevance, with the introduction discussing the migration of Palatine Germans to England and the Tory bid to end Marlborough's 'Forever War' in Europe (and beyond) set against Whig vows of undying support for their Dutch and German allies. 

But, importantly, it doesn't get stuck in this mode. Whig and Tory swap roles as Optimate and Populare, but this maps poorly onto the present - and, more to the point, Owers provides a goodly number of instances where both sides employ both modes (or are made up of both types, in varying proportions). Other elements feel contemporary without very direct parallels having to be drawn: Defoe's Shortest Way with Dissenters is received as both a genuine and ugly attack on nonconformists and a piece of satire. Addison's Cato is warmly welcomed by both Whig and Tory, and plays to packed and hearty crowds applauding different sections, despite being from the pen of a committed Whig. An assassination attempt is made on Robert Harley, the Earl of Oxford and Tory Chief Minister via a rigged parcel - the Bandbox Plot, 1712 - and because it is privately thwarted, is regarded as a hoax (Jonathan Swift was there, and his private correspondence certainly suggests that it was real, and he was worried). As some of those names suggest, there is a flowering of literary patronage in the period.

The element that gets stressed - rightly - is religion. For all that an acquaintance with the Vicar of Bray will help, The Rage of Party will take you painstakingly through Occasional Conformity Bills and Tackers. The fame of Henry Sacheverell ought to be far better known, as a marker of the power of religion and the strange contortions of popularity and fame. 

I've enjoyed The Rage of Party for it's own sake, but it clearly has a bearing on The Rest of All Possible Worlds. Certainly, Malmery-as-written is fevered by the Rage of Party and hasn't blossomed to what it could be. Religion is less stressed by TRoAPW than it might be, for all that The Majestic Vision has been outlined, as have the Schools of Calliste that Teach It. While the Schools will have their political influence and effects, I suspect that politics in TRoAPW should foreground magical debates over religious ones. 'How dare you tax us so heavily to pay for more mages!' 'The systematic creation of mages divorced from their customary state will result in a tyrannical ruling caste of sorcerer-kings!' 'Magic should be for the people, not the Lords!'

Also, A Tale of A Tub is the equivalent of a Substack composed of equal parts political ranting and esoteric vignettes.

***

In addition to diving into the riddle-games and vasty imagery of Solomon and Saturn, here's an essay on Carolingian Angelology, in which the ranks of the saints blend into the ranks of the angels. There's an obviously fantastical image there, though I wasn't expecting the use of the angelic hierarchy as a tool by the Emperor and the Episcopate. I'd certainly heard of folk saints and Guinefort the Holy Greyhound and so forth, but I'd taken it that the proper replacement was an approved sacred virgin or apostle or something - to say nothing of 'Angels in the guise of Martyrs'.

***

I read (and approved of) Queen Mab's Palace, as well as several rather different forms of space travel.

...and speaking of Medieval space travel, this post somewhat resembles my own Faufreluches, categorising and cataloguing the Dying Earth subgenre. You will likely want to pick holes in some of it, though a line between The Night Land and Viriconium is sensible. One question being: Is Yoon-Suin Dying Earth? Certainly, Viriconium and The Book of the New Sun are in its Appendix N. But I'd argue that there is a mild but telling difference between a world where deeds and actions will be swallowed by the death of all (and many deeds and actions have already gone before) and a world where all deeds and actions will be swallowed by growth and fecundity and the weight of a thousand cycles of this in ages past.  

***

The Troy Book of John Lydgate, partially employed in my last post, also has a long section on armour as the Trojans arm for battle: Book III, line 40 or so onwards.

W[h]ere alle þe worþi noble werriours 

Of Troye toun to-gydre assemblid be, 

And many oþer to be-holde and se 

Þe famus knyȝtes arme hem in þat place.

And some of hem gan ful streite lace

Her doublettis made of lyne cloth,

A certeyn fold þat a-boute hem goth;

And some also dempte most surest

To armen hem for bataille of arest,

And dide on firste, aftir her desires,

Sabatouns, grevis, cusschewis, and voideris—

A peire breke, aldirfirst, of maille;

And some þer wer eke þat nolde faille

To han of maille eke a peir[e] bras,

And þer-with-al, as þe custom was,

A peir Gussetis on a petycote,

Garnyssched with gold vp on-to the þrote,

A paunce of plate, whiche of þe silf be-hinde

Was schet and clos, and þer-on, as I finde,

Enviroun was a bordure of smal maille. 

Like Chaucer, his near-contemporary, try reading it aloud (treat yogh - ȝ - as Y and thorn - þ - as Th: Þe famus knyȝtes arme hem in þat place -> The famous knights arm them in that place). 

So we see armour: 'Sabatons, greaves, cuisses and voiders'; a pair of breeches, made of chainmail. 

Choices of armour vary:

some wold armyd be more liȝt

In þikke Iackys curid with satyn;  

'rather be clad in a thick jack cured with satin'.

As do choices of weapons:

To welde hym wel, whan þat he schal fiȝt.

And some wiln han a target or a spere,

And some a pavis, his body for to were,

And some a targe, makyd strong to laste;

And some wil haue dartes for to caste,

Some a pollex, heueded of fyn stele....

A target shield, a spear, a pavise, darts, poleaxes..... 

And some a swerd his enemy for to mete.

And some wil haue a bow for to schete,

Somme an arblast, to stonden out a-syde;

And some on fote and some for to ride

Arraie hem silf, her fomen for to assaile;

Lydgate has no special knowledge of arms and armour, and openly proclaims it, suggesting that you may correct it as you prefer. This is not a technique likely to impress your PhD supervisor, but it's honest and interesting here.

I haue no konnyng euery þing to telle,

And vn-to ȝow it were to long to dwelle—

Where I faile, ȝe mote haue me excusid;

For in swiche crafte I am litel vsid,

And ignoraunce doþe my penne lette,

In her ordre my termys for to sette.

And oft chaungeth swiche harneis & devis;

And ȝe þat ben þer-in experte & wys,

Disdeyneth nat þat I speke in þis place

Of her armyng: for al is in ȝour grace,

Riȝt at ȝour luste to correcte euerydel.

An abridged and annotated version of the Troy Book is here; the arms and armour segment above is here.

***

Khartoum, dir. Basil Dearden, 1966

This is not a very good film, while being a lavishly-funded epic; bad for different reasons than B-Movie blood and guts. It details the 1884-85 siege of Khartoum, and the conflict between General Gordon (Chinese Gordon, Gordon of Khartoum) and the religious leader Muhammad Ahmad bin Abdullah bin Fahal, known as the Mahdi. I've made no focused study of Gordon, but had encountered some of his life, his intransigence, his drive and notable Christian faith. Even setting aside his spectacular death, I suspect that the biographers would be making hay of him in any event. Obviously, do some reading of your own on the Mahdist War. (You may find a detailed summary of the film here).

To get one thing out of the way first: Laurence Olivier plays the Mahdi in brownface, adopting a silly high-pitched accent. This look unnatural against everybody else and doesn't work very well, but otherwise isn't that interesting (other than that it's a real contrast with more contemporary portrayals of Islamic revolts, and for every nineteen reviews that fulminate against it, you can find one that quite likes Olivier).

Gordon is played by Charlton Heston, with what I think is something of a cowboy affect. His defence of Khartoum has a touch of 'defend the frontier town' about it - though the film is quite clear that Khartoum is an old city, with a mixed population of Sudanese, Egyptians and Europeans. He is introduced on a train, which feels a rather Western touch (if without any Colonel Mortimer shenanigans) and later rides out alone into the desert to confront the Mahdi before the siege begins. His personal bravery, strict moral code and quiet defiance of Gladstone et al adds to this. But maybe I'm just reading back from an actor's biography. (Though actually, a Western transplanted to the Sudan might be interesting...)

The film (shot in Panavision) looks a bit sad in places. There's some good wide scenes of battle and fury and armies, though often there's a sad-looking insert with a backdrop for Charlton Heston; these scream 'Charlton didn't want to sit around in the desert'. The soundtrack is often quite what you'd expect, though there's a quote from 'Highland Laddie' that works as a sort of 'Anthem for Doomed Youth' with its contrast of youthly vigour and splendour - and a doomed expedition. To say nothing of the Scottish connection between 'Highland Laddie' and Gordon (as in Highlanders) himself.

The elephant in the room is Lawrence of Arabia, the dialogue of which references Gordon directly. They're trying to capture some of the same magic, but it's not as spectacular, not as impassioned. It lines up very nicely in some ways: the imperial ambitions, the desert war in an Islamic culture, the driven and eccentric protagonist clashing with his political masters. Gladstone and his ministers make multiple appearances, unlike in Lawrence - which drains something from the desert setting, and spells things out in a way that Lawrence didn't do so bluntly with Allenby and Dryden; although in fairness, the tangle of British involvement in the Sudan probably required a little more background for audiences than the First World War. Further, Gordon as an experienced colonial administrator and general can't well be compared to the callow lieutenant Lawrence. The brief, clumsy narration at the start of Khartoum is far vaguer and emptier than the reflections on Lawrence's life at his funeral. 

But there are the lines of a better story, with an often clumsy execution. Gordon's ruthless pre-film efforts to eliminate slave trade and bring peace to the Sudan have produced death and disruption, as the Mahdi notes - and cost him local allies. In theory, this ought to be a contrast of similar personalities: two messianic, highly successful, fanatical warlords, and how their respective cultures treat them. What if both sides had a Lawrence? What if both sides had a Kwasitz Haderach?  

(In theory, this is Feyd-Ruatha. But he's riding on the Baron's coat-tails - and while the Dennis Villeneuve film nods at his popularity, the freakiness of the arena scene, his blatant viciousness and the Nuremburg-like processions distract from this and imply something different with the propaganda spectacles. His moments of military competence are there, but it's never clear that he could found an empire or play the game of imperial politics. Cf. this assessment.)

But, alas, Heston's Gordon is somewhat too heroic; his popularity with the British public is never quite apparent enough to contrast with the Mahdi's dervishes and his clashes with Gladstone's representatives and the delays of Wolsey's forces don't have a good contrast in the Mahdi's ranks. Admittedly, this would have made the film longer and more complex, but if you are going to set yourself up as another Lawrence, such a thing is inevitable. 

Anyway, don't expect to be amazed - but do contemplate giving it a watch. Per one interview, it's a guilty pleasure of Martin Scorcese. And it was enough to make me write all that.