2022/25: The Hollowing -- Robert Holdstock

So much of myth, so much of legend, so much of it is turned around deeds of heroism, and bravery, and revenge, and war … and it all comes down to one thing: death. Violent death. [p.156]

I think I probably read this when it first came out in the early 1990s, and I think it may have been the point at which I began to lose my love of the series. In Mythago Wood and Lavondyss, the mythagos are focii of fascination, objects of desire and curiosity, living fossils of ancient myth. Here they are entities to be warded against: "The station is surrounded by an electronic barrier that repels most mythagos, but also by more traditional warding methods: scarecrows, masks, shields and weapons hung from trees, totem poles. Anything that works." And the focus is on the humans who are, for various reasons, researching or pursuing mythagos. Lacan is a Frenchman who fell in love with a mythago: Helen Silverlock, who reminds protagonist Richard Bradley of 'Cher from the pop duo Sonny and Cher' and who is trying to find a trickster: Alexander Lytton, obsessed with Huxley whose notes and diaries revealed the existence of mythagos in Ryhope Wood; and Richard himself, who is trying to find the son he believed dead. Alex Bradley has created mythagos of his own, and is hiding in a fabulous ruined cathedral, pursued by the 'giggler' who preys on other mythagos.

In this version of the story, Tallis Keeton (of Lavondyss) never comes home and her father dies lost and mad. (Her mother? Who knows? The women in this story get short shrift.) In this version of the story, heroes become monsters (Holdstock's Jason is especially repellant) and there is less wonder, little magic. Instead, the wood feels grim and mean. Is this because of Richard's shortcomings as a protagonist? I did not care for him at all, even before he revealed himself as sexist, racist, and irresponsible.

I think what I found in the earlier novels, and what I missed in this one, was the sense of deep time, the hidden origins of myth. This feels more like a war against those myths -- and the myths embodied here are more familar, more evolved. Gawain and the Green Knight; Jason and the Argonauts; the Tower of Babel. Do I want to continue with the series? Maybe not just yet.

Petty gripe du jour: a schoolboy in the late 1950s / early 1960s would not be eating a Lion bar, as they were only launched in 1976.