John Crowley: Little Big

[ions]

Here is the review I wrote and posted over at Palimpsest and The Fictional Woods of Crowley's Little, Big:

It was the place all young hopes go when they have become old and we no longer feel them; the place where beginnings go when endings have come, and then themselves passed.

Something to keep in mind when reading my raving of Little, Big is that I was lucky enough to come across this book at just the right moment in life where it would have a significant impact on me. The subject matter of it and how I looked at and now look at my life resonated very strongly. Thus my enthusiasm may exceed those of others and I do not wish to over-hype this work making it a victim of inaccessible expectations. But, that said, even if I try and look at this book without the emotional impact creating bias I still think this is a fantastic work. What I like most about Little, Big is the humanity of it, the wisdom. Like I said above it just may have been timing but this book may not change my life but it has, at least still has to this point, changed the way I look at a few things in life. I'm not going to bother with a synopsis for a few reasons; one I don't really feel like writing one out and two is others have posted above that they've encountered spoilers regarding the work already and I have no desire to make that any worse. three, I'm coming to the conclusion that a plot is inconsequential in the hands of truly great writers.

Little, Big has perhaps the most apt title of any novel I've ever read. Little is not to be taken pejoratively at any point in the novel. It comes first in fact. Big things happen in Little events. A Tale is only Big because of all the Little components. Each major character plays a Little part, not that any of the main characters are not just that, main characters, but are a Big part of the Tale. It's a Fantasy novel in a Little way yet magic is a Big part even though magic plays such a Little role. Big events are handled delicately but the action is never muted. There are Little stylistic nuances that collectively have a Big effect on the novel. Capitalizations, the impetus for my capitalizations in this mini review (don't worry, Crowley is far more adept with it than I am), and section titles, even Little drawings here and there are Little things that add to the Bigness of the book. I would love, LOVE, to get a hold of the special illustrated edition of this novel but it's just too far out of my price range. And of course there are the parts of the plot that play with Little then Big.

Crowley is a readers writer. His passion for reading is evident in a few ways, sometimes even blatantly. There are more than a few passages which capture love, wonder and magic in little ways that have such a big impact. Here are a handful of what I have written down from this immensely quotable novel.

If you know how to read the World of Books is open to you, after all; and if you like to read, you'll read. If you don't you'll forget whatever anybody makes you read anyway.

But this passion for Tale spinning is also displayed in other Little ways. There's that word again. Books are a part of this story, or maybe more precisely, the art of telling stories is a part of this story. A Big part. Shown in a myriad of Little ways.

This novel is as much love story as it is a Fantasy. As much say as Anna Karenina is a love story.

Love wasn't kind, not always; a corrosive thing, it burned away kindness as it burned away grief. They were infants now in power, he and she, but they would grow; their quarrels would darken the moon and scatter the frightened wild things like autumn gales, would do so, had long done so, it didn't matter.

There was after all no mystery in the end of love, no mystery but the mystery of love itself, which was large certainly but as real as grass, as natural and unaccountable as bloom and branch and their growth.

The real wonder of the novel for me was how all the Little parts described the Bigness of life. Of Time passing. Time crawling in Little steps for some yet taking Big strides for others at the very same time. Chance and Fate. Acceptance and control. Love and Losing Love. All the Little things that make life such a Big thing.

Looking at the review roughly two months later this book still has an impact on me. Absolutely beautiful. I will get to more Crowley but I'm almost afraid to as if one of his lesser books would somehow tarnish my image of Little, Big. I do own Lord Byron's Novel though.

There's a big lovefest for Crowley at The Fictional Woods.

[nnyhav]

He blogs, you know (and Silversary edition of L,B coming in September) ...
but then, so do I: Yr humb & obed serv on Little, Big & Lord Byron's Novel.

Earlier (15.1.07), on his short story collection Novelties & Souvenirs:

... worldly intrusions into my reading are not particularly novel, catching chancy connections on my train of thought, however freighted ...
"P[oe] is the most heavyhanded of writers, even when trying to be whimsical (eg. 'Angel of the Odd')."
-- C.Roth comments in [prior post].

Yes, but ... such whimsy proves the rule:
"'After quitting this coast, the beast continued his voyage until we met with a land in which the nature of things seemed reversed -- for we here saw a great lake, at the bottom of which, more than a hundred feet beneath the surface of the water, there flourished in full leaf a forest of tall and luxuriant trees.'"*
* In the year 1790, in the Caraccas during an earthquake a portion of the granite soil sank and left a lake eight hundred yards in diameter, and from eighty to a hundred feet deep. It was a part of the forest of Aripao which sank, and the trees remained green for several months under the water." -- Murray, p. 221
-- The 1002nd Tale of Scheherazade

"It might even begin with a forest in the sea: huge trees like American redwoods, with their roots in the black benthos, and their leaves moving slowly in the blue currents overhead. There it might end as well."
-- John Crowley, "Great Work of Time", in Novelties and Souvenirs (Thanks for the pointer, Mr Waggish. The title refers to Marvell [Horatian Ode]; I'd meant to remark on the stanzaic structural similarity of Auden's September 1, 1939 to The Garden ...)

18.1 addendum: ... or not end [via WSJ blog 17.1]:
"Underwater logging is possible because many submerged trees and logs are barely affected by their decades of submersion. Lake and river water is often too cold and too deficient in oxygen for decay organisms to survive. [...] Studies of logs raised from Lake Superior show slight color changes, but 'the properties are virtually the same as modern timber,' [...] And although sugars have leached from the Lake Superior logs, this effectively seasons the wood, making it highly desirable for use in musical instruments." Timbre!