Mervyn Peake, Gormenghast

G. Peter Winnington (Université de Lausanne)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.09: English Writing and Culture: Postwar and Contemporary Britain , 1945-present.
Vol. editors: Gina Lyle (University of Glasgow), Graham MacPhee (University of Manchester), Kerry Myler (Birmingham Newman University), Jenni Ramone (The Nottingham Trent University)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1950

Places

China (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

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Written on Sark, where Peake went to live in the immediate postwar years,

Gormenghast

takes up the story of

Titus Groan

at the age of seven. Brought up in a community that ignores the rest of the world, he plays truant one day and rides his pony out beyond the walls. When he looks back from a crest and sees his castle home from a distance, he gains a whole new perspective on his life. Shortly after, he enters a forest and glimpses a sculpturesque girl, seemingly floating from branch to branch above him. It is the bastard daughter of his wet nurse, Keda, known as “the Thing”. Cast off by her people, she has run wild. The sight of her “explodes at the very centre of his conventions” and he becomes “haunted by the thought of this other kind of world which was able to exist without…

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615 words

Citation: Winnington, G. Peter. "Gormenghast". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 31 May 2006 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=4905, accessed 25 April 2024.]

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