A Voyage to Arcturus
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| Author | David Lindsay |
|---|---|
| Country | England |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Fantasy novel, Philosophical, Science fiction |
| Publisher | Methuen & Co. Ltd. |
| Released | 1920 |
| Media Type | Print (Hardcover and Paperback) |
| Pages | 303 pp (first edition hardcover) |
| ISBN | N/A |
| Followed by | The Flight to Lucifer |
A Voyage to Arcturus is a novel by the Scottish writer David Lindsay. First published in 1920, it combines fantasy, philosophy and science fiction in an exploration of the nature of good and evil and their relationship with existence. It has been described by the critic and philosopher Colin Wilson as the "greatest novel of the twentieth century"[1] and was a central influence on C.S. Lewis's Space Trilogy.
Contents |
[edit] Plot Synopsis
The novel has very little, if anything at all, of science fiction. An interstellar voyage is depicted solely to provide a mostly superficial and perfunctory framework to the narration. The book was written at a time when it was no longer possible to conceive strange lands in the antipodes (as in Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels, or in Thomas More's Utopia), and so these have to be set at Tormance, an imaginary planet orbiting Arcturus, which, in the novel (but not in reality), is a double star consisting of stars Branchspell and Alppain. (The choice may have been inspired by the nonfictional A Voyage to the Arctic in the Whaler Aurora published in 1911 by an identically-named David Moore Lindsay.) The lands are used to represent philosophical systems, or states of mind, through which the main character, Maskull, passes on his search for the meaning of life.
Maskull is depicted as a man longing for adventures, who accepts an invitation from Krag, an acquaintance of his friend Nightspore, to travel to Tormance. The three set off from an abandoned observatory in Scotland but Maskull finds himself alone in Tormance. In every land he passes through he usually meets only one or two persons; these meetings often (though not always) end in the death of those he meets. He learns of his impending death, meets Krag again, and dies shortly after learning that he is Nightspore himself. The book concludes with a final revelation from Krag (who reveals himself as being know on Earth as «pain») to Nightspore about the origin of the Universe.
All characters and lands are types used to convey the author's critique of several philosophical systems. (That is why the inhabitants of Tormance are so few; they suffice to make the point they are intended for.) The author turns out to support a variation of the doctrine of the Demiurge, somewhat similar to that defended by some Gnostics.
[edit] Contents by chapter
Chapter 1 - The Seance A séance is organised to which someone invites two recent acquaintances, Maskull and Nightspore. Their late arrival is marked by a «supernatural» noise. The medium causes a smiling man to materialise. Krag arrives uninvited, kills the apparition, and calls Maskull and Nightspore (with whom he was acquainted) to the street.
Chapter 2 - In the Street Krag invites Maskull and Nightspore to come to Tormance, a planet orbiting Arcturus, whnce the apparition comes. Maskull disbelieves the proposal as a joke but accepts it when Krag shows him with a small but heavy and potent pocket telescope that Arcturus consists of two suns. Upon a question from Nightspore, Krag says that Surtur (unknown to Maskull) went ahead and they must go to follow him.
Chapter 3 - Starkness Maskull and Nightspore arrive on foot (after travelling by train) on the Scottish observatory of Starkness, where Krag was to meet them. The observatory is abandoned. Two bottles are found with «Solar back rays» and «Arcturian back rays». The first, unfastened, flies back to the sun because of the light rays trapped within.
Chapter 4 - The Voice Nightspore leads Maskull to a spot in the shore some miles off where a sort of a drumbeating is heard, and tells him that if he hears it again he is to 'try always to hear it more and more distinctly'. Maskull attempts to climb the observatory tower but is unable to go beyond the first of the seven stories because of the heavy gravity. From the window he sees Arcturus again. He hears a voice saying that he is but an instrument and though he will go in the voyage, only Nightspore will return.
Chapter 5 - The Night of Departure Nightspore says gravity in the tower in Tormance's and that Maskull will find death in Tormance. Krag arrives, causes Maskull and Nightspore to support Tormance's gravity by spitting on a cut in their arms, and the three climb the tower whose windows no longer magnify. They depart naked in a 'torpedo of crystal' moved by Arcturian back rays. During the 19 hour voyage, Maskull sleeps.
[edit] Maskull's first day in Tormance
Chapter 6 - Joiwind Maskull awakes alone in a desert in Tormance and finds that he has new organs in his body, such as a tentacle stemming from the heart. A woman comes to him and exchanges blood with him (making it easier for him to live in Tormance, and harder for her), and says: that she is called Joiwind, her husband Panawe, and live to the North in Poolingdred; that she undersdtands his speech thanks to a forehead organ that reads minds; that Surtur is called Shaping, or Crystalman, and created everything (she also implicitly says that he is God); that they do not eat, out of respect for living things, but drink gnawable water; that there are five primary colours in Tormance, blue, yellow, red, ulfire, and jale; that the tentacle is used to increase love for other creatures. While journeying home they adore Shaping in a shrine and upon arriving meet Panawe.
Chapter 7 - Panawe Panawe suggests that Maskull may be «a man (...) who stole something from the Maker of the universe, in order to ennoble his fellow creatures». He says that life in Tormance has many different formas because the planet is still new, that human beings resemble earthlings because «all creatures that resemble Shaping must of necessity resemble one another», and that Alppain is visible only to the North. Panawe tells his story to Maskull; he travelled in the Wombflash forest (from where he saw Swaylone's island), Ifdawn Marest, and Poolingdred.
Chapter 8 - The Lusion Plain Maskull sets out to further explore Tormance and gets to the Lusion Plain, where he meets a man.
- "Maskull, look well at me. Who am I?"
- "I think you are Shaping."
- "I am Surtur."
He asserts the beauty of his world, claims Maskull is there to serve him, and disappears. Maskull proceeds and meets a woman, Oceaxe, from Ifdawn, who instead of a tentacle has a third arm. She is rude, shows interest in having him as lover, and gives him a stone to convert his tentacle into a third arm.
[edit] Maskull's second day in Tormance
Chapter 9 - Oceaxe Maskull wakes up having the third arm, that causes lust for what is touched. He travels to Ifdawn with Oceaxe, who wants Maskull to kill one of her husbands, Crimtyphon, and take his place. Maskull finds that revolting, but does kill Crimtyphon when he sees him using his will to force Sature to become a tree.
Chapter 10 - Tydomin Tydomin, another wife of Crimtyphon's, shows up and uses her will to force Oceaxe to suicide and Maskull to follow her to her home in Disscourn, where she will take possession of his body. On the way they find Joiwind's brother Digrung who says he will tell her all; to prevent this, and incited by Tydomin, Maskull absorbs him, leaving his corpse behind. At Tydomin's, he goes out of his body to become the apparition of the séance where he met Krag, but when he is killed he goes back to his body before Tydomin could possess it, and awakes free of her mental power.
Chapter 11 - On Disscourn Maskull takes Tydomin to Sant, to kill her. In Sant no women are allowed; only men who go to follow Hator's doctrine. On the way they meet Spadevil, who proposes to reform Sant ammending Hator's teaching with the notion of duty. He turns Maskull and Tydomin into his followers getting them two forehead organs.
Chapter 12 - Spadevil Catice, the guardian of Hator's doctrine in Sant, who has only one forehead organ, cuts one of Maskull's, to test Spadevil's arguments. Maskull accepts Hator's ideas and kills Spadevil and Tydomin. Catice says he will leave Sant to meditate on Spadevil's arguments, claims that Shaping is not Surtur, and sends Maskull away to the Wombflash Forest, in search of Muspel, our home.
[edit] Maskull's third day in Tormance
Chapter 13 - The Wombflash Forest Maskull awakes in the Wombflash Forest with a third eye as his only foreign organ, hears the drumbeat, follows it, and meets Dreamsinter, who tells him that it was Nightspore who Surtur brought to Tormance and that he, Maskull, is wanted to steal Muspell-light. Maskull then sees a vision where Krag kills him while Nightspore follows to a light, and faints.
Chapter 14 - Polecrab Maskull awakes again and proceeds to the shore of the Sinking Sea (whence Swaylone's Island is seen), where he meets Polecrab, a fisherman, married to Gleameil.
Chapter 15 - Swaylone's Island Maskull goes to Swaylone's Island, where Earthrid plays a musical instrument called Irontick by night, and from where no one who heard it ever returned, together with Gleameil, who is ready to leave her family because of the attraction of the music. Earthrid warns Gleameil that the music he plays may kill her, but she stays and dies. Maskull then plays Irontick; Earthrid dies and Swaylone's Island is destroyed.
[edit] Maskull's fourth day in Tormance
Chapter 16 - Leehallfae Maskull crosses the sea on a tree and reaches Matterplay, where living beings sprout and disappear before his eyes. He goes up a stream and meets Leehallfae, a human being neither man or woman, but of a third sex, who is looking for the underground country of Threal, where Shaping is to be found.
Chapter 17 - Corpang They reach Threal by entering a cave and Leehallfae dies. Corpang appears and says this is because Threal is not Shaping's world, but Thire's, Thire being, together with Shaping and Amfuse, the authors of three worlds of existence, relation and feeling. Corpang came to Threal to follow Thire, and leads Maskull to three statues of these divinities. There Maskull has a vision of their power, hears a voice saying he is to die in a few hours, and then the statues are seen with faces like a corpse's. Realising that he had been following false gods, Corpang follows Maskull to Lichstorm, whence he hears the drum beats.
Chapter 18 - Haunte Maskull and Corpang meet Haunte, a hunter who travels in a boat that flies thanks to masculine stones that repeal earth's feminility. He takes them to Sullenbode, a faceless woman that acquires facial features from a man, killing him in the process. Haunte dies in this wise.
Chapter 19 - Sullenbode Maskull desires Sullenbode and she desires him, thereby becoming alive permanently (without killing him) as long as he loves her. Maskull, Sullenbode and Corpang proceed in a direction to which someone looking for Muspell once went, but Corpang goes eagerly ahead, and Maskull stops when he has a vision of Muspell-light. Having lost interest in Sullenbode for a moment, she dies.
[edit] Maskull's fifth day in Tormance
Chapter 20 - Barey Maskull proceeds to Barey where he meets Krag again, and then Gangnet, who defends Shaping and his creation. Since Gangnet is unable to send Krag away, they travel together to the ocean and then take to the sea in a raft. When Alppain rises, Maskull seens in a vision Krag causing the drum beat by beating his heart, and Gangnet, who is Shaping, dying with Muspell-fire. Back to the raft, Krag tells him he is Nightspore, and he dies.
Chapter 21 - Muspel Krag and Nightspore arrive at Muspell, where there is a tower similar to that in Starkness. From the windows of its several stories Nightspore sees that Shaping uses what comes from Muspell to create the world for his sole pleasure, thus preventing that Muspell matter from going back to its source as it would, and thereby causing suffering. Krag acknowledges that he is Surtur and is known on Earth as pain. Nightspore goes back with him to reincarnate and spread knowledge about Surtur, Shaping, and Muspell.
[edit] Geography of Tormance
No systematic effort to establish a geography of Tormance is ever found. Maskull travels from South to North and the lands he passes through seem to be the only possible choice, since he never stops to wonder in which direction he will go next.
[edit] Names
Just like nearly everything else in this book, names of characters and places are symbolic. Meanings and significations are subject to dispute.
| Characters | ||
|---|---|---|
| Name | Origin | Comments |
| Maskull | muscle, skull, masculine | |
| Nightspore | night, spore | |
| Krag | crag | |
| Shaping | shape | |
| Joiwind | joy, wind | |
| Panawe | pan- (greek prefix meaning 'all'), awe | Panawe is someone to whom all life inspires awe. |
| Slofork | fork | |
| Broodviol | ||
| Muremaker | maker | |
| Nuclamp | clamp | |
| Oceaxe | ocean, axe | |
| Sullenbode | sullen, bode | |
| Crimtyphon | crime, Typhon | Crimtyphon is depicted as having criminal tendencies. |
| Sature | saturation | |
| Tydomin | dominate | Tydomin uses her will to dominate Oceaxe and, for a while, Maskull. |
| Digrung | ||
| Spadevil | spade, evil, devil | |
| Hator | hater | Hator hated pleasure. |
| Maulger | ||
| Catice | ||
| Dreamsinter | Dreams, inter (Latin for 'between') | Maskull encounters dreamsinter "between dreams", in a brief dream-vision sequence in the Wombflash Forest. |
| Polecrab | pole, crab | |
| Arg | ||
| Gleameil | gleam | |
| Earthrid | Earth, ride | |
| Leehallfae | ||
| Faceny | face | |
| Amfuse | ||
| Thire | ||
| Haunte | hunter | |
| Lodd | ||
| Gangnet | net | |
| Places | ||
| Name | Origin | Comments |
| Starkness | start, darkness | When Maskull begins his journey, he is in darkness. |
| Tormance | torments, romance | |
| Branchspell | branch, spell | |
| Alppain | all, pain | |
| Poolingdred | dread | |
| Ifdawn Marest | if, dawn, forest | |
| Lusion Plain | plain, illusion | According to the book, it is an illusion to think that the creator (Shaping) is God (Surtur). |
| Sant | ||
| Wombflash Forest | womb, flash, flesh | |
| Muspel | spell | |
| Sinking Sea | ||
| Swaylone's Island | ||
| Teargeld | tear | |
| Matterplay | matter, play | |
| Threal | three, real | |
| Lichstorm | light, storm | |
| Sarclash | ||
| Adage | ||
| Mornstab Pass | morning, stab | At dawn, Maskull suffers a loss here when Sullenbode dies. |
| Things | ||
| Name | Origin | Comments |
| breve | ||
| poign | poignant | |
| magn | magnitude | |
| sorb | absorb | |
| drude | ||
| probe | probe | |
| trifork | three, fork | |
| Irontick | iron | |
| phaen | ||
[edit] Adaptations and Sequels by Others
The famous critic Harold Bloom, in his only attempt at fiction writing, wrote a sequel to this novel, entitled The Flight to Lucifer. Bloom has since disowned the book and will not associate his name with the novel.
Student filmmakers created a 71-minute film adaptation of the novel in 1970.[2] The film, unavailable for many years, was independently restored, re-edited and color-enhanced[3] to be redistributed on DVD-R in 2005.[4]
Jazz composer Ron Thomas recorded a concept album inspired by the novel in 2001 entitled "Scenes from a Voyage to Arcturus".[5] Music from the album is featured in the 2005 restoration of the 1970 student film.
[edit] External links
- A Voyage to Arcturus — on-line edition
- A Voyage to Arcturus — Project Gutenberg e-text
- Trailer for the 1970 student film from CustomFlix
- A review of the 1970 student film from mysticalmovieguide.com
