This bit of beautiful, lyrical, poetic prose was originally
published by Lord Dunsany in 1924. The
plot is quite simple. The characters are
simple as well, mostly filling particular roles. It couples and contrasts human ways with
entirely alien Elf ways.
The local Parliament of Erl decides it would be good for the
town to have a lord that is just a bit magical.
The local lord sends his son Alveric to bring the Princess of Elfland,
Lirazel. He succeeds with the help of a
witch. When the princess is brought back
to the human fields the priest has some difficulty identifying an appropriate
wedding ceremony and Alveric becomes the Lord of Erl. They have a son, Orion, and the witch is
appointed the nursery maid. Then her
father sends a Rune to return his daughter to Elfland. The priest’s difficulty is only the first as Lirazel
mostly doesn’t adjust to human ways.
Lirazel is returned to Elfland. Alveric goes on a quest in search of Lirazel
and Elfland, abandoning his duties as Lord of Erl. Orion grows up and spends most of his time in
hunting. Orion catches and kills a
unicorn, in a mildly graphic scene. The
members of parliament are satisfied with this level of magic. Orion, however, wants to hunt more
unicorns. In order to do this he
recruits trolls to help manage the dogs.
A troll recruits will o’ the wisps to provide light for hunts during
pitch black nights. The members of
parliament are distraught at the town being swamped with magic. They ask the witch for a spell against magic
and are told off. The King of Elfland
uses another Rune to answer Lirazel’s prayers.
This brings Alveric and Orion into Elfland, which incidentally draws the
magic, and a little bit of Erl’s fields, back to Elfland.
I enjoyed this book tremendously for the lovely
flowing language and the beautiful otherness of Elfland. Having said that this isn’t a modern story
and it is very much not a swords and sorcery tale. The plot is simple and lacks twists. The characters are flat and mostly don’t change. When they do, it is a transformation into
another flat role. It felt less like a
novel and more like a spell calling, “Come away oh human child…” Some are caught by that beauty while others
just aren’t.
