(I finally actually remembered that I needed to respond to this comment while actually at a computer. It's been that sort of week. *facepalm*)
I definitely see the Potterkids-are-adult-forces-puppets thing, but I'm not sure how Magicians does it better, considering every interesting development in Quentin's life is engineered by Jane... or is that the point? That it's explicit?
Though that reminds me that a big part of my annoyance with the book might be the fact that I found Quentin progressively more and more disappointing as a protagonist as the story went on, and then in the last fifty pages HOMG JANE, with her eternal struggle and everything she's sacrificed and I wanted to know all about that so badly the instant it's revealed; so badly that I was really irritated that I'd just spent 400 pages not reading about her.
Thinking about it more, I would be interested in knowing/reading more about Eliot. He is interesting, complex, sort of more at home in his self-destruction, though maybe I just think he's more interesting because Quentin's been blocking the view of his flaws. In any case, I was thinking that if the second book focused more on him, I might be interested, but I'm really not sure I could cope with more of Quentin. Unless he really has actually learned, internalised, adapted from his experiences. It's really not clear from the end of the first book whether or not he has.
Michael and I were talking about the book last night (it came up on the better book titles tumblr as "Harry Potter Says Motherfucker" which is not entirely right but is a good pithy description).
Anyway, yes, I would say that Quentin is exactly like Harry in that he bumbles along through a lot of things, pushed by external forces, and not in a charming kind of way. Similarly, when Harry and Hermione and Ron screw up, it's cute and Hermione gets cat fur or they go to the hospital wing or whatever. When Quentin & co screw up, people die, and it's not cute and charming. I have friends who don't like serial mysteries they describe as "cozies" and I've always kind of understood what they meant, but this is the first time I've internalized the difference between a cozy an a non-cozy.
To me it's clear by the end of the second book that Quentin has internalized some things, but I don't know if he's consciously learned them. He makes the right decision and I'm not sure it's for the "right" reasons. But a good portion of the second book focuses on Julia and magicians outside the Brakebills system, and that's pretty great. I'm really looking forward to book 3.
Ahhh, yes, ok, that's an excellent point about the "coziness" of HP. Though I wonder if it's a little apples-and-oranges with something written for children (not even for young adults, where there's a trend of anti-cozy tough-knocks, but for kids) and something obviously not. Then again, I have always had little tolerance for the "but it's written for kids" argument when I'm eviscerating, say, the first two Narnia books. On the other other hand, the background coziness in HP is somewhat balanced out (for me) by the presence of directed antipathy. As in: you need (especially for children) to have safe space when people are actually out to get you. But in Magicians, the natural predator of the wizard appears to be ennui - which should make the background-menace element the balance, but now that I'm thinking about it, while there were a couple of mammoth, deadly fuck-ups, I never got the idea that they tempered general behaviour with caution. They talk a lot about magic being dangerous, but don't approach it with respect or caution. Our heroes still gaily (and drunkenly) tried ridiculous magic with minimal preparation, no apparent considerations of safety, and rare consequences. (The consequences appear in stories, which don't seat them in the real world of the narrative for me because a) not seeing them happen, neither us nor the characters, and b) there's a pinch of "urban legend" salt, for both us and the characters.) Sure, after the Beast, Quentin never plays another prank on a teacher (though that's not explicitly delivered, it's just an absence) but he still, say, fucks off to the moon, fails, and returns with nothing worse than sunburn. I think it was stated that he could die on the Antartic trek, but I never really felt, in the reading, that he could. (Possibly because there are no previous instances of it happening.)
Long paragraph is loooong. This is what happens when I type as I think, whoops.
I guess the actual short, root-causes summary of what I'm blathering about here is: the Magicians is decidedly, ruthlessly, extremely more realistic. But I don't actually think genuine realism makes for a good story, and I read for good story - which is possibly why I read almost exclusively fantasy. :)
the natural predator of the wizard appears to be ennui
The comparison I never see made in discussions, while we're talking about childish myth-cycles incorporated into Grossman, is Star Wars. Grossman would have seen SW at a magic age (as I did) and I don't think he could have written this book without it influencing him. All of which is a long leadup to saying the magicians are fundamentally Jedi. Their enemy is less ennui than themselves and their ability to fuck things up, which makes intuitive sense of why Quentin is such a fuckup and why they never really learn to be cautious.
(I didn't feel that way at all about the Antartic quest, FWIW. Which is different to Potter in that I never felt like Harry was in real danger, for all that JKR got all GRRM on the supporting cast in book 7, with GRRM meaning arbitrary and pointless. Like it or not about Sirius, that's a pointful death from the story POV, but the random killing people just because isn't necessarily that great.)
I don't think the Magicians is realistic at all, for all that it's not-cozy. I think it's actually a better story than Potter overall, which is obviously a YMMV thing. But Potter is not the standard I would hold up for fantasy storytelling either, even apart from it being a kid's story (it's not just simple, it's hackneyed). I don't know that I'd say Magicians has a great plot but I adored the overall package even when I felt like I could pick at some of the elements (as opposed to say, Gail Carriger, where I thought the first one was adorable in a hodgepodgey way but she really started leaving me cold later).
ETA: I CAN close my parentheses, dammit! They may nest and breed if I'm not careful.
I definitely see the Potterkids-are-adult-forces-puppets thing, but I'm not sure how Magicians does it better, considering every interesting development in Quentin's life is engineered by Jane... or is that the point? That it's explicit?
Though that reminds me that a big part of my annoyance with the book might be the fact that I found Quentin progressively more and more disappointing as a protagonist as the story went on, and then in the last fifty pages HOMG JANE, with her eternal struggle and everything she's sacrificed and I wanted to know all about that so badly the instant it's revealed; so badly that I was really irritated that I'd just spent 400 pages not reading about her.
Thinking about it more, I would be interested in knowing/reading more about Eliot. He is interesting, complex, sort of more at home in his self-destruction, though maybe I just think he's more interesting because Quentin's been blocking the view of his flaws. In any case, I was thinking that if the second book focused more on him, I might be interested, but I'm really not sure I could cope with more of Quentin. Unless he really has actually learned, internalised, adapted from his experiences. It's really not clear from the end of the first book whether or not he has.
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Anyway, yes, I would say that Quentin is exactly like Harry in that he bumbles along through a lot of things, pushed by external forces, and not in a charming kind of way. Similarly, when Harry and Hermione and Ron screw up, it's cute and Hermione gets cat fur or they go to the hospital wing or whatever. When Quentin & co screw up, people die, and it's not cute and charming. I have friends who don't like serial mysteries they describe as "cozies" and I've always kind of understood what they meant, but this is the first time I've internalized the difference between a cozy an a non-cozy.
To me it's clear by the end of the second book that Quentin has internalized some things, but I don't know if he's consciously learned them. He makes the right decision and I'm not sure it's for the "right" reasons. But a good portion of the second book focuses on Julia and magicians outside the Brakebills system, and that's pretty great. I'm really looking forward to book 3.
Reply
Long paragraph is loooong. This is what happens when I type as I think, whoops.
I guess the actual short, root-causes summary of what I'm blathering about here is: the Magicians is decidedly, ruthlessly, extremely more realistic. But I don't actually think genuine realism makes for a good story, and I read for good story - which is possibly why I read almost exclusively fantasy. :)
Reply
The comparison I never see made in discussions, while we're talking about childish myth-cycles incorporated into Grossman, is Star Wars. Grossman would have seen SW at a magic age (as I did) and I don't think he could have written this book without it influencing him. All of which is a long leadup to saying the magicians are fundamentally Jedi. Their enemy is less ennui than themselves and their ability to fuck things up, which makes intuitive sense of why Quentin is such a fuckup and why they never really learn to be cautious.
(I didn't feel that way at all about the Antartic quest, FWIW. Which is different to Potter in that I never felt like Harry was in real danger, for all that JKR got all GRRM on the supporting cast in book 7, with GRRM meaning arbitrary and pointless. Like it or not about Sirius, that's a pointful death from the story POV, but the random killing people just because isn't necessarily that great.)
I don't think the Magicians is realistic at all, for all that it's not-cozy. I think it's actually a better story than Potter overall, which is obviously a YMMV thing. But Potter is not the standard I would hold up for fantasy storytelling either, even apart from it being a kid's story (it's not just simple, it's hackneyed). I don't know that I'd say Magicians has a great plot but I adored the overall package even when I felt like I could pick at some of the elements (as opposed to say, Gail Carriger, where I thought the first one was adorable in a hodgepodgey way but she really started leaving me cold later).
ETA: I CAN close my parentheses, dammit! They may nest and breed if I'm not careful.
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