Literary Techniques used in the novel Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
Hello, everyone! *waves* For my first post here, I'd like to share an essay on Good Omens that I wrote for school! (It was my IB Extended Essay, if that means anything to anyone here...)
Since it was written for examiners who (presumably) are not familiar with GO, a significant amount of time is spent on giving background information, but I think I managed to get some interesting ideas in there as well. :D
Please tell me what you think!
Literary Techniques used in the novel Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
Abstract
Good Omens, by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, is about a boy and his dog. Specifically, the eleven-year-old Antichrist and his loyal hellhound. Adam is sent to earth as a baby to prepare the world for the Apocalypse, but after a mix-up he is raised by an ordinary British couple as an ordinary human boy. Meanwhile, Heaven and Hell’s agents on earth are frantically trying to find him and save the world, in defiance of their superiors’ wishes. Add a colorful supporting cast including the Four Motorcyclists of the Apocalypse, “Tibetans, Aliens, Americans, Atlantisans and other rare and strange Creatures of the Last Days,” (Gaiman and Pratchett xiv) and you get a wacky, slapstick comedy perfect for a bit of mindless entertainment.
Or perhaps not. Good Omens is indeed humorous, but it’s a humor laced with razor-sharp satire and a compelling vision of the human condition. The lighthearted surface artfully conceals thought-provoking messages and ideas that take the reader unawares. As Gaiman stated in a Locus Magazine interview, “One of the great things about humor is, you can slip things past people with humor, you can use it as a sweetener. So you can actually tell them things, give them messages, … and because there are jokes in there, they’ll go along with you, and they’ll travel a lot further along with you than they would otherwise.”
This is the first paper to conduct a detailed study of Good Omens in an attempt to identify the literary techniques the authors use to bring their ideas across to the reader. It will examine the use of individual characters to represent larger concepts, and to persuasively present ideas to the reader. It will also identify various types of satire used in the novel, and how the authors use them to further illustrate their philosophy.
The prologue of Good Omens shows Crowley the demon and Aziraphale the angel in the Garden of Eden, contemplating their roles in the recent expulsion of Adam and Eve. Crowley was the serpent that gave Eve the apple, while Aziraphale was the Angel of the Eastern Gate who barred the humans from returning but-in a moment of pity-gave them his flaming sword so they could protect themselves. “Funny thing is, I keep wondering whether the apple thing wasn’t the right thing to do… Funny if we both got it wrong, eh? Funny if I did the good thing and you did the bad one, eh?” muses Crowley. (Gaiman and Pratchett xi) This puzzle is the core question that runs through the rest of the book: are humans better off for having been expelled from the Garden, for having gained the knowledge of Good and Evil and the ability to choose between them?
The novel examines both good and bad aspects of humanity, and puts forth opinions on ideas such as the importance of choice and free will, the thin line between Good and Evil, and the value of humanity as “a huge powerful potentiality, waiting to be shaped” (Gaiman and Pratchett 45), neither innately good nor innately evil. Pratchett and Gaiman unflinchingly examine the cold, hard reality hidden behind humans’ comforting clichés and self-deception, but they don’t forget about humanity’s admirable qualities either; and in the end they come away able to celebrate humanity despite it all. They put forth the philosophy that even though humans do great good at some times but great evil at others, they are always fascinating, complex, and full of potential; and perhaps that is enough.
The Use of Characters
Aziraphale and Crowley are the main field agents on Earth for Heaven and Hell respectively. They have both been here since the very Beginning in 4004 BC, and six thousand years of living among humans have left their mark. Both of them have ‘gone native,’ so fascinated by humans’ complexity that some humanity has rubbed off on them as well. They’ve developed a sort of friendship, since “you grew accustomed to the only other face that had been around more or less consistently for six millennia.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 31) The unlikely duo illustrates two points of the book’s philosophy: the fascinating and pervasive nature of humanity, and the thin line between Good and Evil.
Crowley and Aziraphale have both come to find the creature comforts found on Earth more appealing than either of their home bases. After all, “You couldn’t get a decent drink in either of them”. (Gaiman and Pratchett 12) Crowley adores his flashy black car, while Aziraphale jealously guards his large collection of rare books. Crowley convinces Aziraphale to defy Heaven and Hell and help save the Earth by reminding him that, whichever side wins, it will mean the end of the everyday human things they’ve come to love. “No salt, no eggs. No gravlax with dill sauce. No fascinating little restaurants where they know you. No Daily Telegraph crossword. No small antique shops. No bookshops, either.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 33) The love that two such ancient and powerful beings have for Earth shows that there must be something special about the little planet they’ve watched for millennia.
The mere existence of their friendship illustrates that the divide between Good and Evil is not unbridgeable, but the authors further use them to illustrate the blurring of the line between the two sides by having each agent act in ways that would stereotypically be assigned to the other. Crowley “breathes life back” into a dove that Aziraphale has accidentally killed (Gaiman and Pratchett 65), while Aziraphale dines on deviled eggs (Gaiman and Pratchett 55) and restores a bent bicycle wheel to be “as perfectly round as one of the Circles of Hell.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 77)
Crowley and Aziraphale are also used to subtly introduce a comparison between the Cold War, which had just ended when the book was written, and the war between Heaven and Hell. They meet in a park populated by spies conducting clandestine meetings, and later in “the cafeteria of the British Museum, another refuge for all weary foot soldiers of the Cold War.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 55) Crowley later makes the analogy explicit, as the Apocalypse is about to begin: “So the Cold War was over and the Great War was starting for real.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 255) Gaiman and Pratchett use this analogy to emphasize the idea of an unwinnable war in which the Earth’s entire population will become civilian casualties.
Crowley and Adam, the young Antichrist, are the main philosophical voices of the novel. Both of them appeal to the three rhetorical modes of persuasion identified by Aristotle-ethos, the appropriateness of the speaker; logos, the factual basis for the argument; and pathos, the emotional appeal to the audience-but in different ways.
Crowley is an appropriate choice for a philosophical voice because he is a character who has seen all sides of the conflict. His description at the beginning of the novel, “An Angel who did not so much Fall as Saunter Vaguely Downwards,” (Gaiman and Pratchett xiii) firmly establishes him as a morally ambiguous character who inhabits a gray area between Good and Evil. He remembers Heaven, is now a demon of Hell, and has lived on Earth for millennia; and thus he is fully qualified to give expert opinions on all three. Pratchett and Gaiman use him to lay out the foundations of their philosophy in the first quarter of the book, and in addition to his case to Aziraphale for saving the Earth, Crowley delivers three major sections of exposition between pages 12 and 72. These include such straightforward declarations of the book’s philosophy as “Where you found the real McCoy, the real grace and the real heart-stopping evil, was right inside the human mind.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 71) This exposition is “most often stated as part of a sort of third-person limited narrative, instead of quoted directly in his own voice.” (Kotetsu) This gives weight to Crowley’s statements, since at such times his mental voice becomes nearly indistinguishable from the voice of the book’s omniscient narrator.
Crowley appeals to logos when he uses examples to support his ideas on human nature. In his opinion, humans are capable of more evil than demons could ever be, and he cites examples such as the Spanish Inquisition and human torture methods as proof. However, he also appeals strongly to pathos as he’s persuading Aziraphale to help him stop the Apocalypse, listing a wide range of Earthly things from food to music to shops that Aziraphale, and most likely the reader, knows and loves.
Aziraphale sometimes acts as a foil to Crowley by expressing naïve views that Crowley, as the voice of sophisticated reason, shoots down. “You see,” Aziraphale says triumphantly regarding the misplacement of the Antichrist, “evil always contains the seeds of its own destruction.” “Nah,” Crowley replies. “For my money, it was just average incompetence.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 81-82) Aziraphale still clings to some of the clichés that Pratchett and Gaiman are trying to refute in the novel; and, in that sense, he could represent the voice of the reader whom the authors are trying to wean away from those clichés. Thus, Crowley and Aziraphale’s arguments could represent the intended interplay between the reader and the book, with Crowley (the voice of the authors) slowly bringing Aziraphale (the reader) around to his point of view.
Adam is an appropriate philosophical voice for the novel because he, like Crowley, stands on the middle ground between Good and Evil. He is the son of an angel, but a Fallen one who is now a demon, and he was raised human. He is “a small figure poised perfectly between Heaven and Hell.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 336) His character appeals most strongly to pathos, milking his innocence and adorably childish diction for all they’re worth to charm the readers into agreeing with the ideas he spouts. “I just don’t see why everyone and everything has to be burned up and everything,” he says. “Millions of fish an’ whales an’ trees an’, an’ sheep and stuff.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 332) However, his childishness also permits a blunt logic that appeals to logos by making the reader think ‘it’s so simple, even a child can see it!’-for example, his statement that “Seems to me, the only sensible thing is for people to know if they kill a whale, they’ve got a dead whale.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 337)
Adam is also a clear metaphor for humanity as a whole-his name alone suggests it, and it is made rather explicit at the end: “He’s not Evil Incarnate or Good Incarnate, he’s just…a human incarnate-” (Gaiman and Pratchett 336), Crowley realizes during the final confrontation, when Adam sides with humanity against both Heaven and Hell. As such, most of Adam’s attributes and actions can be related to Pratchett and Gaiman’s ideas on humanity.
When one character first meets Adam, she thinks he looks “something like a prepubescent Greek god. Or maybe a Biblical illustration, one which showed muscular angels doing some righteous smiting. It was a face that didn’t belong in the twentieth century. It was thatched with golden curls which glowed. Michelangelo should have sculpted it. He probably would not have included the battered sneakers, frayed jeans, or grubby T-shirt, though.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 125) Adam’s physical beauty represents the beauty found in humanity and the good that humans are capable of. However, his scruffy clothes represent humanity’s flaws and imperfections. This messy air is integral to Adam, a rough-and-tumble child who is later described as “a scruffy Napoleon with his laces trailing” (Gaiman and Pratchett 364); just as humanity’s imperfections are an integral part of the fascinating whole.
Adam’s childish escapades with his friends, simply called the Them, serve as a microcosm for some of the points the book is making. “…if you wanted excitement, and interest, and crowded days, then every Them would prize a lowly position in Adam’s gang above leadership of any other gang anywhere.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 117) If Adam represents humanity, then the Them’s choice represents the book’s elevation of humanity’s captivating and confusing nature over any high ideals of Good or Evil. Adam’s escapades also introduce an elaboration of this core idea, which is that this nature of humanity stems from a blithe disregard for consequences. “He was … distantly aware that at some future point there would be questions asked about muddy shoes and duckweed-encrusted pink dresses. But that was the future, and it lay at the other end of a long warm afternoon that contained planks and ropes and ponds. The future could wait.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 123) This quote illustrates how the authors use Adam and his friends to express a more affectionate, indulgent take on humanity’s foibles than Crowley’s worldly-wise commentary allows.
The Them have a rival gang, the Johnsonites, and the relationship between the two gangs is an allegory for the relationship the book postulates between Heaven and Hell. Adam deliberately uses it as such, to explain to his three friends-and, by proxy, the reader-why Heaven and Hell must not be allowed to wipe each other out in the Apocalypse. This explanation of Adam’s appeals to both logos, by using the familiar as an analogy to understand the unfamiliar, and to pathos, by making the reader feel that the epic struggle is as petty as a childhood rivalry.
The Use of Satire
Good Omens is a good example of Horatian satire, a type of satire which “[tries] to laugh us into truth.” (Gordon) The comical aspects of the book keep it more or less lighthearted and soften the cutting edges of the exposure of human failings that it accomplishes.
Most of the book is written in a style that is “…almost exaggeratedly English. Douglas Adams, T.H. White, and P.G. Wodehouse are authors who write in this style, with very British phrasing and lots of eccentrics fumbling about, and everything, even itself, being treated lightly.” (Swain) This style could also be described as ‘low burlesque,’ meaning that it uses humorous or very colloquial language to discuss serious subjects. The use of this type of satire keeps the book entertaining for the reader, but it also helps illustrate some of the authors’ philosophical points.
The ‘low burlesque’ style is used frequently in Crowley and Aziraphale’s conversations, and in their internal monologues, often for the purpose of showing how little difference there is between Good and Evil. Using exaggeratedly casual language to discuss the conflict between the two makes it seem unimportant and almost petty. The technique is introduced as early as the book’s prologue: upon Adam and Eve’s expulsion from the Garden, Crowley comments that “…that one went down like a lead balloon.” (Gaiman and Pratchett ix) His dry observation serves as the reader’s introduction to his character and sets the tone for the rest of the book. “Oh, yes. The Reign of Terror. Was that one of yours, or one of ours?” (Gaiman and Pratchett 35), Crowley later asks Aziraphale, his lazy curiosity showing that the two of them have become inured to how hard it is to tell the difference between their respective sides.
Crowley and Aziraphale are not the only characters to use ‘low burlesque’ satire, which is found throughout the book. As noted previously, the narrator’s voice and Crowley’s internal monologue are often almost indistinguishable, and their use of satire is similar. “[Humans] get carried away by new ideas, like … dressing up in white sheets and lynching people, or dressing up in tie-dye jeans and playing guitars at people. Offer people a new creed with a costume and their hearts and minds will follow,” the narrator observes. (Gaiman and Pratchett 18) By using such a blasé tone to describe the Ku Klux Klan and by comparing it to the hippie movement, the authors do three things simultaneously: remind the reader of the depths to which humans can sink; soften the impact of that reminder in accordance with their tolerant view of human nature; and offer support for one of their most important points: the idea of an essential human-ness underlying the most seemingly disparate of human actions. For the same purposes, an armed terrorist is made to speak in a stereotypically British way: “That’s why my lot wanted [this hotel]. Il General Ernesto de Montoya said to me, he said, Fernando, the war’ll be over by Saturday, and the lads’ll be wanting a good time.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 105) Aside from providing comic relief, it drives home the authors’ point that-to use a cliché-people are people.
Pratchett and Gaiman’s determination to break down clichés also leads to the use of ‘high burlesque’ satire, which uses language so exaggeratedly serious and formal as to be ludicrous. At times, this is done by adopting an epic or heroic tone, as a parody of the treatment that religious subjects would conventionally receive. “…there will come Road Widening, yea, and two-thousand-home estates … Executive Developments will be manifest.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 74) More often, however, the ‘high burlesque’ satire in Good Omens parodies the modern world by using exaggerated versions of today’s pseudo-intellectual catchprases and psychobabble. “Having a baby is the single most joyous co-experience that two human beings can share,” thinks a husband blissfully as his wife is undergoing the messy process of giving birth. (Gaiman and Pratchett 25) “I am normatively in England … protecting democratism, Mom, sir,” a soldier intones to his mother. (Gaiman and Pratchett 343) The deadpan use of exaggerated catchphrases makes the characters using them look dimwitted, mocking people who use such clichéd expressions in real life. Pratchett and Gaiman show the reader that the phrases simply serve as an inferior substitute for actual thought.
The authors make use of contrast throughout the book, both to counteract the lightheartedness characteristic of low burlesque by reminding the reader of the presence of serious themes, and as a satirical tool in its own right. An example of the first type of contrast occurs on page 108: after the terrorist with the exaggeratedly-British speech presents a humorous and human face of war, the lighthearted mood is broken by a chilling description of the redheaded Motorcyclist of the Apocalypse who personifies war. “She was beautiful, but she was beautiful in the way a forest fire was beautiful … And she held her sword, and she smiled like a knife.” This may be what Pratchett meant when he said in a Writers Write interview that, in order to have an impact on the reader, humorous works “have to have tragic relief.” Examples of the second type, contrast used as a satirical tool, occur when a dose of reality is interjected after a cliché or unthinking assumption. The fanatical Witchfinder Sergeant Shadwell goes on a barely-coherent rant about Bangladeshi heathens who work on the Sabbath and thus are obviously witches, at which point the narrator interjects that “certainly Mr. Rajit worked on the Sabbath. In fact, with his plump quiet wife and plump cheerful children he worked around the clock, never mind the calendar” (Gaiman and Pratchett 159), revealing the hardworking and unassuming nature of the alleged agents of evil.
The narration of the book occasionally shows flashes of self-consciousness, hovering on the edge of metafiction, that is, “fiction about fiction, i.e. fiction which self-consciously reflects upon its own nature, its modes of production, and its intended effect on the reader.” (Engler) Some characteristics of metafictionality that apply to Good Omens are “the use of a self-conscious narrator, the parodying of a specific literary text or fictional mode, and the disrupting of the traditional reading process.” (Engler) In more ‘serious’ recent works, metafiction is used to question the existence of an absolute reality and posit that perhaps ‘real life’ is also a fictional construct. However, in Good Omens the flashes of metafictionality primarily serve as yet another satirical technique, commenting on the human tendency to use platitudes and self-deception to disguise the harshness of reality.
The most prominent use of a ‘self-conscious narrator’ in the book is when the narrator breaks the fourth wall to talk to the reader, urging him or her to imagine a blissfully normal future for “Baby B,” the baby with whom Adam was mixed up. “You don’t want to know what could have happened to Baby B. We like your version better, anyway.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 28) The narrator is almost patronizingly permitting the reader to continue pretending that happy endings are the norm, while implying darkly that in fact they are not.
The authors parody literary conventions by showing how people construct stories or fantasies around their own lives, pretending that things work out as neatly in the ‘real world’ as they do in stories, and then by showing how self-delusional such fantasies are. One character, when looking for a misplaced book of prophecies, tries a method “which every romantic bone in her body insisted should work, which consisted of theatrically giving up, sitting down, and letting her glance fall naturally on a patch of earth which, if she had been in any decent narrative, should have contained the book. It didn’t.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 99) Thus, even if the characters consciously attempt to manipulate the conventions of story to their advantage, they fail because real life simply does not work like that.
A ‘disruption of the traditional reading process’ is provided by the book’s footnotes, a Pratchett trademark which appears in his other novels as well. The footnotes digress from the linear narrative, allowing the authors to elaborate on various points. They often present little anecdotes or revelations intended to mock clichés or conventions as well. For example, a soldier complains that “his wound from Nam was starting to play up,” but a footnote slyly informs the reader that the wound was in fact received when he slipped in a hotel shower on a vacation in Vietnam. (Gaiman and Pratchett 315)
At the end of the book, after Adam has chosen to be an ordinary human boy, he steals some apples off a neighbor’s tree. The story has come full circle, and the authors offer their final answer to the question of whether the first apple was worth it: “…there never was an apple, in Adam’s opinion, that wasn’t worth the trouble you got into for eating it.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 366) Once again using Adam as an allegory for humanity, Pratchett and Gaiman sum up their philosophy and wrap up their book with a neat framing device.
Conclusion
The novel Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, can be read and appreciated on several different levels. Readers simply looking for a bit of lighthearted humor can read the book as just that, and go away contented. However, readers who decide to look beneath the humorous surface to search for deeper ideas hidden beneath will not be disappointed either. The authors use the characters to represent larger concepts such as Good, Evil and humanity, and to persuade the reader into accepting the authors’ philosophy on these concepts. The book is also a satirical work that uses a wide variety of techniques to once again put forward the authors’ opinions on the human condition.
Bibliography:
“Rhetoric.” Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. 19 Jan 2006.
Engler, Bernd. "Metafiction." The Literary Encyclopedia. 17 Dec. 2004. The Literary Dictionary Company. 25 February 2006.
Gaiman, Neil and Terry Pratchett. Good Omens. Ace Books: New York, 1996.
Gaiman, Neil and Terry Pratchett. Interview. Locus Online Mar. 1991. 18 Jan 2006.
Gordon, I.R.F. "Satire." The Literary Encyclopedia. 1 Nov. 2002. The Literary Dictionary Company. 20 February 2006.
Kotetsu. "...Very Complicated Solitaire." Temptation: A Shrine to Anthony J. Crowley. 2003. 17 Jan 2006.
Pratchett, Terry. Interview with Claire E. White. “A Conversation With Terry Pratchett.” Writers Write April 2000. 18 Jan 2006.
Swain, Rebecca. Rev. of Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. Green Man Review. 18 Jan 2006.
EDIT:
Also--if anyone wants to see the true face of insanity...look no further than goodomens_ee, which I created to keep track of all the quotes that might be useful for this essay.
It has pretty much every single possibly-significant quote in the entire book, along with page numbers, tags for sorting, and matching icons.
I'm so obsessive-compulsive. o_O
Since it was written for examiners who (presumably) are not familiar with GO, a significant amount of time is spent on giving background information, but I think I managed to get some interesting ideas in there as well. :D
Please tell me what you think!
Literary Techniques used in the novel Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
Abstract
Good Omens, by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, is about a boy and his dog. Specifically, the eleven-year-old Antichrist and his loyal hellhound. Adam is sent to earth as a baby to prepare the world for the Apocalypse, but after a mix-up he is raised by an ordinary British couple as an ordinary human boy. Meanwhile, Heaven and Hell’s agents on earth are frantically trying to find him and save the world, in defiance of their superiors’ wishes. Add a colorful supporting cast including the Four Motorcyclists of the Apocalypse, “Tibetans, Aliens, Americans, Atlantisans and other rare and strange Creatures of the Last Days,” (Gaiman and Pratchett xiv) and you get a wacky, slapstick comedy perfect for a bit of mindless entertainment.
Or perhaps not. Good Omens is indeed humorous, but it’s a humor laced with razor-sharp satire and a compelling vision of the human condition. The lighthearted surface artfully conceals thought-provoking messages and ideas that take the reader unawares. As Gaiman stated in a Locus Magazine interview, “One of the great things about humor is, you can slip things past people with humor, you can use it as a sweetener. So you can actually tell them things, give them messages, … and because there are jokes in there, they’ll go along with you, and they’ll travel a lot further along with you than they would otherwise.”
This is the first paper to conduct a detailed study of Good Omens in an attempt to identify the literary techniques the authors use to bring their ideas across to the reader. It will examine the use of individual characters to represent larger concepts, and to persuasively present ideas to the reader. It will also identify various types of satire used in the novel, and how the authors use them to further illustrate their philosophy.
The prologue of Good Omens shows Crowley the demon and Aziraphale the angel in the Garden of Eden, contemplating their roles in the recent expulsion of Adam and Eve. Crowley was the serpent that gave Eve the apple, while Aziraphale was the Angel of the Eastern Gate who barred the humans from returning but-in a moment of pity-gave them his flaming sword so they could protect themselves. “Funny thing is, I keep wondering whether the apple thing wasn’t the right thing to do… Funny if we both got it wrong, eh? Funny if I did the good thing and you did the bad one, eh?” muses Crowley. (Gaiman and Pratchett xi) This puzzle is the core question that runs through the rest of the book: are humans better off for having been expelled from the Garden, for having gained the knowledge of Good and Evil and the ability to choose between them?
The novel examines both good and bad aspects of humanity, and puts forth opinions on ideas such as the importance of choice and free will, the thin line between Good and Evil, and the value of humanity as “a huge powerful potentiality, waiting to be shaped” (Gaiman and Pratchett 45), neither innately good nor innately evil. Pratchett and Gaiman unflinchingly examine the cold, hard reality hidden behind humans’ comforting clichés and self-deception, but they don’t forget about humanity’s admirable qualities either; and in the end they come away able to celebrate humanity despite it all. They put forth the philosophy that even though humans do great good at some times but great evil at others, they are always fascinating, complex, and full of potential; and perhaps that is enough.
The Use of Characters
Aziraphale and Crowley are the main field agents on Earth for Heaven and Hell respectively. They have both been here since the very Beginning in 4004 BC, and six thousand years of living among humans have left their mark. Both of them have ‘gone native,’ so fascinated by humans’ complexity that some humanity has rubbed off on them as well. They’ve developed a sort of friendship, since “you grew accustomed to the only other face that had been around more or less consistently for six millennia.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 31) The unlikely duo illustrates two points of the book’s philosophy: the fascinating and pervasive nature of humanity, and the thin line between Good and Evil.
Crowley and Aziraphale have both come to find the creature comforts found on Earth more appealing than either of their home bases. After all, “You couldn’t get a decent drink in either of them”. (Gaiman and Pratchett 12) Crowley adores his flashy black car, while Aziraphale jealously guards his large collection of rare books. Crowley convinces Aziraphale to defy Heaven and Hell and help save the Earth by reminding him that, whichever side wins, it will mean the end of the everyday human things they’ve come to love. “No salt, no eggs. No gravlax with dill sauce. No fascinating little restaurants where they know you. No Daily Telegraph crossword. No small antique shops. No bookshops, either.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 33) The love that two such ancient and powerful beings have for Earth shows that there must be something special about the little planet they’ve watched for millennia.
The mere existence of their friendship illustrates that the divide between Good and Evil is not unbridgeable, but the authors further use them to illustrate the blurring of the line between the two sides by having each agent act in ways that would stereotypically be assigned to the other. Crowley “breathes life back” into a dove that Aziraphale has accidentally killed (Gaiman and Pratchett 65), while Aziraphale dines on deviled eggs (Gaiman and Pratchett 55) and restores a bent bicycle wheel to be “as perfectly round as one of the Circles of Hell.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 77)
Crowley and Aziraphale are also used to subtly introduce a comparison between the Cold War, which had just ended when the book was written, and the war between Heaven and Hell. They meet in a park populated by spies conducting clandestine meetings, and later in “the cafeteria of the British Museum, another refuge for all weary foot soldiers of the Cold War.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 55) Crowley later makes the analogy explicit, as the Apocalypse is about to begin: “So the Cold War was over and the Great War was starting for real.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 255) Gaiman and Pratchett use this analogy to emphasize the idea of an unwinnable war in which the Earth’s entire population will become civilian casualties.
Crowley and Adam, the young Antichrist, are the main philosophical voices of the novel. Both of them appeal to the three rhetorical modes of persuasion identified by Aristotle-ethos, the appropriateness of the speaker; logos, the factual basis for the argument; and pathos, the emotional appeal to the audience-but in different ways.
Crowley is an appropriate choice for a philosophical voice because he is a character who has seen all sides of the conflict. His description at the beginning of the novel, “An Angel who did not so much Fall as Saunter Vaguely Downwards,” (Gaiman and Pratchett xiii) firmly establishes him as a morally ambiguous character who inhabits a gray area between Good and Evil. He remembers Heaven, is now a demon of Hell, and has lived on Earth for millennia; and thus he is fully qualified to give expert opinions on all three. Pratchett and Gaiman use him to lay out the foundations of their philosophy in the first quarter of the book, and in addition to his case to Aziraphale for saving the Earth, Crowley delivers three major sections of exposition between pages 12 and 72. These include such straightforward declarations of the book’s philosophy as “Where you found the real McCoy, the real grace and the real heart-stopping evil, was right inside the human mind.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 71) This exposition is “most often stated as part of a sort of third-person limited narrative, instead of quoted directly in his own voice.” (Kotetsu) This gives weight to Crowley’s statements, since at such times his mental voice becomes nearly indistinguishable from the voice of the book’s omniscient narrator.
Crowley appeals to logos when he uses examples to support his ideas on human nature. In his opinion, humans are capable of more evil than demons could ever be, and he cites examples such as the Spanish Inquisition and human torture methods as proof. However, he also appeals strongly to pathos as he’s persuading Aziraphale to help him stop the Apocalypse, listing a wide range of Earthly things from food to music to shops that Aziraphale, and most likely the reader, knows and loves.
Aziraphale sometimes acts as a foil to Crowley by expressing naïve views that Crowley, as the voice of sophisticated reason, shoots down. “You see,” Aziraphale says triumphantly regarding the misplacement of the Antichrist, “evil always contains the seeds of its own destruction.” “Nah,” Crowley replies. “For my money, it was just average incompetence.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 81-82) Aziraphale still clings to some of the clichés that Pratchett and Gaiman are trying to refute in the novel; and, in that sense, he could represent the voice of the reader whom the authors are trying to wean away from those clichés. Thus, Crowley and Aziraphale’s arguments could represent the intended interplay between the reader and the book, with Crowley (the voice of the authors) slowly bringing Aziraphale (the reader) around to his point of view.
Adam is an appropriate philosophical voice for the novel because he, like Crowley, stands on the middle ground between Good and Evil. He is the son of an angel, but a Fallen one who is now a demon, and he was raised human. He is “a small figure poised perfectly between Heaven and Hell.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 336) His character appeals most strongly to pathos, milking his innocence and adorably childish diction for all they’re worth to charm the readers into agreeing with the ideas he spouts. “I just don’t see why everyone and everything has to be burned up and everything,” he says. “Millions of fish an’ whales an’ trees an’, an’ sheep and stuff.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 332) However, his childishness also permits a blunt logic that appeals to logos by making the reader think ‘it’s so simple, even a child can see it!’-for example, his statement that “Seems to me, the only sensible thing is for people to know if they kill a whale, they’ve got a dead whale.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 337)
Adam is also a clear metaphor for humanity as a whole-his name alone suggests it, and it is made rather explicit at the end: “He’s not Evil Incarnate or Good Incarnate, he’s just…a human incarnate-” (Gaiman and Pratchett 336), Crowley realizes during the final confrontation, when Adam sides with humanity against both Heaven and Hell. As such, most of Adam’s attributes and actions can be related to Pratchett and Gaiman’s ideas on humanity.
When one character first meets Adam, she thinks he looks “something like a prepubescent Greek god. Or maybe a Biblical illustration, one which showed muscular angels doing some righteous smiting. It was a face that didn’t belong in the twentieth century. It was thatched with golden curls which glowed. Michelangelo should have sculpted it. He probably would not have included the battered sneakers, frayed jeans, or grubby T-shirt, though.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 125) Adam’s physical beauty represents the beauty found in humanity and the good that humans are capable of. However, his scruffy clothes represent humanity’s flaws and imperfections. This messy air is integral to Adam, a rough-and-tumble child who is later described as “a scruffy Napoleon with his laces trailing” (Gaiman and Pratchett 364); just as humanity’s imperfections are an integral part of the fascinating whole.
Adam’s childish escapades with his friends, simply called the Them, serve as a microcosm for some of the points the book is making. “…if you wanted excitement, and interest, and crowded days, then every Them would prize a lowly position in Adam’s gang above leadership of any other gang anywhere.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 117) If Adam represents humanity, then the Them’s choice represents the book’s elevation of humanity’s captivating and confusing nature over any high ideals of Good or Evil. Adam’s escapades also introduce an elaboration of this core idea, which is that this nature of humanity stems from a blithe disregard for consequences. “He was … distantly aware that at some future point there would be questions asked about muddy shoes and duckweed-encrusted pink dresses. But that was the future, and it lay at the other end of a long warm afternoon that contained planks and ropes and ponds. The future could wait.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 123) This quote illustrates how the authors use Adam and his friends to express a more affectionate, indulgent take on humanity’s foibles than Crowley’s worldly-wise commentary allows.
The Them have a rival gang, the Johnsonites, and the relationship between the two gangs is an allegory for the relationship the book postulates between Heaven and Hell. Adam deliberately uses it as such, to explain to his three friends-and, by proxy, the reader-why Heaven and Hell must not be allowed to wipe each other out in the Apocalypse. This explanation of Adam’s appeals to both logos, by using the familiar as an analogy to understand the unfamiliar, and to pathos, by making the reader feel that the epic struggle is as petty as a childhood rivalry.
The Use of Satire
Good Omens is a good example of Horatian satire, a type of satire which “[tries] to laugh us into truth.” (Gordon) The comical aspects of the book keep it more or less lighthearted and soften the cutting edges of the exposure of human failings that it accomplishes.
Most of the book is written in a style that is “…almost exaggeratedly English. Douglas Adams, T.H. White, and P.G. Wodehouse are authors who write in this style, with very British phrasing and lots of eccentrics fumbling about, and everything, even itself, being treated lightly.” (Swain) This style could also be described as ‘low burlesque,’ meaning that it uses humorous or very colloquial language to discuss serious subjects. The use of this type of satire keeps the book entertaining for the reader, but it also helps illustrate some of the authors’ philosophical points.
The ‘low burlesque’ style is used frequently in Crowley and Aziraphale’s conversations, and in their internal monologues, often for the purpose of showing how little difference there is between Good and Evil. Using exaggeratedly casual language to discuss the conflict between the two makes it seem unimportant and almost petty. The technique is introduced as early as the book’s prologue: upon Adam and Eve’s expulsion from the Garden, Crowley comments that “…that one went down like a lead balloon.” (Gaiman and Pratchett ix) His dry observation serves as the reader’s introduction to his character and sets the tone for the rest of the book. “Oh, yes. The Reign of Terror. Was that one of yours, or one of ours?” (Gaiman and Pratchett 35), Crowley later asks Aziraphale, his lazy curiosity showing that the two of them have become inured to how hard it is to tell the difference between their respective sides.
Crowley and Aziraphale are not the only characters to use ‘low burlesque’ satire, which is found throughout the book. As noted previously, the narrator’s voice and Crowley’s internal monologue are often almost indistinguishable, and their use of satire is similar. “[Humans] get carried away by new ideas, like … dressing up in white sheets and lynching people, or dressing up in tie-dye jeans and playing guitars at people. Offer people a new creed with a costume and their hearts and minds will follow,” the narrator observes. (Gaiman and Pratchett 18) By using such a blasé tone to describe the Ku Klux Klan and by comparing it to the hippie movement, the authors do three things simultaneously: remind the reader of the depths to which humans can sink; soften the impact of that reminder in accordance with their tolerant view of human nature; and offer support for one of their most important points: the idea of an essential human-ness underlying the most seemingly disparate of human actions. For the same purposes, an armed terrorist is made to speak in a stereotypically British way: “That’s why my lot wanted [this hotel]. Il General Ernesto de Montoya said to me, he said, Fernando, the war’ll be over by Saturday, and the lads’ll be wanting a good time.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 105) Aside from providing comic relief, it drives home the authors’ point that-to use a cliché-people are people.
Pratchett and Gaiman’s determination to break down clichés also leads to the use of ‘high burlesque’ satire, which uses language so exaggeratedly serious and formal as to be ludicrous. At times, this is done by adopting an epic or heroic tone, as a parody of the treatment that religious subjects would conventionally receive. “…there will come Road Widening, yea, and two-thousand-home estates … Executive Developments will be manifest.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 74) More often, however, the ‘high burlesque’ satire in Good Omens parodies the modern world by using exaggerated versions of today’s pseudo-intellectual catchprases and psychobabble. “Having a baby is the single most joyous co-experience that two human beings can share,” thinks a husband blissfully as his wife is undergoing the messy process of giving birth. (Gaiman and Pratchett 25) “I am normatively in England … protecting democratism, Mom, sir,” a soldier intones to his mother. (Gaiman and Pratchett 343) The deadpan use of exaggerated catchphrases makes the characters using them look dimwitted, mocking people who use such clichéd expressions in real life. Pratchett and Gaiman show the reader that the phrases simply serve as an inferior substitute for actual thought.
The authors make use of contrast throughout the book, both to counteract the lightheartedness characteristic of low burlesque by reminding the reader of the presence of serious themes, and as a satirical tool in its own right. An example of the first type of contrast occurs on page 108: after the terrorist with the exaggeratedly-British speech presents a humorous and human face of war, the lighthearted mood is broken by a chilling description of the redheaded Motorcyclist of the Apocalypse who personifies war. “She was beautiful, but she was beautiful in the way a forest fire was beautiful … And she held her sword, and she smiled like a knife.” This may be what Pratchett meant when he said in a Writers Write interview that, in order to have an impact on the reader, humorous works “have to have tragic relief.” Examples of the second type, contrast used as a satirical tool, occur when a dose of reality is interjected after a cliché or unthinking assumption. The fanatical Witchfinder Sergeant Shadwell goes on a barely-coherent rant about Bangladeshi heathens who work on the Sabbath and thus are obviously witches, at which point the narrator interjects that “certainly Mr. Rajit worked on the Sabbath. In fact, with his plump quiet wife and plump cheerful children he worked around the clock, never mind the calendar” (Gaiman and Pratchett 159), revealing the hardworking and unassuming nature of the alleged agents of evil.
The narration of the book occasionally shows flashes of self-consciousness, hovering on the edge of metafiction, that is, “fiction about fiction, i.e. fiction which self-consciously reflects upon its own nature, its modes of production, and its intended effect on the reader.” (Engler) Some characteristics of metafictionality that apply to Good Omens are “the use of a self-conscious narrator, the parodying of a specific literary text or fictional mode, and the disrupting of the traditional reading process.” (Engler) In more ‘serious’ recent works, metafiction is used to question the existence of an absolute reality and posit that perhaps ‘real life’ is also a fictional construct. However, in Good Omens the flashes of metafictionality primarily serve as yet another satirical technique, commenting on the human tendency to use platitudes and self-deception to disguise the harshness of reality.
The most prominent use of a ‘self-conscious narrator’ in the book is when the narrator breaks the fourth wall to talk to the reader, urging him or her to imagine a blissfully normal future for “Baby B,” the baby with whom Adam was mixed up. “You don’t want to know what could have happened to Baby B. We like your version better, anyway.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 28) The narrator is almost patronizingly permitting the reader to continue pretending that happy endings are the norm, while implying darkly that in fact they are not.
The authors parody literary conventions by showing how people construct stories or fantasies around their own lives, pretending that things work out as neatly in the ‘real world’ as they do in stories, and then by showing how self-delusional such fantasies are. One character, when looking for a misplaced book of prophecies, tries a method “which every romantic bone in her body insisted should work, which consisted of theatrically giving up, sitting down, and letting her glance fall naturally on a patch of earth which, if she had been in any decent narrative, should have contained the book. It didn’t.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 99) Thus, even if the characters consciously attempt to manipulate the conventions of story to their advantage, they fail because real life simply does not work like that.
A ‘disruption of the traditional reading process’ is provided by the book’s footnotes, a Pratchett trademark which appears in his other novels as well. The footnotes digress from the linear narrative, allowing the authors to elaborate on various points. They often present little anecdotes or revelations intended to mock clichés or conventions as well. For example, a soldier complains that “his wound from Nam was starting to play up,” but a footnote slyly informs the reader that the wound was in fact received when he slipped in a hotel shower on a vacation in Vietnam. (Gaiman and Pratchett 315)
At the end of the book, after Adam has chosen to be an ordinary human boy, he steals some apples off a neighbor’s tree. The story has come full circle, and the authors offer their final answer to the question of whether the first apple was worth it: “…there never was an apple, in Adam’s opinion, that wasn’t worth the trouble you got into for eating it.” (Gaiman and Pratchett 366) Once again using Adam as an allegory for humanity, Pratchett and Gaiman sum up their philosophy and wrap up their book with a neat framing device.
Conclusion
The novel Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, can be read and appreciated on several different levels. Readers simply looking for a bit of lighthearted humor can read the book as just that, and go away contented. However, readers who decide to look beneath the humorous surface to search for deeper ideas hidden beneath will not be disappointed either. The authors use the characters to represent larger concepts such as Good, Evil and humanity, and to persuade the reader into accepting the authors’ philosophy on these concepts. The book is also a satirical work that uses a wide variety of techniques to once again put forward the authors’ opinions on the human condition.
Bibliography:
“Rhetoric.” Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. 19 Jan 2006.
Engler, Bernd. "Metafiction." The Literary Encyclopedia. 17 Dec. 2004. The Literary Dictionary Company. 25 February 2006.
Gaiman, Neil and Terry Pratchett. Good Omens. Ace Books: New York, 1996.
Gaiman, Neil and Terry Pratchett. Interview. Locus Online Mar. 1991. 18 Jan 2006.
Gordon, I.R.F. "Satire." The Literary Encyclopedia. 1 Nov. 2002. The Literary Dictionary Company. 20 February 2006.
Kotetsu. "...Very Complicated Solitaire." Temptation: A Shrine to Anthony J. Crowley. 2003. 17 Jan 2006.
Pratchett, Terry. Interview with Claire E. White. “A Conversation With Terry Pratchett.” Writers Write April 2000. 18 Jan 2006.
Swain, Rebecca. Rev. of Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. Green Man Review. 18 Jan 2006.
EDIT:
Also--if anyone wants to see the true face of insanity...look no further than goodomens_ee, which I created to keep track of all the quotes that might be useful for this essay.
It has pretty much every single possibly-significant quote in the entire book, along with page numbers, tags for sorting, and matching icons.
I'm so obsessive-compulsive. o_O