Book Review
The Winter King by Bernard Cornwell
The creator of Sharpe, the TV hero of the Napoleonic wars, Bernard Cornwell, turned his hand to the Arthurian Legend. The Winter King is the first book in the "Warlord Chronicles" trilogy.
I actually read this book a number of years ago, but at the time I was married to a religious fanatic who, if she saw the title of the second book, would have gone ape-shit and forbidden me to read it! (The second book is called "The Enemy Of God"!)
So, now, I have re-purchased the first book and bought the other two at the same time on a 3 for 2 offer from Waterstones!
Cornwell has given the story an interesting twist, stripping the tale of the magic but putting in the narrative how the magic gets added in later. Merlin is not a wizard, he is a druid. That is not to say that he doesn't do magic, but that a druid's magic is more to do with superstition, trickery and herb-lore than waving the hand, saying an incantation and turning someone into a toad! In other words, because Merlin believes he can turn someone into a toad, and because everyone else believes it, Merlin never needs to actually do so, or if he does, he uses a simple trick to drug the victim and replace him with a toad while he sleeps.
The book tells of Arthur's rise to power following the death of Uther Pendragon. It is told through the eyes of one of the few survivors of Arthur's war on the Saxons, a man named Derfel, himself born of a Saxon slave, but raised by Merlin and a loyal warrior in Arthur's service.
The thing I like most about Cornwell's treatment of the legend is the background and setting. Ever the historian, he has obviously done his research and has removed from the legend all trace of Norman and Middle-ages Britain that Hollywood added. So, there is no "round table" - although the warriors do sit and eat in a circle. There are no "knights", although Arthur does lead a band of heavy cavalry clad in Roman scale-mail armour. In fact, the whole setting is in a Britain that, since the Roman withdrawal a few hundred years earlier, has fallen into civil war and fragmentation. Much that the Romans left behind is still there, like the roads, villas and baths, but many are in disrepair.
Christianity is rife, but most Britons are pagan and worship the old gods, or the gods of Rome. Merlin's quest is to purge Britain of foreign religions and bring back Britain's old gods. Arthur's vision is of a Britain united and at peace, with no Saxons.
The Winter King of the title is Mordred. (Not, in this case, the result of incest between Arthur and Morgan Le Fey, but the crippled baby son of Uther, Arthur's half brother, born in the winter shortly before Uther's death).
I shan't say more, as it may spoil it for anyone who happens to read this and hasn't read the book...