The Kingdom of Evil a Continuation of the Journal of Fantazius Mallare
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The Kingdom of Evil is a continuation of Fantazius Mallare; it seems to stand on its own, but since I haven't read Fantazius Mallare I might be missing some of the emotional overtones. Even without knowledge of the earlier volume, though, I thought this book was worthwhile.
Others might have a vastly different opinion, though--hence the tight-rope walking. It would be easy enough to make a book like this seem pretentious twaddle--and some may so see it. To
Ben Hecht walks a tight-rope in this one.The Kingdom of Evil is a continuation of Fantazius Mallare; it seems to stand on its own, but since I haven't read Fantazius Mallare I might be missing some of the emotional overtones. Even without knowledge of the earlier volume, though, I thought this book was worthwhile.
Others might have a vastly different opinion, though--hence the tight-rope walking. It would be easy enough to make a book like this seem pretentious twaddle--and some may so see it. To me, it was both fascinating and scarring. It's too bad that Hecht's later work on movies has so overwhelmed his reputation that his earlier fiction has fallen out of favor. Perhaps that is why this book is not canonized among other great weird literature, like H.P. Lovecraft's and Clark Ashton Smith, both of which bear a resemblance to Hecht's work, in language, mood, theme, and imagery--although Hecht mostly pre-dated them with this work.
The book is a dark fantasy, in line with Blake and the Decadents of the 1890s, and would be followed by works in the 1960s that gave the genre a turn toward the farcical--here I'm thinking of Richard Brautigan.
The (very short) novel opens with an omniscient narrator prefacing the excerpts that are to come from the journals of Fantazius Mallare; he assures the reader that reality continues as it always has, and that even though Mallare himself seems to think otherwise, there are hints in them that he knew he was consciously fantasizing or deluding himself. The problem, the narrator says, is that Mallare could not fit himself into this world, and so created another world--but he always knew that one was a simulacrum, and so was still never at home.
Then follows a disturbing story, of the world wiped out by a fog-or perhaps the world is just hidden for a time, so that a few hundred men (all men) could be kidnapped to some strange land, and deposited in a cave, where they are slowly selected by the land's king, Sebastian, to do some bidding. Mallare, and his companion Julian, a poet whom Mallare despises but who will not leave Mallare alone, are chosen last. They see that the others have been busy building a huge castle at Sebastien's insistence. They are surrounded by hermpahroditic slaves.
Without the skills of scientists and technicians, Julien and Mallare mostly watch, eventually meeting Sebastien's paramour, Kora. She is repulsed by Mallare, who has become obsequious to Sebastien, and wants only Julien, who views the whole scene as ridiculous. But Julien shuns her, and Kora confesses that she is bored with having an entire world built for her--because she is the reason Sebastien does anything--and wants a god. So the scientists and technicians create a God.
Hecht's descriptions of the God and its Ark are amazing for their grotesqueries and precision.
Inevitably, though, the God disappoints Kora--it is stupendous, but also stupid. And the world they inhabit begins to dissolve, until the final, short chapter, when we learn--spoiler!--that in the real world, Mallare was found dead in a cabin, with dead animals, and a dead woman.
The ending is fitting enough, but to on point, as are several episodes later in the book. Early on, the fantasy is real, and gripping, the relations of that world--and fantastic worlds in general--to our own not obvious. (Rather than the straight lien of a tight-rope in these early passages, Hecht is following a Moebius strip, with the fantastic world reflecting ours, which reflects the fantasy. There are distant echoes of our own world in the make-believe, but points cannot be plotted as on a graph.) Later, though, in his speeches, Julien makes clear that the entire episode is being conducted int he fevered brain of Mallare, and everyone is just a piece of Mallare's imagination: Kora is the muse, Sebastien his mind, Mallare the part that doesn't fit into the world, and Julien the knowing piece. This description flattens the Moebius strip and reduces some of the fantasy to mere simulation. Like the ending that is supposed to shock, what it really does is cheapen the story. Far better when the weird was simply . . . weird. (The vulgar Freudian thinking doesn't help much, either.)
Nonetheless, however ultimately unsatisfying the explanation of the creation, the world that Hecht invents is frightening and bizarre and wonderful and well worth a visit.
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THE PLOT: In The Kingdom of Evil we explore the second half of Fantazius Mallare's Journal, where he creates a world in his head called The Kingdom of Evil out of his own madness where everything
Though I don't know when this book was written. I only know m cop is a reprint from 1978 done by HBJ with the 12 woodcuts included. This is the second in the series, the first book, Fantazius Mallare was printed in 1924 and sold by subscription. In 1926, the government banned the novel for being obscene.THE PLOT: In The Kingdom of Evil we explore the second half of Fantazius Mallare's Journal, where he creates a world in his head called The Kingdom of Evil out of his own madness where everything is Mallare-like somehow and evil lurks in corners. Amazingly, the writing in this novel is so beautiful that it is hard to think of parallel greatness at the moment - I'm so struck by the prose of Bechtel. Here is an example ( since we are long out of copyright. )
The fog drifted into the city like a great blind moth. It fluttered in the air peering in at high windows. Slowly it stretched its vast wings destroying steeples and rooftops. For a number of hours the fog remained like that.
Behind the fog the city lay, a tangle of silhouettes. The buildings floated in the mists, moving faintly like dark bubbles in the air. Grey and grimacing the city persisted.
The Kingdom of Evil, HBJ,reprint 1978
The writing is so stunning, the vocabulary so immense that I was moved by his word choice, his cadence, his ideas. It is almost poetry not prose because it's got a meter all it's own and his statements are more poetic than not. To read this book is to experience Mallard's three phases of madness - the abduction of builders and experts is phase 1. The building and populating of the Kingdom is phase 2. The destruction and rebellion are phase 3. All tragedies must end sometime. The plot of this one is so convoluted and twisted that you will have Np idea what is waiting for you around the next corner of the Kingdom, much less who anyone really is. A+ on plot.
CHARACTERIZATION : The characters in this book are all Mallare, or different figments of Mallare that have come out of his own mind. So the only characterization we are concerned with is Mallare himself and he is quite mad. The novel is narrated from his POV, so we can't trust the words out our narrator even though he sounds so logical and sane, but there are so many examples that sanity has long fled and madness resides with that there is no mistaking the madness in his three phase plan and his created world. He's not quite the guy that follows the shade around the house but he could easily stare into the distance with that thousand yard stare - dreaming of his Kingdom; forgetting to eat, sleep, or bathe. Eventually this would kill him, but if things went wrong in the Kingdom, there would be no purpose to life as he know it. He created the Kingdom, after all he created the Kingdom to get away from life which he did not feel a part of and which he despised. So if the the Kingdom is gone, there is no place for him to go but six feet under, hopefully his soul in a better place and not reincarnated as a dung beetle or a cicada or a mole rat. His characterization was stellar. How do you narrate a book as someone clinically insane with prose like poetry and cadence like music and still come up with a tragedy that breaks your heart. Mr. Bechtel must be a genius, that is the only thing that I can think of. I don't know how recognized Hecht or his books are, but he is an artist who deserves to be among the treats like Joyce and Hemingway among others to name just a few. A++ for characterization
THE PACING:Frankly, I didn't notice the pacing because by the first few sentences of the book I was glued to it. Enjoying the writing; revealing in it actually, the pages flew by on as in the back of my mind I appreciated the use of such words as "acephalic", "fecundated" and "aphrodisiacle" which are common, along with the musical meter and the wild subject matter out of the mind of a mad man. The pages flew by, never slowing, never ceasing, always flying. I never even noticed I was getting close, until I hit the last page, which brings us to our next section, so I'd say A++for plotting.
THE ENDING: The end of the novel was fitting in a mad sort of way, but do you expect from a mad man. It broke my heart anyway. Maybe it's just just me, but ever since I was little I wanted to runaway too, just not in my head. I use books for that. I wanted to runaway to an island in the Pacific or the Carribean where I could have an old fort or castle to keep off drug runners and have big parties with my friends on the beach. Maybe even declare myself a country, join the United Nations and get foreign aid. I like that running away better than the type Mallare does in the Kingdom. The tragedy is in the ending. A+for the ending.
THE UPSHOT: This is a book that everyone in the whole world should read. If it's not a classic like The Sun Als Rise or Ulysses it should be immediately. I really mean that! My next move is to find the banned book, Fantazius. Mallare, which is the first half of his journal and probably his descent into madness. I must find and read it, I have no choice now. I am officially hooked. Go out and buy thoese two books. Though I've only read the second, the writing quality speaks for itself, and what censors thought obsene in 1926 is tame by today's standards. I'm sure that there are worse things on reality television than in that novel. I must admit, The Kingdom of Evil does have one woodcut that is pretty risque. It shows a girl's boon. I had to warn you. I took it to a doctor appointment and that woodcut was showing on the back. The doctor asked me what I was reading. I told, I also told him it was good. He smiled at me and said " I bet! " then put the book down. It was only later I realized the boon woodcut was showing at the time. Dirty old doctor. Buy these books anyway. They may be free because they are out of copyright. Just go get them! They are so beautifully written, and the woodcuts are edgy - boons and all.
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'The Kingdom of Evil' is Hechts sequel to 'Fantazius Mallare'(1922) - a decadent novella which is better known for the wonderful Wallace Smith illustrations and the fact that is was branded obscene than its actual content; which is frankly something of a mess with its sub Des Essaintes excesses and purple prose. So, to the Kingdom...
'The Kingdom...' is the diary of our 'hero' Mallare who has become mad and dreams himself
This review was previously posted on the Side Real Press website in 2011.'The Kingdom of Evil' is Hechts sequel to 'Fantazius Mallare'(1922) - a decadent novella which is better known for the wonderful Wallace Smith illustrations and the fact that is was branded obscene than its actual content; which is frankly something of a mess with its sub Des Essaintes excesses and purple prose. So, to the Kingdom...
'The Kingdom...' is the diary of our 'hero' Mallare who has become mad and dreams himself a realm run by a sinister magician figure named Sabastian who in turn creates amusements for a woman named Kora. Both Mallare and Sabastian are love rivals for Kora, but she seems to favour a poet named Julien who spends a lot of the book arguing with Mallare over the nature of the reality in which they find themselves. As they are all constructs of the diarist Mallares' delerium this leads to some problems as each character tries to justify their place in Mallares dream. All this is before we add in troops of hermaphrodite servants, an 'ectoplasmic' sky city, the arrival of hundreds of naked women and a gigantic God named Synthemus created by Sabastian as a gift to Kora.
The result is written is a style that fuses a mixture of Poe, Huysmans and Clark Ashton Smith with, shall we say, idiosyncratic results. An example:
"This madness from which I suffer, this will be the end of man. Madness will be his last philosophy, His little song will cease. His monotonous scribblings will end. And mind, the grey and mutilated monster he has enchained within him will seize his senses. The shapes of life, the noble and complacent structures before which he stands today preening himself and humming will twist into horrible designs, collapse into decalcified symbols of woe. He will weep. Delusions will rupture his nights. Out of the little realities he has so proudly reared, phantoms ghastly and murderous will launch themselves at him. Everything about him will become laden with horror. The day and night into which he looks will, like a dreadful mirror, give him back only the Witches' Sabbath of his mind." And so on...
Totally pretentious, at times very silly, but with some nice moments, this is a fun read. 'The Kingdom...' seems to be regarded as inferior to its for infamous forebear, but I actually found it better because of excesses- 'Fantazius' is far too serious in its decadent pose.
My ($3 s/h) reprint contains the illustrations from the 1st edition by Anthony Angarola which are perhaps more 'interesting' than 'inspiring'.
Great literature it aint, but it has its place, and rattles along at a good rate. I found it far more entertaining than much of the pulp fiction, a la Weird Tales etc, of the same period and this book will while away a winter hour or two for you.
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Source: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/1939489
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