This drawing was started a while ago as a side doodle, inspired by the drawing prompt: “An alternate cover design for your favorite book”. It’s really hard for someone who loves books as much as I do to choose a favorite, but when I sat down, my hand just started drawing Gormenghast castle.
In a layer that I have hidden on this final version of the image is a sort of joke-y blurb: “It’s a slow-burn, post-war portrait of a closed, traditionalist society slowly collapsing in on itself!” My husband saw it while I was working and he (who has also read the book) nodded at me and said, “Nailed it.” So I’m going to go ahead and leave that there instead writing the whole “Why I Love this Book” essay that I have started and deleted three times now. I’m still mad because that doesn’t touch on so much of what makes Mervyn Peake wonderful and unique.
For instance, there’s a whole chapter just about the ecosystem of the birds that live on an abandoned part of the roof. The castle itself is a character in its own right. Gormenghast, the castle-city, being completely isolated, is the only real plot device, so the story becomes a study of characters in a bell jar. You almost inhabit the stones of the castle as an observer, watching the microcosm of Dickensian personalities collide.
Ugh. So much for brevity!