The Trouble with Inkheart

Not too long ago, I wrote a story called Shade of Durandana. In this tale, a highly exaggerated version of myself contrives to bring the characters of one of my novels into the primary, or “real,” world, where they then proceed to wreak havoc on the life of a hapless, energetic and thoroughly British professor. Although intended primarily as a comedy, like all stories it was built around a fundamentally serious idea, to wit, that literary characters have a real existence.

This idea was most explicitly expounded in a scene in which David Maxwell converses with the professor shortly after the first few characters have made their appearance, and because it makes the point I wish to expound, I quote it below.

I led [Maxwell] to the front deck and we seated ourselves. I waited for him to begin, but he seemed in no great hurry to speak.

“Well?” I said presently.

“Where do you wish me to begin?”

“At the beginning. Explain to me why I am supposed to believe that this Aveline is who she says she is, and also explain to me why it is that I was attacked by Arab horsemen, and that the police ran away, and that I found you wandering around the mountain, and that you claim to know this woman.”

“I know this woman,” Maxwell began, “because I created her. That is to say, because I imagined her.”

I raised an inquisitive brow.

“Allow me to start over,” said Maxwell, placing his cane over his right shoulder. “First, Mr. Harrington, would I be correct in assuming that you are a literary sort?”

“I have a great fondness for literature, if that’s what you mean.”

“It is. Very good. I think, then, that you would agree with my philosophy of the characters of literature. You would probably agree that characters are not merely figments of the imagination, that they truly have an existence of their own. They might be conceived in the imagination of the author, but once realized they exist on their own independent of it. Let us consider Mr. Pickwick. Dickens is dead, but Pickwick is not. When I say Mr. Pickwick, we both know of whom we speak. We do not speak of an imagined thing, but of a real one. Our mental images of him may differ, but we still see the same man. We both know how he behaves, how he speaks, what he would think of certain things, and our knowledge is consistent. If he had no real existence this would not be possible. In fact, a well-drawn character will decide for himself how he will act and what he will do. The author does not have to dictate it. Dickens did not have to say to himself, ‘now what do I want Mr. Pickwick to say about this?’ On the contrary, Mr. Pickwick’s nature determines what he will say to something. It was only up to Dickens to write it convincingly.

Now there is a theory held by a number of people, myself included, that if these characters could be converted from non-physical beings to physical ones, and could be brought to a sort of existence outside of their stories, that they would speak, act, and think for themselves in a fashion consistent with their natures. We have both, I’m certain, read books that we had wished had not ended, where it seemed we would have liked nothing better than to have spoken with our favorite characters, and to have asked them to tell us more about themselves. I do not presume that my own novels produce such an effect in their readers, but they seemed the best place to begin, as I would already know them all quite well. The only obstacle was simple yet formidable: I had no idea how to do it. After a number of failed experiments and rather shocking yet disappointing discoveries, I determined that there was only one way.”

Although in real life I naturally do not subscribe to all that the caricature of myself says above, in essence it reflects my real philosophy on the subject. And it is because of this that I found Inkheart so disappointing.

For those who do not know: the premise in brief. Brendan Fraser plays a fellow possessed of a magical ability (or curse) that makes characters come out of books whenever he reads them, and for each one that is read out of the book, someone from the primary world is sucked into it. Unaware of this ability, while reading the book Inkheart, Fraser accidentally reads several characters, including the villain, out of the book, and sends his wife into it. Thenceforth he goes on a quest to recover the extremely rare novel and read out his wife, but meanwhile the villain has captured another chap with the power to read things out of books, and is having treasure, weapons, henchmen, and all manner of dangerous things pulled into the primary world for his personal use.

Parts of this movie, I will grant, were quite good. The premise was naturally interesting, and the part where the author gets to meet several of his characters were mostly funny. (Those worried about spoilers should not read on.) Unfortunately, all was ruined by an impossibly lame climax that contradicted everything every good writer knows about fiction, and makes one wonder why we spent two hours watching these characters put themselves through so much trouble when the problem could have been solved so easily all along, and with no greater weapons to hand than a pen and an arm to write on. Yes, the problems of the movie are all solved by someone writing a bunch of rubbish that would never have happened in the characters’ books, and then reading it aloud.

Not only does this contradict the rules of the movie itself (several times a character states that the author no longer controls his destiny, now that he’s out of the book), it also contradicts a fundamental rule of real fiction. The author does not possess arbitrary control over his characters. Non-writers often have a hard time grasping this, but even thoughtful readers know it is the case. Once conceived, a character has its own nature, and that nature cannot really be changed except through a natural process of development. This is not to say, of course, that bad writers often do create unnatural changes in their characters. But if they do, it means the characters are not real characters but merely objects with which the author constructs his plot, vehicles to carry his story arc from point A to point B.

Take, for instance, my character Redwald, protagonist and narrator of Vincere Omnia. He is a brooding, mirthless, depressed character who never laughs and only smiles in scorn. It would be impossible for me to sit down in the current chapter (where he happens to be more than usually grim) and write him laughing and joking with his friends and generally enjoying life. Now to be sure, I could write the words, but by doing so I would not be making the real Redwald behave thus. He would disgustedly brood in the background while some unnaturally cheery figure that had stolen his name cavorted around in his story. And he would probably write a few bitter remarks about it. I could write the words, but I could not make Redwald—the character who exists as a humorless, cynical, vindictive misanthrope not only in my mind but in those of my readers—do it.

Therefore, if we assume a situation wherein characters have entered the primary world, and are developed and internally consistent enough to be acting of their own will according to their own natures, the idea that they could be dealt with by writing things about them that are inconsistent with their natures becomes impossible. If a Balrog were chasing him, even Tolkien could not simply decide that Balrogs would henceforth be chiefly concerned in serving as charitable cigarette lighters.

This does not even get into the more complex question of how far a character’s existence is intertwined with his story’s existence. Once a story is complete and finished, it stands alone, and the author has no power to alter it. Returning to my example, even at this point where the entirety of the story has not been committed to paper, I could not decide, for instance, that Redwald is homosexual. I could say it, of course, but it would have no effect on Redwald as he exists in the story (which is his habitation and one may say the essence of his existence). And this is not simply because it’s made quite clear in the story that he is heterosexual. There is another character who theoretically could have been a homosexual with no noticeable effect on the plot. But since he was never written as such (and since he is dead at this point in the story, all the text involving him already complete) it makes no difference what I might say or even write about him outside the story itself. The text speaks for itself, and since it says nothing whatever about the character’s orientation, nothing said outside it has any real effect on it. Even what I personally imagined in my mind all along but never wrote down doesn’t matter once the story is written and has been read. The story, once written, no longer belongs exclusively to me. It exists from then on independent of me.

But the writers of Inkheart (in the movie, at least; I can’t speak for how far it represents the book on which it was based) apparently didn’t know or didn’t care about this, and chose to undermine the very concept that propelled their entire story—which was too long anyway for what it needed to execute. But hope remains, I suppose, that Shade of Durandana may one day reach the silver screen to right this wrong.

Archaism Vindicated

From a letter By J.R.R. Tolkien from September of 1955

It was not what you said...or your right to say it, that might have called for a reply, if I had the time for it; but the pain that I always feel when anyone--in an age when almost all auctorial manhandling of English is permitted (especially if disruptive) in the name of art or 'personal expression'--immediately dismisses out of court deliberate 'archaism'. The proper use of 'tushery' is to apply it to the kind of bogus 'medieval;' stuff which attempts (without knowledge) to give a supposed temporal colour with expletives such as tush, pish, zounds, marry, and the like. But a real archaic English is far more terse than modern; also many of the things said could not be said in our slack and often frivolous idiom...But take an example from the chapter that you especially singled out (and called terrible)...'The King of the Golden Hall'. 'Nay Gandalf! said the King. 'You do not know your own skill in healing. It shall not be so. I myself will go to war, to fall in the front of the battle, if it must be. Thus shall I sleep better.' ...I know well enough what a modern would say. 'Not at all my dear G. You don't know your own skill as a doctor. Things aren't going to be like that. I shall do to the war in person, even if I have to be one of the first casualties'--and then what? Theoden would certainly think, and probably say 'thus shall I sleep better'! But people who think like that just do not talk a modern idiom. You can have 'I shall lie easier in my grave,' or 'I should sleep sounder in my grave like that rather than if I stayed at home'--if you like. But there would be an insincerity of thought, a disunion of word and meaning. For a King who spoke in a modern style would not really think in such terms at all, and any reference to sleeping quietly in the grave would be a deliberate archaism of expression on his part (however worded) far more bogus than the actual 'archaic' English that I have used. Like some non-Christian making a reference to some Christian belief which did not in fact move him at all....Why deliberately ignore, refuse to use the wealth of English which leaves us a choice of styles--without any possibility of unintelligibility...I can see no more reason for not using the much terser and more vivid ancient style than for changing the obsolete weapons, helms, shields, hauberks into modern uniforms.

My Very First Story

This is, as far as I am aware, the first story that I ever wrote. It dates from the spring of 1997, when I was around six.

The Indians and the Cowboys

David B. Maxwell

One day some Indians rode into town. Some cowboys and the sheriff saw them. They started to shoot at them. Some of the horses got shot. Some didn't. But the Indians escaped.

The the Indians get back to thew village. The chief comes back. So the Indians told the chief everything that happened.

The the Chief [sic] rode into town with some of his Indian warriors. The he starts a battle against the cowboys and Sheriff West. Some of the women bolted their doors and watched, some bolted their doors and hid their children in cellars. Then the Indians lost the battle. So they retreated.

And then the cowboys and Sheriff West went after the Indians.

Then Sheriff West said to the chief, "Do you want to finish this battle? Or the cowboys will pick you off one by one."

The Indian warriors with their chief chased them off their village. So the Indians stopped to think about how they would keep the cowboys away. So that night the Chief told guards to keep watch.

That night the cowboys came back. Some of the cowboys were killed with arrows and spears by the guards. It was very dark but it was summertime. The Indians heard the cowboys so they hid behind bushed. Then the Indians jumped out and chased the cowboys that weren't killed.

The End.

Life and Its Progressions

I need hardly say that I've been very remiss about posting. Though general busyness and Facebook are partially to blame, another big factor was that I simply felt I didn't have much of interest to say. But I suppose that there is some general news I should bring up.

First of all, I'll be moving in to my dorm at Benedictine on August 22, and beginning classes on August 26, after which I expect this blog will practically die, at least for a couple of months. So if you're not my friend on Facebook and would still like to keep an eye on me through my first semester of college, add me. Needless to say my siblings are looking forward to seeing me out of my room, and I've already seen some go as far to take precise measurements of walls, not to mention monologuing in front of my closet about how all its space will be used.

In other news, my score from the AP English Language and Composition came yesterday, and as God would have it I got a 5, for the which I'm very thankful.

Also, I've watched Defiance, and highly recommend it as one of the best films lately released on DVD. If I ever get Connor to update Tolle Lege any time soon, you should be able to read a full-length review of it. For now, you have to be content with my unreserved recommendation of the movie to all those who can handle an average (for a R-rated movie) level of violence and language. In all other respects it is laudably discreet.

Finally, I think I can say with some conviction that Vincere Omnia has reached the halfway point. Of course, these things are never easy to gauge unless one works from a carefully laid plan (which I never do, perhaps to my detriment), but looking at how much has happened, and how much remains to happen before the end, I think I'm at least two fifths in, if nothing else. It's difficult to write a novel that takes a character from age 10 up to middle age without either having awkward gaps or dragging lulls, but so far I've managed to pull off the progression with what seems to me to be passable dexterity. At least, my small readership has not complained yet. Mom has noted once or twice that the intensity and anticipation of the earlier parts of the novel has been lost somewhat lately (which was to some extent inevitable, but hopefully not irredeemable), but if all goes as planned the novel should be pretty unrelentingly intense from here onwards; I myself can't wait to write the conclusion I have in mind.

That's all for now, chaps. Lord willing I'll update again soon, before I leave anyway.

P.S. I've decided that our society is not completely devoid of useful customs: getting a few hefty checks in the mail for nothing more than breezing through highschool does much to raise the spirits. ;-)

P.P.S. My siblings have lately inspired me to write a comic short story called The Great Elopement. I may post it here when it's done.

A Curious Correlation

The 1680s:

The 1780s:

The 1880s:

And the 1980s:

All evidence leads to the conclusion that in the ninth decade of a given century, human beings are subconsciously yet invariably inclined to inflict upon themselves that most unnatural of curses popularly known as "big hair". Why this is has not yet been determined, but I am in the process of researching it.

Finally, Those Reviews

As You Like It
You never quite know what you’re going to get from Kenneth Branagh, unless it be not always well-realized originality. Hence I approached As You Like It without any fixed expectations.

Fortunately, it turned out to be one of Branagh’s better efforts. The setting of 19th century Japan seemed a strange one at first, but it ultimately works well for a play that is deliberately and self-consciously fanciful, once one gets over the idea of a Japanese shepherdess named Phoebe, and a black man with a perfect English accent named Orlando. The beautiful scenery of the Japanese forests makes a perfectly idyllic setting for Arden, and naturally leads to the inclusion of sumo wrestling, ninjas, Buddhist monks and katanas, though never at the expense of plot.

Everyone turned in an excellent performance. Among the cast were some old familiars such as Brian Blessed and Jimmy Yuill, alongside such unexpected faces as Bryce-Dallas Howard as Rosalind, and Alfred Molina as Touchstone, who, despite their unpleasant associations with the Spiderman films, turn in charming performances. Indeed, charming would be a good description for the whole of the movie, which was a joy to watch from beginning to end, full of humor and levity as well as melancholy and sobriety, which is just as Shakespeare intended, we presume. Branagh himself is conspicuously absent from, and though I think he might have made a decent Touchstone himself, the movie gets along well enough under his direction that it does not need him to appear on screen.

All in all this was a delightful adaptation and one which, unlike some of Branagh’s other works, is more or less appropriate for the whole family, unless one is troubled by a brief session of making out between Audrey and Touchstone that quickly devolves into slapstick, and of course the scantiness of traditional sumo wrestling attire.

Body of Lies
A suitably bearded Leonardo DiCaprio stars as Roger Ferris, a capable and dedicated CIA field officer (possibly SAD, but never made explicitly clear) repeatedly frustrated by his superior Ed Hoffman, an overweight and perpetually eating Russell Crowe. Ferris begins the story stationed in Iraq, primarily occupied with finding al-Saleem, a terrorist leader with ties to al-Qaeda, who has been conducting attacks throughout Europe and the Middle East. But his hunt soon leads him as far afield as Jordan and Dubai, as he makes increasingly complex attempts to capture his illusive target, and is nearly always undermined by the clumsiness or indifference of Hoffman.

This is one of the better movies involving terrorism in the modern world, in part though not entirely because it deals with the activities of real terrorist organizations and the real conflicts against them, even if all the characters are fictional. Al-Saleem is a rather obvious stand-in for Usama ibn Laden, but otherwise all of the characters seem to exist in their own right. Ridley Scott does an expectedly fine job developing his story, and the actors are all splendid. Mark Strong was particularly compelling as the head of Jordan’s GID, and Crowe was amusing and disturbing at the same time, eating Goldfish at his daughter’s soccer game while talking casually to Ferris, who is in the middle of all the action. The film highlights both the advantages and disadvantages of the abilities of modern technology and communications in covert operations: Ferris gets a call from his divorce lawyer in the middle of a dangerous mission, and Hoffman, viewing everything from unmanned aerial vehicles, perpetually interferes with operations on the ground, much to Ferris’s annoyance. But apart from examining this discrepancy between the men on the ground and the men in the office in the War on Terror, it was never very clear to me what the movie was trying to say.

That some reviews accused the movie of leaning too far left while others said it tottered to the right is perhaps a good sign. To me it seemed remarkably balanced, all things considered. Yes, it did suggest that the CIA is generally incompetent, but not for lack of ability or resource by men in the field so much as too much control by men too far away from the action. Yes, it did explicitly suggest that American interrogation techniques pretty much amount to guys in olive drab undershirts and buzz cuts clubbing prisoners to death, but so does it depict terrorists quoting the Qur’an while smashing a man’s fingers with a hammer and preparing to cut off his head on camera.

Connor suggested that perhaps the ultimate point of the film was that the situation in the Middle East today is much more complicated than most people realize, and is not simply a case of Americans good, Towel-Heads bad, or Arabs good, Western Imperialist bad. At one point Hoffman says, “Nobody’s innocent in this s**t, Ferris.” Perhaps he’s right. At any rate, the movie seems to suggest as much. Neither the Arabs nor the Americans are as a class depicted as saints or devils in this movie. Nothing is as straightforward or easy or simple as it may seem from an armchair. And regardless of your opinion of the War, this much is impossible to deny. So if you’re in the mood for a soberer and more realistic look at terrorism in the world today than that offered by, say, 24 or Vantage Point, you might want to check out Body of Lies.

Graphic violence including beatings, whippings, and lots of shootings, as well as fairly pervasive foul language, are things to be aware of.

Mongol
This movie showed up in our Netflix recommendations, with many a positive review accompanying it. It was considered by some the best film of 2008, and described somewhere or other as “a far-east Braveheart.” Now those of you who know me well know that I am no great fan of Braveheart as a historical drama, but maintain that it makes for decently entertaining stuff, if nothing else.

Unfortunately Mongol (first in a planned trilogy) failed on both counts. I don’t quite see how they managed it: they had a decent budget at their disposal, and as their subject the dramatic early life of the man who conquered one of the biggest empires the world has ever known, from Korea to the Ukraine. The soundtrack was good, the cinematography was excellent, and there were some fine battle scenes to boot, but on the whole for all its grandeur and self-importance, the movie seemed unaware that what it was actually showing us was not at all interesting.

Loosely based on the legends of the early life of Temujin—later and better known as Genghis Khan—Mongol manages to give us a story that is big but boring, “epic” but empty. Although supposedly true, the early story of Temujin feels very conventional: his great father is poisoned, an imposter takes over the tribe and enslaves him, his bride is stolen, etc. It could have been decently interesting in better hands, but as it came off it was anything but. Strangely enough, Temujin escapes from bondage as a young boy, and the next we see of him, he is a man, running around in a field as he is captured again. There is no explanation of what took place during all the years in between, but apparently Temujin becomes an expert fighter and tactician, yet manages not to get married or become attached to any tribe.

The movie sacrifices the potentially more interesting and more historical in order to develop its rather ludicrous idea of Temujin as the devoted husband and father that he clearly was not (so many were his wives, concubines and mistresses that I’m told some estimate that 8% of all Asian men are related to him). An uninteresting, implausible, and non-historical subplot in which Temujin is sold as a slave and rescued by his wife Borte takes up time that could have been used to show how he managed to unite the nomadic and tribal Mongols under him. Instead we get a scene where, after frolicking in the grass with his children, Temujin hears from Borte (in about three sentences) that the Mongols have become lawless. He leaps astride his horse, saying that he knows how to deal with Mongols, and rides off alone into the sunset. Without further ado we are thrust into the future, all the Mongols united under Temujin’s banner, save for a few old enemies who face him across the vast battlefield. Perhaps writer and director Sergei Bodrov realized that a society of nomadic bandits would not be inclined to follow the landless, tribeless, hopelessly in love fellow that he had created just because his name was Temujin, and so decided not to deal with it. Either way, I felt like I was cheated out of a potentially interesting historical movie and instead shown a conventional and unlikely romance that had little potential even with well-drawn characters, which these were not.

The dialogue is all in Mongolian, and no doubt is much better than its translation in the subtitles, but all the same the Mongols spend far too much time talking about Mongols: “Mongols don’t go to war over women;” “Mongols do not kill children;” “All Mongols are afraid of thunder.” You’d think they’d all know that, being Mongols themselves. I don’t know much about the historical facts of Genghis Khan and his times, but even I was troubled by the conspicuous absence of archers in most of the battle scenes, despite the fact that it was the Mongol’s signature weapon. Oh yes, and a blazing, sunlit day in the midst of a desert being turned to pitch blackness by sudden storm clouds completely ruined any effectiveness the climax might otherwise have had.

I could say a lot more, but I won’t. Suffice it to say that I think the only reason this movie got so many positive reviews was that it was foreign. But alas, Hollywood’s infection has spread to the East as well.

Hidalgo
Viggo Mortensen stars as Frank Hopkins, a former long-distance horse racer who, along with his mustang Hidalgo, has become a mere attraction in Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West Show. An envoy from Arabia arrives announcing that the Sheik of sheiks is offended by Cody’s claim that Hidalgo is the world’s greatest endurance racer, and challenges Hopkins either to participate in the Ocean of Fire or withdraw the title from his horse. This Ocean of Fire being a race from the southern regions of the Arabian peninsula up to Damascus. Chiefly interested in the hefty purse bestowed on the winner, Hopkins agrees to pit his mustang against the finest horses in Arabia in what might well be the world’s longest race. (Incidentally, the story is based on feats the real Hopkins boasted of, but which in all likelihood never occurred. The Ocean of Fire itself was a fabrication of his.)

Hopkins arrives in Arabia and complications ensue as bandits try to steal the great Sheik’s finest horse, and as a bargaining chip naturally capture his daughter, who happens to be betrothed to a prince who plays a series of dirty tricks to keep Hopkins out of the race. And then there is an avaricious English lady who owns a horse in the race and will do anything to win, including hiring bandits to kill contestants. Oh yes, and a chap named Sakhr (Arabic for hawk), who trots about with a hawk on his wrist, is a stickler for the rules (which include not helping other riders in any way), and thinks the entry of an Infidel in the race to be sacrilege.

All this makes for an enjoyable adventure movie of the old fashioned sort, with lots of scimitars and six-shooters and exotic settings. Of course there are the usual clichés: the Sheik’s daughter naturally is rebellious against the Islamic restrictions placed on women (which are not as watered-down as I would have expected from a Disney movie) to the point of being downright foolhardy. Certainly there are and were such women in the Muslim world, but it strikes me as a copout to only present such people in one’s movies. To me, it is much more interesting and provocative to depict people who are in agreement, or at least tolerance, of a situation we in the modern West may deem distasteful without making them villains. It is likewise fairer, in my view. But that’s an argument for another time. Suffice it to say that she gets away with much that would have gotten her stoned in real life, particularly if she were the daughter of such an esteemed and revered man.

Hopkins’s cowboyism is a little overdone at times, and Arabs self-consciously referring to themselves as belonging to “a horse-culture” felt jarringly anachronistic, but on the whole it was a fun movie that worked well within its own world on most levels. Naturally it was accused by the critics of being racist because it depicted Arabs as a slave-owning people with misogynist tendencies, a very harsh sense of justice, and a superiority complex, but if the movie is racist, then it is the whites who really suffer from it. With the exception of Hopkins (who is half Sioux) all the white men are at best corrupt or ignorant and at worst murderous. At least among the Arabs there are good men as well as bad. The Sioux are of course holy and blameless.

But in spite of its flaws, if you’re looking for a fun adventure movie that for the most part doesn’t take itself more seriously than it ought to (except at the end), you’ll likely enjoy Hidalgo.

Somewhat intense but largely bloodless violence is the chief reason for the PG-13, along with an attempted seduction that does not progress very far and will indeed go over the heads of any not old enough to understand what is happening from the implications of the dialogue and situation.

Chiefly for Fun

So. Most of you are familiar with this curious practice, but in case there are any newcomers lurking in the shadows, here the explanation: I've often wondered what my many stories would be like if translated onto the screen, and naturally I always envision crucial parts such as the opening, the ending, the music, the casting, and of course, the trailer. So here below is a screenplay of sorts for the trailer of Vincere Omnia as I would create it. It was tricky to write in such a way as to avoid leaking critical plot details, but I think I succeeded. So here it is (and I'll have those reviews finished before the week is out, Deo volente).

------------------------------------------------------------------

The screen is black. Thunder rolls in the background as text appears across the blackness.

Media vita, in morte summus.

Thunder rolls again, and the blackness fades into a broad, green valley, overshadowed by dark, rolling storm clouds. The camera pans from left to right over the valley, which is empty save for a few round barrows. Suddenly the camera halts as a lone man comes into view. His back is toward us as he leans against a winged spear, and his grey cloak whips in the wind as thunder rumbles again.

Redwald in voiceover: SO.

Fade out. A slow and steady drumbeat begins, and is the only accompaniment to what follows.

IF IT IS THE TALE OF MY LIFE YOU WOULD HEAR…

Fade in to a brief shot of a young boy and a slightly older girl running cheerfully through tall grass. It is still overcast. Fade out.

…HOW WYRD BEAT ME, TORE ME, SCOURGED ME…

Cut to the same boy, now in a ragged, undyed shirt with an iron torc around his neck, slumped in a pigsty.

…DENIED ME PEACE AND CAME NIGH UNTO BREAKING ME…

Cut to a Viking warrior with a bloody axe over his shoulder, stepping slowly through the doorway of a farmhouse. Fade out.

…THEN YOU MUST KNOW THAT MINE IS NO TALE OF NOBLE BANES.

Fade in to a great flock of ravens winging across a winter sky.

WHO CANNOT NAME COUNTLESS MEN BROUGHT TO NAUGHT BY TYRANTS…

Cut to a Viking jarl sitting at his high seat in the mead hall, his hird all around him, eating and feasting.

…AND TREACHERY…

Cut to a fleeting shot of one warrior stabbing another.

…FIERCE FOES…

Cut to a Viking shield-wall advancing slowly over a battlefield, the Raven Banner fluttering overhead.

…WILLFUL WOMAN…

Cut to a hooded, dark-haired woman in a snowy forest, turning to glance sidelong at the camera.

…OR SIMPLY AN ILL TURN OF FORTUNE?

Cut to a burning village. Fade out.

BUT NOT I.

Anúna’s version of Media Vita begins to play in the background.

Fade in to The Boy again, now a little older, burying his face in bloodstained hands. Fade out.

I HAVE BEEN MY OWN CURSE.

Cut suddenly to The Boy running in terror across a bare, frozen plain.

Cut to a Viking funeral procession, walking slowly through the night bearing torches.

Cut to The Boy embracing his sister.

Welshman in voiceover: Behold, a people shall come down from the north.

Cut to a huge fleet of longships emerging from a misty sea.

Welshman in voiceover: They shall hold the bow and the spear.

Cut to a Danish woman handing a spear to her Viking husband.

Cut to Vikings and Saxons locked in battle, the shield-walls shoving hard against one another.

Welshman in voiceover: They are cruel and show no mercy.

Cut to a horde of Vikings swarming ashore and charging a hill fort.

Welshman in voiceover: Their voice shall roar like the sea.

Cut to an albino woman in a dark cloak kneeling atop a stone pyre and shrieking as she raises a bloody knife.

Cut to a ragged Saxon host working their way through a marsh.

Cut a Saxon Warrior seated by a campfire, speaking to someone out of frame.

Saxon Warrior: I have sworn to kill Northmen, any Northmen, until my kinsmen are all avenged.

Cut to three men stealing over a wooden palisade at night.

Older man in voiceover: And when will that be?

Cut back to Saxon Warrior, glancing up.

Saxon Warrior: When they have killed me, too.

Music intensifies. Cut to the Saxon Warrior kneeling before a stone high cross at a crossroads.

Cut to a close-up of his neck, where he fingers a small bronze cross.

Saxon Warrior in voiceover: Wyrd is everything.

Cut to a Saxon king kneeling at his coronation.

Cut to someone sharpening a sword.

Saxon Warrior in voiceover: Our hopes, nothing.

Cut to the Saxon Warrior on his knees in the snow, facing off against a wolf.

Cut to a man throwing a screaming woman across the front of his saddle.

Saxon Warrior in voiceover: If this is my road…

Cut to four riders in masks galloping down a forest road.

Cut to an Irish warrior thrusting his spear into someone out of frame.

Cut to a Saxon host waving their weapons and howling.

Saxon Warrior in voiceover: …then I will not leave it.

Cut to a shadowy figure kicking in the door of a mead hall.

Cut to a close-up of a hand thrusting a sword downward.

Fade out. Music ends.

Female in voiceover: And when you reach the end of it? What then?

Fade in to two hands clasping, one a man’s, one a woman’s, and both bloody. Fade out.

Vincere Omnia