“I go where danger is because I think that an answer might lie there–some reason for all this tragedy and paradox. Yet I know I shall never find it.”

Following on my recent first foray into Michael Moorcock’s Eternal Champion series, with Elric of Melnibone, it was easy and far too compelling (given that I had the next two books in the same collection) to see what the forces of Law and Chaos held in store for this tortured albino anti-hero. Thus I continued on with The Sailor on the Seas of Fate with every intention of getting back to my summer reading list only to find myself turning the page to begin The Weird of the White Wolf.

While this may seem like an accomplishment to have read three novels in less than a week, I must confess that the whole of the trilogy that makes up my book club edition of The Elric Saga: Part 1 weighs in at a mere 374 pages…so less than half of the standard fantasy tomes that are produced today.

Nevertheless, what these stories lack in page count they more than make up for in content, whisking the reader from one adventure to the next, all the while building upon the reputation of Elric and his blood-thirsty sword, Stormbringer. But these are not mere adventure tales, for in the tellings of the tales of Elric of Melnibone we see a great internal struggle of mind and spirit, and a more cosmic struggle with the ideas of fate, destiny and the forces of man’s will.

The Sailor on the Seas of Fate

In this novel we get three stories as Elric sets out from Melnibone on his year-long quest to explore the kingdoms outside of his own in an attempt to gain knowledge and settle the turmoil of his soul.  The first of these tales throws the reader into the heart of the idea of the Eternal Champion, as Elric is drawn into a quest by a mysterious ship that arrives at a fortuitous moment in his travels.  This ship and its crew is set upon a course to a city on another plane of existence and while there he meets three other incarnations with whom he must join to defeat a powerful brother-sister team of wizards.  The reader, whether initiated into the Eternal Champion mythos or not, gets tantalizing and mysterious glimpses into Moorcock’s multiverse through the eyes of the protagonist.  Michael Moorcock includes enough information to instill an appetite in the reader and then leaves the reader hungry for more.  It is this style of small revelation leading to greater mystery that has captured my attention and has kept me reading.

In the second story Elric comes face-to-face with an old and dangerous legend of his people and is drawn into a conflict to save a woman in part because of the remembrance she brings of his great love Cyromil who awaits him the city of Imyrr in Melnibone.  All the stories in this novel have a seafaring element upon which the title plays, this one more so than the other three and it provided an interesting change in backdrop from the previous adventures.

In the final section of this novel Elric travels to a land fabled to be the birthplace of his people.  Though he doubts the veracity of the claims of his companion, he feels compelled to examine the location to see what he can learn.  There the mysteries deepen, as does the danger which always seems to surround Elric.

The Weird of the White Wolf

This novel opens with a teasing prologue about a human hero, Earl Aubec of Malador, whose sword Elric is in possession of at the beginning of Elric of Melniborne.  The prologue introduced not one, but two very interesting characters that I seriously hope I see more of as I continue reading Moorcock’s work.  From there we see Elric amassing a motley crew to assist him in taking the vengeance he has been slowly nursing throughout the previous stories.  In addition to this chapter in Elric’s history, readers are taken on an adventure in which a presumably lost tomb of great worth is discovered and Elric determines to help obtain it in the hopes that it will answer one of two questions burning in his soul.  And finally an unearthly citadel appears in the midst of one of the Young Kingdoms and Elric is persuaded to explore its origins and purpose before more people disappear, never to be seen again.

With the stories in The Sailor on the Seas of Fate, Michael Moorcock introduces the multiverse and Eternal Champion incarnations in a more solid manner only hinted at in Elric of Melnibone.  Michael Moorcock takes what is largely a fantasy universe and puts just enough science fiction in the background for the story to be genre-defying.  While both of these novels are constructed of stories that are read like fully-contained short stories, they build towards a greater arc by having characters who pass between stories and events that reference previous stories.  For one who enjoys short stories as much as novels, this amounts to a ‘best of both worlds’ situation for me.

Michael Moorcock does some interesting things in his Elric stories, including pairing various companions with Elric.  This gives the protagonist a person, or occasionally a group of persons, upon which to play off of.  It assists in revealing the inner thoughts of Elric while also demonstrating the struggle of the dual nature that wars within him.  Elric is a complex character, with compassion and mercy and a call for knowledge warring against the cruel, narcissistic hedonism of his people, people whose traditions are part of his blood and birthright.  These companions often pass for what are Elric’s friends, though Elric himself is loathe to allow them to get too close and frequently warns them of the tragedies that befall those whose fates are tied to his.

Moorcock is not afraid to kill off characters, even the good, well-meaning ones, if it makes sense within the story (and even arguably when it does not).  The world in which Elric lives is tough, unforgiving and is in the line of sight of warring gods.  The fickle hand of Fate may actually be controlling everything, with Elric just a pawn, but Moorcock teases the idea that this also may not be the case.  Elric’s sword Stormbringer, who is only a minor character in the first novel, becomes a more prominent character in these two novels leading up to a climactic, path-altering moment that only increases Elric’s despair.

“I am a man possessed,” he groaned, “and without this devil-blade I carry I would not be a man at all.”

With each story-within-a-story I am fascinated with the way in which Moorcock’s prose ignites my nostalgia for other stories from my reading past that have a similar vibe while at the same time revealing unexpected elements that at the time of their publication subverted tropes and remain compelling reading today.  I’m thankful that I not only  have more Elric stories to experience but other incarnations of the Eternal Champion to explore.