The Solitudes

by John Crowley

book data

249 ratings, 4.00 average rating, 46 reviews (more data...)

rating	frequency	%
5		39%
4		33%
3		16%
2		8%
1		2%

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published

October 2nd 2007 (first published 1987) by Overlook TP

binding

Paperback, 432 pages

isbn

1585679860 (isbn13: 9781585679867)

description

Reengaging the ideas of alternate lives, worlds, and worldviews that pulsed through his remarkable Little, Big, John Crowley's Ã†gypt series is a l...more

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02/14/08

Elizabeth rated it:

bookshelves: 2008, elizabethan, twentieth-century-late

Read in March, 2008

I've never before come to the end of book and been unsure of whether or not I liked it. I'm intrigued by it. I'd even say fascinated, or, perhaps, compelled is a better word. There is so much to think about. What is the meaning of history? What if there are multiple, real histories (not just multiple historical interpretations) that lie next to each other, like folds in one piece of cloth? Especially for someone who studied history, this is fascinating book for its questions. For someone who lov...more

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02/13/08

Jason Pettus rated it:

Read in February, 2008

(My full review of this book is much longer than GoodReads' word-count limitations. Find the entire essay at the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com].)

So to even begin understanding today's essay, you need to first understand the following -- that what we now know as modern "science," back when it was invented in the 1500s, was in fact mostly a religious pursuit when it was first created. See, such deep thinkers back then ultimately wanted to be c...more (My full review of this book is much longer than GoodReads' word-count limitations. Find the entire essay at the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com].)

So to even begin understanding today's essay, you need to first understand the following -- that what we now know as modern "science," back when it was invented in the 1500s, was in fact mostly a religious pursuit when it was first created. See, such deep thinkers back then ultimately wanted to be closer to God, and that led them to closely studying the way that God works out in nature; and since they wanted to share these discoveries with other deep thinkers, and be able to reproduce the discoveries in other environments around the world, a whole set of systematic rules started getting developed for how to perform and record such observations. And thus did the entire thing start resembling the "scientific process" we know today (form a theory; test it under unbiased conditions that can be reproduced by anyone; share your findings no matter what they are); and thus did such a process have less and less to do with religion over the centuries, with such "scientists" deliberately drubbing out such former mystical elements of their profession as alchemy so as to get the public to take them more seriously.

But was it in fact a mistake to drub out such metaphysical elements from what we now know as science? Did in fact the deep thinkers of humanity before the Renaissance have a different understanding of the way the world works, precisely by combining science with mysticism in the way they did back then, and did the deep thinkers of the Renaissance actually ruin something for humanity by separating the two topics? That's the question at the heart of John Crowley's The Solitudes, part 1 of a four-book cycle known officially as "Ægypt" (or "AEgypt" as I'll be calling it for the remainder of today's essay, to better accommodate those on web devices that cannot display special characters), a book which originally came out in 1987 but just last year received a major reworking and publishing. It is a frustrating book, I'll warn you right off the bat -- a dense, thick, scholarly novel, written in a style meant to sometimes deliberately confuse the reader, with a pacing that can drive you crazy at points and a storyline that is constantly flying at least a little bit right over your head. But it's also one of the most fascinating books I've read in years as well, a book that proposes ideas I've never heard another fantastical author even mention, ideas that literally take a lifetime of academic study to produce in the first place. It's a confusing book that elicits all kinds of shifting emotions in me that are hard to pin down; all of those things are of course going to end up affecting what I have to say about it today.

For example, let's start with just the surface-level plot itself; it is ostensibly the story of Pierce Moffett, a burned-out '60s history professor now muddling through life in the late '70s when our story takes place, who at the beginning of the book is just finishing up a disastrous few years in New York City, teaching at a hipster college in Brooklyn and living with a cunning and beautiful coke dealer in a concrete-lined condo in midtown Manhattan, going deeply into debt to support both the lifestyle the girlfriend brings and to help finance the illegal schemes she's constantly in the middle of cooking up. All of the elements just mentioned have recently blown up in Pierce's face, which is what finds him traveling by bus at the beginning of the novel to attend an interview at a precious private college in the northeast boonies; but right in the middle of the trip the bus breaks down, by complete coincidence in the picturesque upstate New York town of Faraway Hills, where by complete and utter coincidence an old '60s radical friend of his is now living and raising sheep. And thus does Pierce ditch the unmade interview and decide to relocate to Faraway Hills instead; and thus does he attend a series of precious small-town events like annual town-wide croquet matches and hot-air balloon races; and thus does Pierce ring up an ex-girlfriend who's now a literary agent and propose a new job for himself -- as the author of a series of Tolkien-style "Chariot of the Gods" type fantasy novels, so trendily popular in the late '70s, positing a world in which ancient races in mythical cities actually carved out the world we now know, just to fall into obscurity and to be forgotten in modern times.

Ah, but here's the first big complication -- that Pierce isn't kidding about any of the stuff being proposed, and in fact...(less)

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11/20/07

Kelly McCubbin rated it:

(review of isbn 0553051946)

Read in January, 1995

recommends it for: Everyone

Possibly the most formative book I've ever read. The main character, Pierce Moffat, feels so familiar to me that it was easy for Crowley's brilliant prose to influence how I saw the world.
Often compared to Robertson Davies in his use of history and sense of detail, Crowley actually leaves the old master behind with the sheer world-cracking scope of the piece.
Intellectually demanding, but rewarding beyond belief.
This is the beginning of a four book series which was completed th...more

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03/22/09

Vicky rated it:

Toward the end of this very strange and ingenious novel, the author reviews it himself. The hero, Pierce Moffett, has come across an unpublished manuscript by a deceased author, and it sounds very much like The Solitudes itself:

"For it wasn't a *good* book at all, Pierce supposed, considered as a book, a novel; it was a philosophical romance, remote and extravagant, without much of the tang of life as it really must have gone on in the world--as it really *had* gone on if you me...more

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06/30/08

Michael rated it:

bookshelves: slipstream

Read in July, 2008

When I first read this book (under its original title _Aegypt_) I greatly enjoyed it but I didn't have a mature enough perspective to get the most out of it. I also didn't know there was a sequel, and so when I read the third book in the sequence (_Daemonomania_) I was completely lost.

There is another history of the world, concurrent with the history taught to you in school, and Pierce Moffett seeks to chronicle this secret history (peopled by Giordano Bruno, John Dee, and Will Shake...more

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11/22/07

Augustapalmer added it

Read in October, 2007

recommends it for: Anyone who likes alternative histories

Just re-read this and highly recommend it. This series of four books argues that "there is more than one history of the world." In fact, we each make up our own. In particular, these books suggest that history has a series of hairpin curves which completely alter our perception of the past as well as the present. Moments like the Renaissance and the 1960s dredged up ancient texts and opened up a wide range of possibilities that closed down in ensuing decades. The book has amazing chara...more

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04/21/09

Jim Lane rated it:

(review of isbn 0553051946)

I read these books out of order, having discovered Love and Sleep in the library about 5 years after its publication. The world Crowley builds creeps into your mind slowly. The books are slow-moving and dense, but that's part of the point, I think. Crowley gives you time to contemplate the way it really happens, it comes to you while life goes on. There are huge background themes behind the characters, and you glimpse them more clearly than the characters thanks to the historical sections of...more

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01/03/08

Aaron rated it:

(review of isbn 0553051946)

Read in August, 2007

This book will blow your noodle with its investigation into the notion that the world was once totally different than it now is, and that it was possible, during a time, to actually make lead into gold and build a perpetual motion machine. Alas, that knowledge is now lost for good and can never be recovered. Crazy shit.

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07/03/08

Nicolas rated it:

(review of isbn 2266081411)

bookshelves: fantastique, histoire

Read in July, 2001

En fait, le problème, c’est que dès le début, j’ai été noyé par les différents personnages qui se mélangent les uns aux autres sans aucune séparation : on passe du “héros” ou plutôt du personnage principal de Pierce Moffet au Docteur Dee ou à Giordano Bruno sans rien pour nous signaler ces passages, ce qui est très déstabilisant. Déja, ca rendait les choses difficiles, mais je me suis accroché par habitude : je ne supporte pas de ne pas terminer un roman. Le problème, c�...more

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04/15/08

Anneke Dubash rated it:

Read in May, 2008

I am about half way through the book and am enjoying it. However, I find that, unlike "Little, Big", it isn't moving along as swiftly as I would like. I find myself dozing off in parts, particularly in the bits which SHOULD be interesting, where he is laying out the whys and wherefores of Ægypt...

However, I persevere.

Interestingly enough, I had never heard of Dr. John Dee before and the other evening, I was watching a documentary of odd things at the British M...more

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02/12/08

Nancy rated it:

(review of isbn 0553374303)

bookshelves: favorite, fiction, metafiction

I will say right off the bat that this is a book that is (as I saw in a book review somewhere) NFE: Not for Everyone. It resonated with me on very many levels and for many reasons, but it is not anywhere close to mainstream fiction. I happen to prefer books that are somewhat "quirky" and this is about as quirky as they get. Having said that, let me state for those who enjoy a very good off-the-wall type of read, that this is probably one of the better books I've read lately, and how fo...more I will say right off the bat that this is a book that is (as I saw in a book review somewhere) NFE: Not for Everyone. It resonated with me on very many levels and for many reasons, but it is not anywhere close to mainstream fiction. I happen to prefer books that are somewhat "quirky" and this is about as quirky as they get. Having said that, let me state for those who enjoy a very good off-the-wall type of read, that this is probably one of the better books I've read lately, and how fortunate for me that I have the next two in the group (Love and Sleep, Daemonomania) so I can continue the story. Why I bought these, I do not know; I was just flipping through book reviews a couple of years ago and they reached out and grabbed me.

So, this is a book that is incredibly difficult to summarize, and my copy is filled with post-it notes for things I thought were very cool, but I'll try to keep this brief.

At the center of this story is a man named Pierce Moffett, who teaches history at a small university and hates his boss, hates his job and has been exploring a theory he's held for many years that quite possibly some sort of history of the world exists besides the one that everyone knows, and that everything that is known in this other world (know lost) goes back in time and place to a country called Aegypt. Not Egypt, Aegypt. He muses, when thinking about Gypsies ('Gyptians":

"Why do we believe Gypsies can tell fortunes? Because they came not really from Egypt, but from AEgypt, the country where the magic arts were known. And still carry with them...the skills their ancestors had known....And why were they wandering the earth, and why do they still wander? Because AEgypt has fallen. It exists no longer...its wise men and women went forth carrying with them their knowledge, to remember their country and yet never speak of it..." (102).

Aegypt, is not a real place, but (imho) a metaphor for a time when spirits were in everything, and when practitioners developed magic arts to use to placate the spirits or to make supplication to them. This knowledge was handed down, and as people made more discoveries about their world and their environment, as well as their own place within each, they began to order experience around gods, astrology, and other forces. However, at some point, all of this was lost, but remnants of it still exist. Moffett wants to write a book about the history that was, but remains hidden, with only traces left that manifest themselves from time to time. This is what calls to Moffett, and this is what he wants to learn, teach and write about. Through a series of circumstances, he finds himself settled in a little town called Blackbury Jambs, where he makes an amazing discovery. I won't go into it here, in the off-chance that someone else picks up this book and reads it.

The structure of the book was also part of its appeal: It is really a book within a book (or actually, maybe more than one book within a book), as the reader is treated to the writings of Fellowes Kraft, whose fiction draws on the arcane (encounters between Shakespeare & Doctor Dee, the famous magician), on Giordano Bruno, a heretic who was burned at the stake, and whose writings Moffett thrived on as a child and which will once again play a role in Moffett's quest for this hidden history.

Truly, this was a fascinating read, and I was pretty much glued to it once I started reading it. I HIGHLY recommend this novel,(less)

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12/20/07

David Hill rated it:

(review of isbn 0553051946)

Read in December, 2007

I eagerly approached this book on the recommendation of a couple of friends. However, Aegypt wasn't all that I hoped it would be. The main character, Pierce Moffett, is a history professor who discovers the symbolic and mythological underpinnings of the history that he has studied for so long. He becomes fascinated by Hermetics and the works of Dee and Bruno. The portions of the book dedicated to Moffett's exploration of these subjects are excellent. The writing is delightful and fanciful, and ...more

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11/06/07

Tim rated it:

(review of isbn 0553051946)

bookshelves: contemporary-fiction

Read in November, 2007

I came across the last book in this series and it sounded really interesting, so I dug up the first book, this book, and looked forward to it. All I can say is that it is a major letdown. Neat idea, or captivating at least, but poor execution. It felt like it took three-hundred pages just to get the story to start and that was at the end. The historical fiction parts were boring. It all fits together, and I think the reader is supposed to have this moment when they realize that the book the...more

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08/15/07

Brooke rated it:

(review of isbn 0553051946)

bookshelves: 2008

Read in April, 2008

There is more than one history of the world - or so John Crowley says repeatedly in Aegypt (original titled The Solitudes, apparently), the first in a four-book series.

I have to admit, I almost didn't make it through. The first 1/3 of the book is sloooow and pretentious. I hate leaving books unfinished, though, so I plowed ahead. Once Crowley finishes laying out his thesis and starts moving along, it gets better. Still so very pretentious, but better.

It skips back and f...more

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06/12/09

Letha added it

While many people seem to find this first one a difficult read I loved the hopping around between time periods and don't mind the (struggles) and defects of the main character...

For me, Crowley's books are big concept pieces, some with much better story frame works than others, but over all he's a really fascinating author in his ability to deeply examine a idea and it's relationships to history (in this case), social/cultural mores. language and imagination...

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11/16/08

Chris rated it:

bookshelves: blooms-canon, lit--fiction

Read in November, 2008

recommends it for: people who like A. S. Byatt

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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02/06/08

Abigail rated it:

Read in January, 2008

I just started to write that "this book is like a mystery book for history lovers" but that makes it sound like the DaVinci code or something. The parallel is not ridiculous - there is definitely talk of ancient mysteries explained, etc. - but the writing is much better, the characters more believable, and the import decidedly more philosophic. The story blends beautifully the stories of actual 16th century figures -- secular (Shakespeare), religious (Giordano Bruno), and a little of...more

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01/23/09

Kristin marked it as to-read (review of isbn 0553051946)

bookshelves: to-read

this is next on my list of series to read ... i have the set on hold at the library ....

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07/02/09

Katie is currently reading it (review of isbn 0553051946)

bookshelves: currently-reading

Read in July, 2009

I'm 20 pages in and a little confused. We'll see how it goes.

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06/29/08

Green Apple Books & Music rated it:

In the following year, Overlook Press will publish all four volumes of John Crowley's neglected masterpiece, The Aegypt Cycle. Begin the dazzling adventure now with The Solitudes, in which our hero Pierce Moffet becomes enrapted in a strange world of "questions, more questions and mysteries." Crowley writes beautifully and his vast erudition on matters obscure and occult is impressive and delightful. Find out why Harold Bloom enshrined book two of this saga in his "Western Canon"...more

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