The Princess and Curdie (Princess Irene and Curdie, #2) in Into the Forest

Jun 27, 2015 Andromeda M31 rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fantasy

The sequel to the earlier Princess and the Goblin, the Princess and Curdie follows the young miner boy, Curdie, in his quest to restore the King of Gwyntystorm and punish its corrupt inhabitants. The Princess and the Goblin is a fantasy romp, but this sequel is a stranger book.

Although Curdie's fellow miners on the Mountain tell stories of an ugly witch hag, Curdie over comes his stagnation and cynicism and seeks out the Princess's Grandmother, the Hag. The Elder Irene, sorceress, Grandmother, The sequel to the earlier Princess and the Goblin, the Princess and Curdie follows the young miner boy, Curdie, in his quest to restore the King of Gwyntystorm and punish its corrupt inhabitants. The Princess and the Goblin is a fantasy romp, but this sequel is a stranger book.

Although Curdie's fellow miners on the Mountain tell stories of an ugly witch hag, Curdie over comes his stagnation and cynicism and seeks out the Princess's Grandmother, the Hag. The Elder Irene, sorceress, Grandmother, and Queen in the attic, enlists Curdie for an unknown mission. She tells him that secretly, men and women who do not behave with goodness and humanity spiritually devovle into beasts. Burning his hands in her furnace of white and red roses, she grants Curdie the power to touch a person's hand and feel the beast within, such as a snake, a pig, or a mule. The companion for his quest is Lina, an ugly dog-like beast with a heavy rat tail, the throat of a turkey, and the head of a bear, but the spiritual hands of a young girl.

Together, Curdie and Lina travel to the Kingdom of Gwyntystorm, home of Princess Irene and her father from the first book. The King is surrounded by evil and scheming courtiers and has been lying sick in bed for months, slowly poisoned by his doctor. Backed by an array of strange monsters and friends of Lina, Curdie and the Princess struggle to restore order and save her father.

I love this book. I love this book for its strangeness and its Christian mysticism. I love the Elder Irene and her fire of roses able to burn away sadness, terror, and evil. I love Lina, the ugly companion of Curdie, for her past that is never, ever explained. And I love MacDonald's style:

"And so the day went on, and the evening came, and in the middle of a great desolate heath Curdie began to feel tired, and sat down under an ancient hawthorne, through which every now and then a lone wind that seemed to come from nowhere and to go nowhither sighed and hissed. It was very old and distorted. There was not another tree for miles all around. It seemed to have lived so long, and to have been so torn and tossed by the tempests on that moor, that it had at last gathered a wind of its own, which got up now and then, tumbled itself about, and lay down again."

Moral Christian fiber is enforced ...more

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