The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret - 12: Gormenghast Pt. 1 (If My Headmaster Had a Trumpet)

Episode Date: April 19, 2026

The Truth Shall Make Ye Fret is a podcast in which your hosts, Joanna Hagan and Francine Carrel have emerged from Discworld and are now exploring the worlds of speculative fiction. This week, we venture back into the unhallowed halls of Gormenghast.Ridiculous Ritual! Perfidy and Professors! Delirious Dreams! Find us on the internet:BlueSky: @makeyefretpod.bsky.socialInstagram: @TheTruthShallMakeYeFretFacebook: @TheTruthShallMakeYeFretEmail: [e-mail]: www.patreon.com/thetruthshallmakeyefretDiscord: https://discord.gg/29wMyuDHGP Want to follow your hosts and their internet doings? Follow Joanna on BlueSky @2hatsjo and follow Francine @francibambi Things we blathered on about:Peake Studies   Jack dee's face complete compilation! - YouTubeHow Mervyn Peake was almost forgotten - spiked (PDF) The Anomalous Medievalism of Mervyn Peake’s GormenghastLiterary Language as a Tool for Design: An Architectural Study of the Spaces of Mervyn Peake's The Gormenghast Trilogy and 'Boy in Darkness' - Kent Academic Repository The Slow Regard of Silent Things by Patrick Rothfuss - Goodreads by Jove - Wiktionary Music: Chris Collins, indiemusicbox.com

Hang on, we should do the noises checking. Oh, yeah, there's that. That's an important one. Gives a bursar. Maybe a bit louder. Bursar? No, like you're an input. Oh, right, sorry.

Yeah, if you could just like for the rest of this and I can do that. Yeah, I can do that. Okay, sorry, bursar, does that sound better? Yeah, I does, thank you. This bodes so well. We've got to remember how to podcast. I know, I know.

I'm trying desperately to remember. What we're doing here, listeners, is just kind of having a coffee. And that is how the podcast started. There was some steps, though. And they involved reading Discworld, and I haven't done that. Yeah, that bit's weird. I haven't had a lot of sleep recently for various reasons. My insomnia, unfortunately, this week, started manifesting at the other

end of the night as well. And so I woke up at 10 to 5 on Friday and didn't go back to sleep, which is I don't think I've ever seen 10 to 5 from that end before. Anyway, point being, I didn't have a lot of grey matter left when I started reading half of Gorman Gass this morning. And it is now 5 to 8 in the evening. And it's time to talk about what we're lost. I read 271 pages of Gormacast today.

And yet again, as I said a year ago, why would you try and read half of this book in one day, that's stupid. Just read a chapter every day for a normal amount of time. Specifically on the day we're recording about it as well. Well, if I did it another day, I've forgotten it all immediately as a self-preservation thing. Yeah, no, that's fair. This is the best way to do it. So it's very fresh in your mind. It's recently very fresh in my mind, but that doesn't mean I've not forgotten everything that happens in it. Yeah. What I haven't done is looked up any other podcast that I've done Gormann Gass. I'd be interested, actually, once we've done this. Oh yeah, that's a good point. Listeners, if you've got

any other Gorman cast recommendations. Yeah. And if you have, I'm amazed that you're listening to this episode as well, because fuck me. Yeah, we are not rigorous scholars. I found some rigorous scholarship actually. I'm going to talk about that in the episode. I did. I wonder if we found the same rigorous scholarship. Well, I'm going to mention it in the intro, so if we did, that's all right. You can still reference it later. Excellent. Okay. Speaking of, do you want to make a podcast? Yeah, let's make a podcast. Fuck it. What's the worst that could happen? Don't say that, Francine. It's the worst bit foreshadowing considering the fucking book we're talking about.

Goodness me. What's the worst that could happen? She said, sailing through the air. Being eaten by owls, floating off into the moat. Falling into a ravine. Flaming deird. Setting fire to an archivist. Hoomster Moncus.

Amongus. Hello and welcome to Gormancast. Previously, I was the Trusha, Maki Fred. Help me. We were a podcast where we were reading and recapping every book from Terry Pratchett's Disquhar, but we finished that. Now we're wandering down the corridors of speculative fiction, and this is our now traditional for a short time, April.

Visit to Mervyn Peaks, wonderful, big, confusing castle. How many do you need to have before it's a tradition? I think three makes a pattern. So if we do the third book next April, then it's a tradition. will also have run out of Gormengarst. Well, no, there's an interstitial book, isn't there? You're an interstitial book. Yeah, no, there probably is.

Right, anyway, Abmin over. Yes, welcome. I'm Joanna Hagan. I'm Francine Carol. Hi, guys, it's been a while. We're back from a hiatus, and you get the joy of listening to us. Remember how to podcast while we talk about

a completely normal and nottle confusing book. This is part one of our discussion of Gorman Gars. We're starting at Chapter 1 and going up to the end of Chapter 39, So many chapters. It's a lot of chapters. Note on spoilers before we crack on. We're a spoiler like podcast. We're not going to spoil any Discworld, probably, or anything major.

We're not going to spoil the second half of Gormongars because neither rest of Reddit yet. But I've had it spoiled for me several times over. Actually, yeah, so have I. But we're not going to spoil it for you. No, we're going to try a very best not to. So that you can come on the journey with us. The awful, confusing labyrinth-time journey through corridors that oughtn't be.

Well quite. Or a nice springy journey through mosses in the forest. Yeah, I like that one better. Somehow also tinged with terror? Yeah. Because I don't think Mervyn Peake knows how to write a character getting from one place to another without terror.

Yeah, no, I think that's very true. I would go with Forest out if I had to pick out of the two, though. Oh yeah, for sure. That springing through the moss sounded amazing. Francine, do you want to introduce us to the book, Gorman Garde. I do want to do that. Amazing. Gorman Garland.

by Mervyn Peake. This is the second in the Gomonghast trilogy. If you remember, dear listeners, we did Titus Grown about this time last year. This one was published in 1950. It won the Heinemann Award in 1951. It won the Lopes Award at some point. It was, again, a very critically acclaimed book. I spoke last year about Peake's relationship with Tolkien, and I noted this time that the book bears a cover quote from C.S. Lewis would not for anything have missed Gorman cast. So yeah, it's hugely influential, absolutely bad shit. We talked about Pete himself quite a lot in our first Titus-grown episode, so I won't go in-depth again. But I have been reading more about him and I do still find him fascinating. And so I'll link a few things. There's an article called How Mervyn Peake was almost forgotten, which I think was a little misnamed. But it did contain some good quotes from other authors, including Antelie Burgess. It remains essentially a work of the closed imagination, Burgess writes,

in which a world parallel to our own is presented in an almost paranoid denseness of detail. But the madness is illusory and the control never falters. It is, if you like, a rich wine of fancy chilled by the intellect to just the right temperature. And that is a quote, I would say, written by a man who's just read too much Gorman Gass in one sitting. Yep. The PhD thesis that I read, which I think might be the one that you've also read, is an architectural study of the spaces of Mervyn Peaks, the Gorman Garsk trilogy and Boying Darkness. literary language is a tool for design?

No, I haven't read that. Oh, all right, brilliant. I found a broader spectrum of scholarship about Manpeak that I will, I'll talk about when we get there in the episode. All right, fantastic. Well, this thesis then, in which the author Imogen Helen Louise, Lesser Woods, tried to recreate Gormancast Castle by textual descriptions alone. I haven't read the whole thing yet because I only found it an hour ago, but it looks really interesting. It goes into discussion about the use or lack thereof of plain English. in architecture, that kind of thing.

That sounds amazing. So before I pass over to you, I'd just like to read this quote from Mervyn Peake, which I believe explains a bit. I had no method. I had no preconceived plan. I really wanted to make a kind of Pan Technicon book in which I could shove in any mental furniture

however horrible or however beautiful if I could do so. Well, that explains a lot, doesn't it? So what happened last time? Yeah, we can do a previously on Titus Grown, But not me. I'm not doing it. No, I'm going to do the previously on. You're going to show me up by doing it? No, it's not good.

I decided to do this entirely from, well, mostly from memory, but I had read the first half of Gormengarde, which has a much better previously on in it. So we don't really need this. A very confusing one. Confusing, but it works. So, right, previously on Tituscray, there's this massive castle and there's a room

and it's got a lot of carvings and statues in it, and that's because there are these people called the outer dwellers who do these carvings and statues. and the room is looked over by a guy called Mr Rockhod. So that's a place in the castle. There's this baby, Titus, who's born to the Countess grown. She likes birds. And the father is Sepulgrave, the 76th Earl of Gormengars.

So this baby is going to be the next Earl after Sepulcrow. Anyway, there's a lot of rituals. There's a guy called Sourdust who oversees the rituals. He's got a beard. Sepulgrave's got a guy working for him called Flay, who's got very clicky knees, and Flay tells a lot of people about the baby being born. Flay does not get on with the chef,

who I think is called Swelter. I checked, he did swelter And there's also future The Seppel Graves' daughter, she's 15, and she whimsies about a lot. There's this kitchen lad, steer pike, he's a bit of a wanker. Keep an hour on him.

Yep, watch him. Start social climbing by literally climbing. And then there's Dr. Perrine squatter. He lives sort of on the grounds, and he's got a sister called Irma, and he's a bit of a confidant for future, which is good because she needs someone. Anyway, Titus needs a wet nurse

because the countess is obviously busy with having birds and cats. Um, amazingly the birds and cats seem to also get on all right. It's fine. Yep. Uh, so they bring in Cader from the outer dwellings, um, who used to be beautiful, but isn't any more. So all this ritual is going on. Oh yeah, no, she still is at that point, isn't she?

Anyway, there's all this ritual going on. Steer Pike sort of befriends fuchs, gross, uh, and then sort of befriends the doctor. And then eventually gains the confidence of the twins, Cora and Clarice, who are sepulcraves, sisters. And believe that they should have gourmet gast. as much as they can believe anything they're not the brightest. He convinces them to set fire to the library during one of the rituals

so that he can play the hero. Sourdust, unfortunately, dies in the fire and is replaced by Barkentine, equally beardy, also on a crutch. The destruction of the library unfortunately destroys Sepulcrave, mentally at least. Then Flay and Swelter's...

Pine cones, yeah, there's a whole thing with pine cones, can worry about it. Flay and swelter, their animosity against each other finally boils over, so they face off, Swellter dies. Sepulgrave kind of disappears to get eaten by owls, as you do. Flay gets exiled.

Kada returns to the outer dwellings, her lovers face off. She has a child by one of them. And then there's a ceremony in which Titus becomes the 77th Earl of Gormongast because Sepulgrave's dead and eaten by owls. Although no one necessarily knows that he's been eaten by owls. He's just sort of gone. No, I don't think they do, do they? Yeah.

Sadly, unfortunately, Kada kills herself. But as we learned in this book, she did have a child before doing that. Steer Pike is now firmly ensconced in the nonsense of Gormongast. And the castle... Ensconced in nonsense. And the castle kind of remains weird. And that's what happened on Titus Grown. Yeah, that sounds right.

I try to see this very much in the style of when I have three gin and tonics and then explain the plot of something to you. It was in the style of it, but there wasn't enough talk about clothes. That is true. Or ships. Or eyebrows. No, and those are my three usual topics, which I think says a lot about me as a bisexual. There's a quote somewhere in here.

that said gay a lot of times I have those written down yeah Cutflour is obviously my favourite character in this. Surprisingly, not a lot of eyebrow mentions in this actually. Yeah, distinct lack of eyebrows which is disappointing. Considering every other feature of everybody's face

is poured over in grotesque detail. Yeah. So we're going to go through chapter by chapter. So we'll start with chapter one. We don't have chapter headings this time which is quite upsetting, but I've got a little in which one,

in which Titus is seven. and we meet the castle's ghosts. I like how you say in which, like sandwich or... Yes. I'm being efficient, Francie. We've got 39 chapters to get to. I know, and I've just destroyed that time saving through the 39 chapters with this 30-second tangent.

Amazing, isn't it really? Incredible. Have you got a favourite quote or bit of description from this section? Oh, yeah. I just like how he describes food as belly timber. Great. There's so many just weird and ridiculous ways to describe things in this book, and I love all of them.

Yeah. How about you? A slightly longer one. The sun's rays, searing a skein of cloud, burn with unhampered radiance through a hundred windows of the southern malls. It's a light too violent for ghosts. And Keda, sourdust, flay, swelter and sepulcrave dissolve in sunbeams. There's a lot of sunbeam in this again. We talked about that in Titus growing as I recall.

Yep. A piercing sunbeam with some dust moats in it. We know Marvin Peep likes a piercing sunbeam with some dust moats in it. Does he? Does he ever? and red. Does also quite like the colour red. Yes, we're briefly not even really introduced to Titus in this.

We just explained he's now seven, so we're about five years past the events of Gomagast. And then the ghosts serve as a handy previously on, so we have Sepulgrave, the Melancholy Earl, Flay the cadaverous and Tacitoran, the chef who gets his sort of ghost and the way he died as beautifully described, floating like a moon-bathed sea cow,

a long-sword bristling like a mast from his huge breast. I think it's a mark of a good long sword if it can bristle on its own. Yeah, I think that's what I look for in a long sword when I'm looking for a long sword. I think I stuck this into the belly of my nemesis. Would it bristle? Would it bristle? And if the answer is no, I don't spend my money on that broadsword. These are the questions you have to ask.

You're a sensible consumer. Sourdust, the master of ritual. And then lastly, Kada, that she should be a ghost seems natural for even when alive. There was something intangible, distant and occult about her. And I do like the book points out that, well, her death was horrible. Wasn't as bad as the Earls. So as Mervyn Peake is ranking things, getting eaten by owls still does seem to be like sort of top of the list. It's certainly worse than Ravine, isn't it?

I would say it's worse than. Because he was eaten alive by owls. Yeah, exactly. I feel like if you die and then owls eat you, that's not so bad. And I think, you know, not to get too into it, but I think owls probably wouldn't be efficient in the killing because they used to killing much smaller things. It's not like, you know, with a polar bear you could expect. Not deliberate mercy, but mercy through efficiency. Yeah. Owls, I imagine, inefficient. Anyway. The inefficiency of owls, praise on my mind, much like the owls prey to play to

But the 76th Earl of Gormongass. 76, sorry. Fuck me. I was going to say something important. Well, actually, before I say something important, something unimportant but nice is how Flay was kind of a ghost anyway. I like that. Yeah. Something important is, what do you think of this book, actually, which I should have said before we got into this, but as we sit between the two here, that still works.

What do you reckon of this as compared to the last one? I feel like I found it easier to grip onto the first. one. There was, there wasn't much more of a narrative. There's actually like a couple of really clear narrative three lines in this first half of this. Clear is generous. I am being generous, yes. Clear compared to, I think maybe Titus Gray. But I don't know. There was something about it where I think because the world was still really new to me, I was willing to latch on and look for narrative. Whereas this, I think I was almost, it, it was difficult to relax and enjoy the, like the nonsense and the kind of nothing burger chapters for their own sake because I was waiting to get to

things happening. Yeah, I wonder if we didn't have a deadline if we would have enjoyed it more. Yeah, I still liked it. I did. I did actually. Especially when you try and remember that the point is that it's nonsense. Like, yes. You are meant to be, I believe, suffused in this dreamlike state of being almost. But it was, you texted me this morning and you sort of, I've lost the plot of it. And I was like, yeah, I think if you let your brain sort of unlatch a bit and just go with the book. Yeah, yeah. It is a really nice read.

Yeah, I enjoyed my day reading this nonsense. Yeah, and there are a couple of storylines specifically that we will get to that I absolutely adore and some characters that I am deeply obsessed with and want to spend a lot more time with. But before we get to them, chapter two in which we meet the living. Favorite bit of description in this? Oh, I believe it is prune squalor who's described as having a celluloid face, which I seem is a bit transparent. Yep.

Like, you know, pale. But it just reminded me of shooting stars, the TV show, not the astronomical phenomenon. Be weird if it was that. Where do you remember Vic Reeves introducing Jack D. He always said, Jack D with your face like a forgotten tunnel or something like that. Oh, yeah.

Like Jack D with your celluloid face, I think works quite well. that context. Yeah, I can see that. So sorry listeners who are under 30, but I thoroughly recommend you look up shooting stars, which has Bob Mortimer and Vic Reeves. Yeah, and we do like Bob Mortimer and Vic Reeves. And then obviously, so here we're meeting the living characters,

our cast still wondering about the castle, the Countess Gertrude. Yes, still great. Amazing. Love her. Not a great parent. Don't care. Delight. everything about her, every description of her.

She is now making a point of looking out for Titus whenever she can after not being very interested as a baby. Her love for him is as heavy and formless as loam. I know what the fuck. It just is. It's just there. You get it. When you read it, you get it. That's not a sentence I'm analysing. It's just a sentence I really wanted to say. It can't analyze love like loam.

No, you can't. It's something I do really love about this book is the amount of times I stopped while reading to just read a sentence aloud to myself. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. God. It's, I won't say it's a book meant to be read aloud because I don't believe anyone would survive the experience despite their being. Sorry, Tendent. I was going to download the audiobook to kind of get a head start, well, on some long drives recently. What I did by accident was download the abridged audio book. And I thought, oh, that might be all right, actually. and, you know, I can go back and double-checks and bits. But the abridged audio book is four and a half hours long. The audio book is 22 hours long.

That's not a bridge. That's just a synopsis. Yeah. I mean, this podcast is likely to be four and a half hours long and we're not reading out the book. I will be reading quite a lot of quotes. I've got so many that I absolutely adore. Oh, you're not that many, Joanna,

because I do have to edit it down to less than four hours. That's fine. That's a rule. Fine. Well, let's talk about. the other characters then. Fuchsia. Says me, dragging us up on a tangent.

My apologies. Fusia. Our darling, darling, Fusher, who I still adore. He doesn't really seem to have changed all that much, despite, I'm assuming now being in her early 20s, but I guess you don't get a lot of... Yeah.

You don't get a lot of opportunity for growth and maturation while living at Gorman Gass. No, I shouldn't imagine you do, no. Which does also beg the question, because we are seeing how Titus is being educated. in a class entirely full of boys. How are women educated in Gormongast? Was her education entirely delivered to her by Nanny Slag?

I reckon that's probably a girls' classroom. This is a kind of pseudo-medieval thing going on, isn't that? And I think girls would still be educated up to a certain age. I mean, she knows how to read. Yeah, I reckon she probably went to school until she was like 10 or 11. Yeah. That's my guess. Yeah, speaking of Nanny Slaggers, is Nanny Slagging about for part of this book?

Spoilers for later in the same episode. Oh, her poor weak heart. Oh, her poor week heart. The twins, I do have to get in the description of so limp of brain that for them to conceive an idea is to risk a hemorrhage. Yeah, I mean, it's beautiful, isn't it? Our prune squallas are around, including Emma, who is such a big part of this and brought me so much joy,

misses her fitting on the social matter at least three times a week. I think we said last time, the more I read about the brother, Arthur, prune squalor, the more I like him. Yes, Alfred. Alfred. Alfred, or Bernard. He interchangeably has both names. Interchangeable Dernets.

Interchangeable Alfreds and Bernards. We've all suffered them. I like that the poet is around. We met him very briefly in the beginning of Titus Grown, I believe, during Steerpike's climb. The wedge-headed poet, yeah. Yes. He's not had a nice time of it every time.

He's not had a lovely time, but... I'm compared to some of the other characters. He's having a fucking bull. isn't it? Yeah. Barkentine, Master of Ritual with his awful.

Crutch, awful, awful, awful thing. Flae is still living in the woods and I'm glad Flay is around in some way. I love Flae.

I'm delighted that Rock Hod is still in his hall of bright carvings who don't really spend any time with them. Something feels right just with everything

knowing that Rock Hod is in his hall of bright carvings. I wonder if we get any more about these bright carvings. I feel like we've got a taster and then it never.

I'm hoping we get more out of dwelling stuff in the second half of the book. We'll see. Because as we said to it, listens, we don't know what happens past chapter 39, yeah. And Steer Pike, who, if he had ever harboured a conscience, he had by now dug out and flung away the awkward thing. That's fucking terrible, isn't he? He's the worst. I have so many thoughts about Steer Pike. Most of my thoughts about this entire book are based around these character sections, because that's where I really like to dive into things.

Yeah, at least one of my quotes for him that's annotated with, I'll, Fuck off, mate. I've sent you some of my... There's a lot of fucks to up I can my notes. It's tedious sometimes. There is something... Oh, I can't remember where the description is from, but the idea of the tedious, low-grade evil.

It might be from Good Omens, I think. He's that sort of evil. If he existed in a modern-day universe, he'd sell things. Yeah, absolutely. He's really good at it, and you've got to give him that, but it's just, you know... Yeah. He's hustling it.

That's what it is. He reminds me of the hustle culture boys. He would have a podcast, brackets, derogatory while realizing what I'm doing. He wouldn't have a podcast like this. Yeah, no, we're great. This is well worth your time, listeners. Don't worry about that. This will make you rich and attractive.

I felt like we should maybe less. Read this weird fucking book. That will make you handsome to many people. Right, into chapter three, in which professors flap and steer pike creeps. Lovely. And I want to shout out a lovely bit of description from steerpikes creeping and what he's looking through, which is Craigmire, the acrobat who crossing his apartment upon his hands might frequently be seen tossing from the soul of one foot to the soul of the other, a small pig in a green night dress.

Yeah, and never mind about that. We're not going to say anymore. And never mind about that. We're never going to see Craigmire again. We don't know why an acrobat lives in the castle who has a small pig in a little. a green night. We don't know why the nightdress is green. I wonder if these things bedeviled Mervin Peek, and this was the only way he could get them out of his poor little head. You think he was bedeviled by an acrobat with a small pig in a green nightdress? Well, I certainly would be. I am now. He's passed it on to us. There's a mysterious character later that just appears in a window and has a parrot. Yeah. Yep. And again, not seen

again. But, you know, maybe a nice bit of narrative symmetry with the corset of many frills and painted macaws. Oh, very true. Or maybe not. Or maybe not. Maybe it's just there. I liked in chapter three, though, when what's his face, steerpikes walking along, moving past the table, removing past the apple, taking a bite without slackening his pace. And then suddenly look for all the world as though his legs were shrinking from the ground up, but the floor of the room sloped curiously. And he was on his way down, a decline in the floor.

It's just one of those watching from the third-person perspective that's very cinematic. And it's like your kind of thing, I think. Yes, no, it felt very like you can see this, you know, where the camera is and how it's happening, and then you cut the going down and the... This is why it does feel like you are just getting an invite into this mental world. You're effectively being invited to become one of the ghosts and observe. Oh, yeah. Nice. Going to haunt the narrative, whether you like it or not, Mervyn P.

I think the narrative's haunted enough already, quite frankly. Yeah, yeah. me getting involved. If you are haunting us, Mervyn Peake, please don't take any of what I'm saying as a fence. I do think you're very cool.

Yeah, no, I think you're great. You've also confused me a lot. Leave the nightdressed pig out of it. Right. Why is the night dress green? Doesn't matter. Chapter 4. Sometimes the curtains are just blue,

Duran. Sometimes the night dress is just green. Usually, I hugely disagree with the curtains that just blue quote, but you know what, this time, maybe the dress is just green. Maybe the night dress is just green.

Or maybe it's a complementary opposite to read. True. Maybe the pig represents envy. All right, that's stop now. Before we go to chapter four, though, chapter three is also our first sight of the professors. And I was excited when I saw the professors, because I quite like a school story.

I read a lot of like boarding school stories and things growing up. Oh, yeah. So I was very excited to bring in that element. And now chapter four. We get a bit unseen university as the professors there. Oh, we get really unseen university. chapter four in which abella's rung and titus sits astride his pony before going to class oh yeah i've got a really short quote that picked out for this one in a hall of plaster walls the silence yawned just a lovely bit of internal rhyme uh something i'm going to keep coming back to as we go because it's one of my favorite things across this section is the depictions of boredom and time-classing time passing especially in class

that took me back in an almost painful way some of them I think honestly a lot of my unhappiness while reading this book was because of its efficacy in taking me back to a classroom setting yeah and that is not something I ever wanted to be reminded of but this has just like a short one of the things on the blackboard represented a sum in short division but might as well have been some hieroglyphic message

from a moonstruck prophet to his lost tribe a thousand years ago Moonstruck Love Moonstruck And yes We start seeing Titus Figuring out that Being rebellious is a thing he could do Yeah

Could do should do Could do, should do The quick bridal wrench The freedom from the Oster As he's decided to Quickly bring his pony into the stalls And he gets bored of it very quickly This first time

The Oster comes and returns him I think I can tell why he's seven Because everything's seven in this book Yeah But he definitely seems older than seven, doesn't he? And you can explain that way a bit by him being, you know, the overly precocious aristocrat that he is. But yeah, I think definitely he's got like the mind of a 10-year-old

in the narratively appropriate age. Yeah, I can see that. And this idea of him being, I don't know, forced into this being treated as an equal as one of the class, but also not. Yeah. And then he's going to be told to stop and be above them all and never have anything to do with them again

and he knows that's coming. Again, it's like this little symmetry to some of the ways that aristocracy and royalty especially used to work in various societies. It is interesting. And it's not sympathetic to that system, I think. No, no, none of it is sympathetic to any system, I think. And then on to chapter 5,

in which Nanny's poor dear heart is heavy, Steer Pike visits Fuchs's window sill, which for some reason I've written in my nose as windmill. and the Countess descends with her flowing feline sea. Oh, this is my oh fuck off mate bit, his infernal slinus, the arch fluke steer pike. Yeah, this is him, he turns up on the window sill and presents this card and she starts laughing, his very ponderous, good afternoon, madam.

The thing is, though, like, absolute ick, oh, fuck off steer pike, but also I get why she is very charmed by this moment. Yeah, you have to, she's very immature, and that is specifically said. she's social, you know, she's starved for any social interaction. She's clearly like more mid-teens in her head than 20 years old. And we'd have fallen for that kind of shit when we were 15, 16. Oh, 11. 17, let's be honest, yeah.

Yep, yep. Let's not talk about what we fell for when I was 17. But yeah. Yeah, I'll get real specific. Like someone, someone who is in any way close to her age interacting with her is in itself just such a, delight because it's such a break from monotony. The fact that it is someone doing something to entertain her. Absolutely, yeah.

I totally get why she's into it. And, oh, the description of the mirror in this has smallpox so badly that she had to peer into this one on blemish corner. Yeah, yeah. And then also in this little steer pike interaction again, get why she's charmed in that moment. But then you get this being reminded of the time he carried her through the thunderstorm, which hopefully reminds us.

of it and she starts almost blushing and it's, ah. Yeah. Again, I guess it. I fully get why, because this is the only interaction she hands with anyone and she is a very romantic soul. And I like that she's not entirely charmed by him. She also finds him a bit disgusting, but... No, but she must recognise that this is the only chance at this kind of interaction she's going to get, so... Yeah, because I've overlooked the repugnance. I would assume her future is basically to be married off to someone at some point. Yeah, I mean, even if that, though,

because you think those twins they were the last equivalent, weren't they? It sounds like the women are just pretty much forgotten rather than married off. They don't seem to have much interaction with other teukedoms. Apparently we'll find more about this kind of stuff in the later books, but later book.

Later book. And then also the countess who is waking up and starting to think, and I like that this is in this chapter. We've just had this very ix-deer-pike conversation with Fuchsia and the countess is at the same time starting to clock that, thinking might be important and there might be something malevolent

as an influence in the castle. It does highlight quite how long it's taking her to wake her brain back up though, doesn't it? Because this is several years later. Yes. And she's like, hmm. Something like my husband going missing and the chef going missing

and many other violent goings on in the castle herald something unpleasant. Five years later. Yes, unpleasant. I must see the doctor. Oh, and a general thing from the section as well, she's described as walking out into the rain as though we're not there,

and obviously we're looking for little, the things that inspire Pratchett, you walk wrong for rain, you go all hunched up, you should move between the drops, and indeed Granny seemed to be merely damp, and it's from equal rights. Lovely, well done. And there's a couple of other moments in this specifically that are, like, seem to be inspiration, possibly for equal rights. So I do wonder if, I'm pretty sure I've not read Gormengar's bit actually started with equal rights.

There was a reference to Gormengarst in that. Yeah. I'm wondering if that, one of our listeners, I think, found it somewhere recently. We'll have to shut the discord. But I'm pretty sure. I'm now starting to think Pratchett may have had a reread of this quite close to writing equal rights. That's my current theory. Anyway, chapter six then.

in which Irma decries the lack of men in her life and prune squalers sends her to sleep. Oh God, oh, God, oh, I see it. Yeah. You would, wouldn't you? You absolutely would. Indeed, to mention the various pet names that the doctor comes up with for his sister

because we start quite sweetly with things like turtle dove and fruit drop. Then we go to sweet white of egg, my spasmic one, my querulous queen. It'll continue throughout the section of Elle is beautiful. Yeah. As a sudden urge for a husband, this is my favourite part of the book. It's my favourite storyline. It's like Mervyn Peek decided to drop a surreal regency fiction in. Yeah.

Amid the just sort of chaos nonsense of the castle. And I love it so, so much. This was the first occasion in the book, this chapter, where today I went, oh, for fuck's sake, Mervyn, come on. which was the long, long paragraph about the doctor's teeth. Yes. I'm not going to read it out because I'm not going to do that to everyone because of my reaction to it. And I know it's good, it's good description and it's great and it's really well written,

but it's just a whole fucking book. Yep. And it was sunny outside. But yes, the doctor himself. I quite like the osseous horse. That was this chapter. Yeah, that's brilliant. Please don't read the whole thing. Oh, I'm not going to.

Listeners can read that themselves, but I also do like the description. Come clap your scapulet and twitch the pale pagoda of your spine, remove from life's eternal itch. What need for iodine? Yay. I was wondering if that bread knife was going to fall down onto somebody, or into somebody's eye or something. Chekhov's trembling knife type situation. but thus far. The knight is young, I suppose.

Well, we're halfway through the book, and so far the knife has not landed on anyone's head. I don't think Czechoscan goes off halfway through the... Oh, no, it's Act 3. So, you know, we're not on Act 3 yet. The knife could still fall from the ceiling. It would be probably one of the least weird deaths. It would probably be one of the least weird deaths.

And before we move on quickly, also, the idea of the Dr. Prinkwell's study that he is not really using as a study, And it makes very clear. No writing desk, no paper ink. Not even a waste paper basket. Gasp. Very much gasp.

Oh, I've made a couple of notes through the book of, as I did last time, I think, of words I'd just never heard off before. Marmorial. I'm not sure I know that one. Made of, or compared to marble, as in this case, her long marmorial face. Excellent. And then chapter 7 in which the countess visits the doctor to discuss potential rebellion and perfidy in the castle. Perfety is a word I don't use enough. Yeah, I know we ought to.

And heterodoxy. Yes, that's a good one. Oh, actually, while we're on that, there's a word in this chapter I didn't know. Which is when the doctor decides to create a story about why there's a knife in the ceiling, about rescuing his mule from a python a long time ago. he just sort of throws into brackets Lytosis after saying something wasn't bad Oh yeah So Lytotus

spelt L-I-T-O-T-E-S It's straight from Wikipedia A Figure of Speech and Form of Irony to emphasise a point by stating a negative to affirm a positive So not bad meaning good Not easy is what he uses in this Meaning really fucking difficult

Or you know No oil painting That's in my rhetority book. Oh, amazing. I would never have been able to recall of the definition in this context. He's annotating his own story. But what's interesting about this is that it is misspelled in the book. And so I'm obviously looking it up with the wrong spelling. And I found the Wikipedia page with the correct spelling. But the wrong spelling led me to a website called piquestudies.com. Super. Which has a whole page that explains random misspellings that were never fixed or edited in the book.

Now, warning, I will link to it, but I clicked on it and end up immediately reading a massive spoiler for part two. Oh, we've been here before. We have, and there's a whole academic journal now defunct with so many... I remember this. Yep. So many really interesting resources, and I did end up clicking around and reading quite a lot on that. It's not a tab you could open while we're recording front soon. I've closed it.

Yep. And I would like a gold star next time I see you. Put down the history of espionardipate your page for unseen but yes I will link to it in the show notes so if you're not worried about spoilers it is a really really fascinating resource and it's an old website and you know what I feel about how I feel about an old website. Lovely lovely

like a vintage car it's pale yellow with burgundy text for art scene like an IBM keyboard like an IBM keyboard anyway yeah that was just on the looking up words there's a couple in the book

where part of the reason I didn't recommend know the words and it was misspelled. One of the other things from the peak studies, FIQ I got, is that Prune Squalor is referred to as both Alfred and Bernard, and during an edit of one or like a reissuing, someone said, do you want me to go through and fix that? So it's because he was, no, that's fine. I love him.

I love him, and he's ruined my day. As a character is in the section, obviously we have got the Countess and Prune Squalor. Can I say my favourite bit from his anecdote? Oh, yes, of course. I was among mountains, huge tufted things, full of character, but no charm. I was alone with my faithful mule. We were lost.

A meteor flew overhead. What use was that to us? No use at all. It merely irritated us. There were a few laugh-out-loud bits in the book. That's definitely one of them for me. This is also the chapter of... It sounds like us telling a story.

It does... Lightosis. I worry that. prune squalor is us but better at it I will give him this really good improv skills fantastic I really like reading this dialogue it is fun

this is also the chapter where the counters ask for goat's milk and the prune squal does not bat an eye just ask for a goat is brought the wrong sort of goat asked for a second goat and it's like this nice comedy interlude as we're going through this quite serious conversation

about what could be wrong in the castle after she's brought all of her cats into his house and they perch themselves up on the mantelpiece and such like. And it's ridiculous. Just someone walking in with a goat, wrong sex! Walking in with a second goat. But then you get this lovely scene of the Countess milking the goat with the half-smile of extraordinary tenderness on her wide lips.

And it makes me so interested in who the Countess was before she was the Countess. Oh, yeah. Yeah, because she's not just implied, but stated to be much cleverer than she has cause to practicing. Yes. and yeah absolutely i'd love to know maybe we'll find out one day and if she's had cause to milk goats in the past if that's part of her history her life yeah yeah well she must she must have yeah that's another nice parallel with the uh witches

yeah there is something very witch about her as long as she's got like some very lady sybilness to her descriptions the way she seems to always be like a ship in full sale yeah lady civil if you took out the uh the love for humanity Yeah But then, yeah, she's got hints of witch to her as well. Chapter 8? Yeah, all right. Chapter 8, in which Steerpike visits the twins, who would like to kill him?

Yeah. Which, fair, can't run the judge. So we learn he's been keeping them isolated and locked up so they don't spill the beans about the library thing by making them live in fear of the weasel plague. And he had arranged it to look like they had. killed themselves so everyone else believes them to be dead. That damn ravine.

That damn ravine. They haven't been thinking about it all that much. They're mostly thinking about who's going to get to wear the crown because they're sure they're going to be stepping into their power any day now. Everyone is being killed off by the weasel plague. Yeah, yeah. And Steerpike is doing horrible things, like making them crawl around underneath the rug. It's horrific.

It's hard to feel sympathy for these characters because they're dreadful. But you do feel a bit of sympathy for them. You feel sympathy. because Steer Pike is still worse. Yes, yeah, absolutely. Because what we've seen up to this point in this book, a lot of what we see with Steer Pike doing is not so bad. I think this is the nice early reminder.

Like, no, this guy's a dick for also kind of no reason. Like, this isn't just telling you he has no conscience. This is showing you he is making two old stupid women crawl around a rug because he enjoys them feeling humiliated. Yeah, yeah, he's not just like utilitarian. and oh, I'm so logical I'm going to do that. He's like sadistic. Yeah.

If it's just the utilitarianism and this was something I'm coming back to, I was reading this with all of his stuff and his feelings of Barkerty. I can kind of respect the being very utilitarian and this is all nonsense. Because I also think all the ritual is kind of nonsense and causing stagnation and that's a bad thing. And we're not shown that the ritual is necessarily a good thing. But I think we talked about this a year ago, didn't we? that he seems to be this, you know, quite realistic sort of man who thinks himself very above it all, very separate from emotion.

Yeah. And actually is just as emotional as everybody else, but because he never come to terms with it, is much worse at dealing with it. Yeah. He's got very 2000s atheist energy. He does, yeah. But I do really love the end of this chapter

when they start thinking about killing Steerpike, and it's the way one of them has the thought, and then the other one says it very quietly. We could do it together, couldn't we? It's nice, it's ominous. It is. Right, chapter 9, in which Titus claims a space, and this is a very short chapter where not very much happens,

Titus climbs around and he claims himself a space. It's like his little version of Fuchsiazatic. It is. It's very, again, as Fusassas, but a slow regard of silent things. Oh, God, I haven't read that in so long. Come on, Rothfus. Come on, Rothfus.

Like annual yelling into the void. Yeah, it's never going to happen, but I might reread Slow Regard of Silent Things I'm not going to reread the other ones until the third one comes out but it is a beautiful little novella if you've read any King Killer Chronicles

but not that one do listeners I recommend it Yeah Right chapter 10 in which three professors gather and then the headmaster arrives This is where we start meeting individual professors I mean

Chapter 10 and 11 I think we can probably almost just mash together here because then I don't know why it's separated. It is pretty much a normal one. I have to imagine that Mervyn Peake has a much better memory for faces than I do, or just a much better memory in general, because the amount of detail he goes into

for each of these people's appearance, and I can remember maybe two or three of them because he keeps bringing it up. But each of them has had a upsettingly detailed magnification of his face. Very much so. There's also very good lists. across these chapters. Oh yeah. And you know how I feel about a list?

I am going to read one out, which is the list of things on the table in this leather study. Go on. This ancient span of furniture was littered with textbooks, blue pencils, pipes filled to various steps with white ash and dottle, pieces of chalk, a sock, several bottles of ink, a bamboo walking cane, a pool of white glue, a chart of the solar system,

burned away over a large portion of its surface through some past accident with a bottle of acid, a stuffed cormorant with tin tuit. A stuffed cormorant with tint through its feet, which had no effect on keeping the bird upright. A faded globe with the words cane slypate Thursday, scrawled in yellow chalk across it, from just below the equator to well into the Arctic Circle, any number of lists notices instructions,

a novel called The Amazing Adventure's Stupid Cat, and at least a dozen high, ragged pagodas of buff-coloured copy books. Fuck, yeah. This feels like what happens if I don't... It's like my coffee table. Yeah, this is why I make myself clean my dining room every week. because otherwise that table just becomes this. I don't know where this stuff Cornborough keeps coming from.

This is some tax with no effect on the city. You just let it pull you like, you know what, fuck it, I'm not touching that again. Fine. I can see the moment of frustration that led to that corner and lying there forever. And the globe that goes into the fire by the end of these chapters. Well done, Slipate, whatever the name is. I mean, the names are great.

Oh, yeah. I mean, they're brilliant. It's but they're so good I barely even stop on them anymore Yep, Opus, Fluke, Perch, Prism and Bellgrove are our first three Mm-hmm But Belgrove being our romantic hero of the book Yeah, as it turns out, I wish you'd get his teeth pulled, poor sod

Yeah Undeniable nobility in the nose Fluke is the one that just sort of hangs out, lies down a lot and laughs a bit Perch Prism is the Yeah, Perch Prism is the small plumpish man with self-assertion, redolent in every movement he makes. He's got a bit of a pea-y-nose.

Yeah, and rings and rings around his eyes. Yes. And we get the nice description of the schoolyard that this room kind of overlooks here and this idea of all the knives that have snapped on the surface and thousands of initials carved into it, making this another very eternal part of Gorman Gass. I really like that.

Yeah, that description of a schoolyard could be anywhere in the last 500 years, couldn't it? Exactly, yeah. 500, you know, whenever schoolyards became a thing, I don't know. And yes, and then into chapter 11 in which Barkentine's edict is read to the teaching staff, he plans to inspect the Earl's lessons.

And my character stuff kind of overlaps with my favourite bit of description here, if you'll allow me. Yes. Comparing Dead Yorne and the fly. There's no reason why they should both be human beings. Yeah. They had two legs, two eyes each, one mouth apiece. There was no similarity.

We did only in the way that giraffes and stoats are classified for convenience sake under the commodious head of fauna. Giraffes, too, are mentioned at least twice in this section, I'd like to say. There's a lot of exotic fawda being brought into the mix. We meet Dead Yarn, the head teacher, who has created a marvellous system of delegation. Incredible way of speaking. Yes. Like the, you can, even though you're reading and both of us, I know, read a damn sight faster than we speak, um, you have to slow down somehow when you're reading him. It's very clever. Yeah, these pauses built in as he asks, to things like, uh, Bellgrove's poor mandibles.

Oh, well, never mind, Ed, Ed, you want. And yes, the fly, the freckled midget who pushes him around in his weird, wheelchair that's also sort of a high chair. Yeah, no, I'm finding it. Is it like an umpire's chair, are we thinking? I'm really struggling as well because, no, I'm going to tangent, actually, let's not do that. And yes, some more professors, flannel cat, who in my notes constantly, is flannel cat, brackets, poor flannel cat. Oh, yes, yeah, poor fernel cat.

He's the one who's quite stressed about teaching. It doesn't really help him. Flannel cat's lovely, isn't it? It is. Flannel cat's like a bagpuss. Yes. I think that's it. Bagpus is a flannel cat.

And so in my head, flannel cat is bagpuss. Poor backpuss. How could you punch bagpuss in their face? And shred and shrivel, who have theories about subconsciouses and don't agree on things. Yeah. We have Spiregrain, splint, and throd, the trio. This sounds very dull, doesn't it? Boris and Bunsen Bean.

Yes, very much. And they're the ones who are acolytes of. some bearded person we'll meet in a couple of chapters and cut flower crust and mule fire the last trio la cut flower is my fave a cut flower the dandy crust the sponger and the choleric mule fire yes cut flower is the is the laa sir la sir I love a la I do I've got a real soft spot for it I like a dandy crust scrounges a lot of money of people and has a fictional wife in exile because he thinks it makes him more interesting and romantic.

And it does. He's right. Yeah. Without that, he's just crushed. But I really like the whole idea of schooling, expanding the world of Gorman Gass, still without leaving the castle. And a lot of this could almost, if it wasn't for Barkington, could kind of be a separate book. Well, yeah, and I did a bad job kind of summarizing one of the papers I was looking at, which talks about kind of the kind of medieval aspects of,

this world, but also at the same time, it's very much dragged into the 19th and 20th centuries in places, like here. Yeah. Like, this is very much an early to mid-20th century, a university or a private school kind of faculty, isn't it? I feel like there's like, I was reading it and thinking, oh, this is all like deep, deep inspiration for the unseen university. But then also it's because the unseen university is also based on the same kind of nonsense faculty is this. So I don't know how much of this is direct inspiration and how much of it is just this and the Unseen University

have the shared DNA. I think it's both. Yeah. This is a small part of the vast amounts of stuff Patrick read with this exact same faculty in different flavours. Yeah. And also he went to a school. Also he went to a school. Yeah.

A couple of questions I do have with this schooling existing, which we didn't know in the first book. Was Steerpike schooled here at some point? Because... I reckon. Whose children are these children? I don't think it matters. The millions of staff, that's who.

They're all hereditary roles as well, aren't they? A lot of them are. We've seen two quad men at least, I noted during this. They're educated here. They're taught about itismus. I've never tried to say that we're alive, and I'm not going to try now. But they're taught about those. Alive or dead.

They're taught about those sorts of things. And then they're sent off to do their work. Name and Isthmus. name and Ispice. It's now my life's ambition to yell at a really inappropriate time to pretend I've been paying attention. I was going to come back in the podcast and a few chapters, I'm sure. Chapter 12 then, unless you had any more thoughts on the professors meeting.

In which the herons are in their hall and a child appears for a moment. This is another very short chapter with just a long, gorgeous bit of description. And apparently at some point there's a small ecosystem of. herons in part of the castle. Yeah, that's lovely. And then this is our first introduction to the mysterious child, who is referred to as the thing, as we learn later by the out-swellers. But I'm going to keep calling her the child.

I think that's nicer. I think that's nicer than The Thing. And it shows she's inhabiting the same space as Titus at some. Yes. I mean, there's a little connection there, isn't there? Because the little, the Zephyr. Yes. Picks up and goes and finds him.

And then it's chapter 13 in which the old man who believes in nothing dies of a burning beard freeing his acolytes from the shackles of his beliefs. They're fucking bizarre. Completely bizarre. We don't know who this man is. He just has a conversation with a young guy

who can't stand him and then the guy sets fire to his beard. Great foreshadowing. Yeah. Considering Bark and Tim's death bays are on. Is it? Well, or is it just this happened again? Also possibly that.

What's an allegory? God knows. At this point, I'm too afraid to ask. Some kind of heron. Come on. Do you have a favourite bit of description from this section, Francine? Or a favourite quote? Yes, well, a two-parter, really. Said Throd of the wet face, it is grief's gravy, spire grain. A little later, Greece's gravy was an overstatement, said Throd.

I only said it because, after all, he is dead. And I like saying the right thing at the right time. I always have. But it was excessive. The lengthy, lengthy description of the three different faces of Spiregan's Faint and trod. I enjoyed it. I had a lovely time.

Again, I won't read the whole thing. But in running the eye from one face to the next, a similar sensation was experienced as when the hand is run from glass to sandpaper, from sandpaper to porridge. Oh, yes. The three genders. The three genders. Sorry, which one are they again?

Glass, sandpaper and porridge. I don't like this world. But yeah, so this is... I don't know if I want to be any of those. The young man sets fire to the old... We don't know who the young man is, but he sets fire to the old man's beard. We don't really know who the old man is.

Why do we need to know it's in a dark red room with a fairy? Who's this fuck up? What's this symbolising? Right, but then, but then. Help me. I can't. Spire grain, splint and throd realized that they are no longer shackled to this belief

of not believing in anything. Why were they shackled? Also, I can't answer that. But now they are allowed to believe things like that they are in pain, that they are human, that they are alive. And I think as a foreshadowing thing, it's interesting because later Barkentine's beard

will be burned and that's going to lead to some death. And what will that do? Is it foreshadowing, Joanna? Maybe. I feel like foreshadowing has to suggest something's going to happen. Well, yeah. Does it suggest that? Or did two people's beers get burnt?

Okay. Foreshadowing is maybe not the right word. This is like a micro version of what we're going to see in macro later in the beers get burnt. And then people are freed from belief and potentially the market. Right. Okay. Yeah. Yeah.

Freed from ritual. And will that have an effect? Because there isn't going to be a new master of ritual unless, like, yes, steerpike does it? But like, no. someone's going to let him they're going to have to send for a new one well we we did learn about his kid didn't we oh yeah maybe that's around

I did look actually because his kids describe with a birth mark and there is one of the kids in the school described with the birth mark but the birth marks are differently described birth marks and also it was 40 years ago also that but you never time moves weirdly here as well yeah

chapter 14 then so I didn't mean to take out my upsetness with your use of foreshadowing. I'm sure you're probably correct. I'm just, again, this was another point where I think I wrote down, no, literally, yeah, in my notes here, it says, why? After I just read a page full of a description of this room

in which this man has died. I do think what helped me with reading this actually and enjoying this book is that I stopped asking why pretty quickly. I just decided not to. I think sometimes it's okay to just not ask. just accept it for what it is. I mean, we know why, which is that Mervyn Peake wanted to put stuff from his brain onto paper. Asking why that was in his brain is a question I'm not brave enough to ask.

There's a lot of dark red in this. There is a lot of very, there is a red that's almost black for the, that the columns are painted for the poet's recitation later. And I think that perhaps follows from the more crims than reds of Titus grown. And I feel like if I was in a slightly different headspace, I could make that sound quite meaningful. I think it sounded perfectly meaningful. Listeners, I would be so grateful

if you could just do that inside your own heads for me. Yeah, if you could, thank you. Thank you. You know what I mean. You've got this bar. It's like fresh blood versus blood that's been there for a long time. Oh no, yuck. No, worse. No, that's not what I mean. Oh, no. I've known you forever.

It's what the kind of red invokes. Or like the encroaching darkness, that kind of thing. Okay. But no, actually. now you say that. It's in the blood. Anyway, chapter 14, in which Titus dreams of colour,

and I'm a prunes squalor, wishes to party with some professors. And there are a couple of really, really good descriptiony bits of, but the best bit of Titus' long, imaginary wandering, which I have to admit my mind wandered from a couple of times I was trying to lead it.

But he's imagining his buccaneers, one of whom every inch of whose face was scabbed and scarred like a boy's knee. I thought it was a really great simile. Yeah, that's good. And the doctor gets a quick, very delightful list when he's asking which men should be invited to the party. These males, these stags, these rams, these tomcats, these cocks, stoats and ganders. It's beautiful. It is. It is. But I like this for Tysus. It is described as the first train of thought he'd ever troubled to follow very far. And it's this idea of something about him as he's growing up suddenly becoming more conscious and more awake. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. And that is something that is explicitly disliked in him by Barkentheim later.

Yes, that he's becoming able to think for himself. And I think that must be pretty much what drove Sethel Crave mad before the real madness set in, mustn't it? The fighting against the internal and external. Yes, they're trying to put away any internal so that he can be doing the ritual things. this chapter also has one of my favorite descriptions of like boredom and time passing this idea of breaking 60 seconds down and how many seconds are there in an hour and doing the maths and seconds are small one two three seconds are really big yeah yeah and I remember like doing that kind of maths while staring at a clock in a schoolroom oh yeah god yeah this is

15 right uh 14 14 sorry sorry yeah there it is oh okay yes, that's right, because we get the corsage of hand-painted parrots also mentioned here, just to put it in its place. When Irma decides on her party, there's so many really good back and forths between Irma and the doctor in this scene as well. Everything about her declaring a party and he's sort of trying to go with it while also being really bemused about how this is going to work. Yeah, yeah.

But yeah, I did think a gown of a thousand frills with its corsage of hand-painted parrots was I want one. Your kind of thing, yeah. Yeah, no, I would quite like that. Actually, I might have to see if I can make that. A thousand frills. There's a lot of frills, but I believe in you. But yes, Emma describes inviting the professors

because they are the only eligible bachelors around. She says, they're gentlemen and worthy of my love. What, all 40 of them? Could we call it a suire? Well, there's no law against it that I know of. And calling is going off on tangent, silly soufflays is quite accurate somehow. Yes, it is. Okay.

Chapter 15, in which Titus turns Truitt when he hears the call to adventure. And my favourite thing in this chapter, Titus's relationship with future is adorable. This idea of sort of, you're coming riding, no, horrible weather. And then she just throws some cake at his head on as I am. Yeah. It's so like sibling relationship. Yeah, yeah. Speaking of someone who has a sister

and we will throw at things at each other's heads. Yeah. Affectionate. By way of, yeah, brackets, affectionate. Making sure that you have nutrition in the most violent way possible. Yep. And then, yeah, I also like the idea of what it is for him to be truant, being a conqueror or a demon,

because it's so massive, so far away from anything he's ever done. Hmm. Chapter 15. Chapter 15. Yes. One of my least favorite similes in the whole thing, and there are a lot of favorite similes. so I sort of said note this one.

Acres of ivy spread themselves like dark water over the roofs and appeared restless the millions of heart-shaped eyelids winking wetly. Oh, yeah. Unpleasant. What is it about wetly that just sends a metaphor right down, doesn't it? Mm-hmm, yeah. It's not even a practice-sudding metaphor.

I just don't like this one. That is fair. And 16, where we get a bit more... A bit more forest. A bit more forest. decides to send his horse home. Yeah. He's probably committed to this now.

I do like how it goes from love to nightmare and back again. Yeah, no, I suppose it is very childlike, isn't it? Yeah. This is thrilling and amazing and wonderful and the best thing I've ever seen. And oh, God, no, wait, hang on, am I dreaming? And am I going to die? Yeah. I'm so scared and hungry and delighted and nightmare.

Yeah. Leap us forward quickly. It's not a lot of happens there compared to. The chapter 17 in which the students play in Bellgrove's classroom, Dead Yawn interrupts, and an incident with a wax floorboard takes the headmaster's life, meaning Belgrove gets promotion. Jesus Christ. Right?

This was such a bonkers fucking chapter in a book full of obviously bonkers chapters, but it's just this mix of like horror and slapstick. Yeah. That I was ridiculous. somehow just came out of nowhere for me. Yeah, you get this ridiculous game they're playing where they fly out of the window, come back in and then shoot at each other, which used to be used with clay and glass marbles,

but after the third death and a deal of confusion in hiding of the bodies, it's so hilariously dark in this kind of boys' school stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And the game serves this purpose of being like a bonding activity for them because who else knows that they do this? And then the guy's flung it. into the air and his head's caved in. And then he lands on his head.

His head is caved in and Bellgrove applauds because he thinks that... Name and Isthmus! Oh, and he starts... Just another little list thing, pulling out random nays, Tynepot, quag, fire, sparrow, hash, hag, dangle. These are not the names of any of the children in that class. He is just saying syllables. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Those are just the common names in this universe. It's like St. Jones, Evans. I will say, before we get to the dead headmaster, though, this has got a technique that, um, uh, Dead Master, yeah. Um, this has got a technique that I've pointed out when Pratchit does this sort of thing. It's one of my favorite devices in fiction is using like a room to help you understand a character. So you get this description of Flukes teaching room, which was long and narrow and badly lit. And perch prisms, which was so white and bleached and even the leather on the walls was sometimes washed.

Yeah. And flannel caps is presented. so he's always sitting in shadow like this big kind of dark cardboard cut out. Yeah. And also, again, another thing that just feels very unseen university. I'm trying to think of, I annoyingly couldn't think of a really good specific example. But it reminds me of something. I know Pratchett has done multiple times where he's described, say, a selection of desks or...

Yeah. Oh, in an unseen university, actually, unseen academicals. I believe the beds are described. Yes, that's exactly what I was thinking of. Yes, that delighted me. And then, as he said, the kind of slapstick horror of the headbusters caved in head. I had to reread that a few times to make sure I'd read it correctly. Especially, yeah.

And then the fly just launched himself out the window. Yeah, just like without reacting facially, it seems, he just goes. Off I go. There we are. And all of this, because of that upturned floorboard with the wax on it that they had left up from their game. Yeah, oh, fucking hell. And I'll tell you what, I'll tell you that, lads, this is why we insist on risk assessments in office environments.

It's a rollercoaster of a very short chapter. Oh, man, yeah. Or as you've put it in the plan, Jesus Christ, that's a hell of an exit. Moving on to Bellgrove in a slightly less upsetting context. In which Belgrove settles into his new role and the professors are invited to a party. Belgroves describe as having the melancholy grandeur of a sick lion.

Yeah, and once he's said that, I can see him a lot easier. Again, I do think he's got a bit of Rid-Cully to him. I think there is some in there. Different personality-wise, but there's bits of commonality. Again, I think because it's drawing from the same source. Yeah. I wouldn't be able to describe

myself as a Belgrove stand in the same way that I'm a Rid-Cully stand, but... Oh no, nowhere near as much as I'm a red-cully stand. Like, that's a level that very few people could ever ascribe to. But it's interesting how elevated he becomes in our estimation as well as in like a position when he's taken out as headmaster. Because before he was very much, you know, whatever crowd of weird eccentric, slightly revolting man.

And now with much the same characteristics, but with some extra insight into his mind, he is pretty likeful character. And he is our romantic hero of the piece so far. I'm converted Sorry I don't think we have to fancy him That's forever Good good

I'll tell you what There's fucking no one in this book That's sticking out to me And I can usually fancy Pretty much anything Picking My standers a low look at me when I was 17 Anyway

Shout out Cut Flower quickly in this section for giving us some life advice. Let us be terribly gay, la. Look, I know that gay has a different connotation written in the 1950s, and I don't care. I'm a child. My partner and I mostly communicate by just shouting the word gay at each other around the house.

I'm going to laugh when Cutflower says his gay things. Yeah, sure, do. Thank you. That is your right. That is my right. That's the podcast Resident Queer. That's the dandy. Nah.

But yes, I like how we're seeing, you know, because this is the chapter we see them get the invitations to the party. I like how we're seeing that in this part of Gormongast as well, there is ritual that is stuck to. You do things the same way. Like going through a turnstile, even though there was plenty of space outside of the turnstile, the fact that very, like, without really blinking after dinner, they turn the tables upside down, sitting them like they're rowing a boat and sing a song because that is what is done. I liked the song. I did like the song.

That one I did read aloud. Yeah. It's all very... Ho the Megapode. It is very Ho the Megapode. I assume at some point these professors have indeed hunted a megapode. They must have done. They must have.

Oh my God, speak of Ho The Megapode and the horn. Sorry to go back to that horrible chapter. But there was that whole bit where it's described as if he had had a trumpet at his lips as he sawed. through the air than he would have floated away never to be seen again like an angel. And it's very much if my grandmother had wheels, but much worse. If my headmaster had a trumpet and wings, he'd fly into the distance, not be standing upright on his crust skull. Come to the true show, make he fret, whereas that's literary analysis and morosh being

just ring, incredulous at this book. No, I'm with you. I'm with you 100%. I haven't slept enough for this. Right, sorry, back to 20. I don't think I could do this well rested, I'll be honest. No, you're right. Chapter 19 in which Titus seized the child in the forest before being taken in by the exiled flay. Yeah, I liked a little quote in here, similar to my internal rhyming. Some of it's just lovely constructed sentences, which is the same scene enclosed in with its mellow cyclorama, its hateful dream of gold.

Yes, that is a good one. And also brings us back to cyclorama, one of my brief fascinations. Parorama, cyclorama, it was a whole thing. Got very into the ramper. Listen to one of our old rabbit holes, I think. I hear that about Francine. She's got a bit into the ramas, if you know what I mean. La.

La, sir. Your hateful cyclorama of gold. Your imaginary trumpet. But we only really see the child in the context of Titus coming across her briefly. But this, again, it's a new idea for him that there is someone who would not think of bowing to him because she's the 77th out of Gormongast. And this is the first time he's met someone who has zero interest in the fact that he's the 77th of Gorman Gast. Yeah. And it's nice that she just kind of floats across his vision like, how?

It's like in a cartoon, isn't it? Where you get like the cheek, like Bugs Bunny. Yes. do that. That's how I want to enter more rooms, but unfortunately, I am, as yet, I think we've learned that we can't, we can't risk it. No, we can't. Unfortunately, I cannot be floating and whimsical.

We are one waxed floorboard away from disaster at all times. And I am simply to study. I've developed a new fear. Right. And then Flay, Flay comes out to do some fishing and he clicks. the clicking breaks out as every step like a distant musket shot oh here he is

our hero one of the first thing he does when he realizes that this is Titus is to ask after future and how I add all that and then when he does He is lovely isn't he? He is and when he shows Titus' cave

he sort of waits for approval Is he our romantic lead? Fuck he might be If I had to pick someone, I'm least repulsed by. It's the man with the musket knees. Of the available men. And women. Oh no, wait, the countess.

The countess, yeah. No, we can fancy the counter. She's got enough simple phone. The goat-milking cat herder. Or the man with the musket knees. Truly an embarrassment of riches. Oh God, if this podcast overruns, you can probably cut about 20 minutes of me just cackling. Shant.

I'll cut the words. We're just going to have contextless laughter. That would, I think, be more appropriate for this than anything we've actually said. Should we take a break? I've been a good night to my husband and promised him that we will someday be reunited, but that it is unlikely to be tonight or maybe this year. It's unlikely to be this side of the moment of gas. I've refills my coffee and I'm settling in to our new reality.

What have you got there? I've got a beer. At this point in the proceedings, frankly, it's a miracle I haven't got on to gin. Yes, why haven't you? She says, weirdly accusatorily. Someone who doesn't drink at all. Because I'm not sure how long this is going to take us and I would have had to bring up the Bustle.

I mean, it can't make it less coherent. I'll say that for part two. There's just me in the last few chapters of Gorman Gaw. I'm gone. I'm gone. I'm sorry. I'm going to lose my job if I don't go. Just me monolocke.

I was drinking gin from the Bostle. Chapter 20 in which Titus hangs out in Flay's cave. Nice cave. I was thinking as we were refilling our drinks that at least the two characters to whom we've decided we're going to be attracted for lack of anything else. At least they are practical. We've seen Flay builds himself a dam and the counters milk a goat. And those two, I would say, admirable qualities in a partner. I'm not sure what a dam is useful.

But I think it might be. Titus is quite sweet in this section as well. This thinks to himself, I mean, I'm in an adventure. I'm in a very much heard in Bilbo Baggins voice. Yeah. It is Bilbo Baggins, isn't it? And he's run away without his hood. Oh, no.

And Flay, he's sort of hoping for an ally in Flay here, but Flay's like, no, you need to go to the castle and do your duty, just like your father, follow the countess, your mother. He describes her as a fine and proud woman. If we really want to look for some romance, we can ship that, I guess. I guess. Yeah, it's, it's, it's, unbreakable loyalty to the system.

And it's obviously not obvious to tighter it straight away because he lives in a cave, but if he could do anything but live in a cave, obviously he would. Yeah, but if he could be there in the castle and be part of the system if he wasn't exiled. Yeah. Which has me then torn again because I'm torn between, like, I don't think the stagnation of ritual is a good thing,

but I kind of want Flay to be unexiled and get to go and have a nice time in the castle. Well, yeah, I mean, in the background of Gorman Gast, which I don't believe is ever really going to sort itself out, I suppose we'll sign out, but if this is the way the world has to be, it would be nice if Flake could be happy. Yes, it would. However, it does sound like he's made a very nice cave.

And he's got a shanty. He's got a shanty. He's got a shanty in another cave. Titus is thinking of visiting again at some point. I'm now realizing in my head a shanty is this kind of building, isn't it? Because I was thinking see shanty. Yeah, no, shanty, like shanty town. Yeah.

I see that now. I'm very tired. I'm very tired, and I've read, I don't know if you know this, but at this point I've read nearly 20 chapters of Gormongast. You're actually actively just reading the book for the first time while I talk about it. No, you're not doing that. chapter 21 in which Titus comes home to his sister and is banished to the lichen fort.

Fuchsia visits before Titus is treated to a game of marbles with Bellgrove and Dr. Prune Squalor. Lovely. A chapter full of loveliness, I would say, despite a bit of imprisonment. An absolutely delightful chapter. This whole thing with Fusia, Titus and Fuchsia's relationship, the fact that he goes to her first and she is so full of love for him in that moment, she would fight for him, she would die for him, she spits out of him, of the window and says that's what I think of it all, Titus. Yeah. Yeah. Which again, you're cheering up your seven-year-old brother.

That's exactly what you do, isn't it? Yeah. And the fact that she is now so passionately in his corner makes me very happy. And I like that when Steer Pike winks at Titus, he recoils from it. He's horrified by his grace. He's got the ick for Steer Pike. Yeah. And a little boy has a good instinct.

Well done. And then I think this is where I also really, really build up all the sympathy. and liking Bellgrove because he so wants to be this loved professor. And it's weird that it's not, he's right. It is weird that it's not. But because he isn't, instead of just bemoaning that and becoming a nastier person, he tries, he comes and he tries to be someone for Titus and gets down and plays marbles with him.

And Titus seems to, again, despite being seven years old, it seems to understand what's happening here. Yes. And plays along with it, laughs at the right point. and plays marbles with the old man and now he does have a firm ally. Yes, and Prune Squalor comes in and joins in the Marbles, and then there is three of them, and they do all forget themselves in it, and have fun, and that's wonderful.

And it's nice to revisit the Marbles, having had a little, I would say, psychedelic trip moment with them earlier. Yes. And the colours. Nice that they get to be used properly as Marbles. Yes. Marbles are great, though. I love marbles.

Not to go off on a very. very simplistic tangent, but they're very pretty. I really wanted to be a glassblower for a bit when I was younger because we got to go visit a local-ish glass factory and I really wanted to learn to be a glassblower and make marbles and watch, I will still occasionally disappear on just watching videos of marbles with the cool twists of colour inside being made and that sort of thing. One of my big life regrets not becoming a glassblower.

The description of the schoolmaster pose that Bellgrove unconsciously adopt where he sort of puts his hands in small of his back and looks down and then up in a certain way, with generations of urchins and mimicked as the seasons move through Gorman Gass at some point in classrooms and dormitories and everything, a child had stood with his hands behind his back and his chin lowered, with his eyes cast to the sky, and perhaps an exercise book on top of his head by way of mortarboard. I hate to say it, but I think that's how I stand when I'm looking for fossils. That's excellent.

Listeners, I've found some fossils next to a chalk pit, which is very exciting. Those of you who, there must be some of you still, who have listened to the rest of the episodes that we've done on things like the chalk. I haven't yet found a shepherd's crown, but I have found a bit of Ammonite and some sort of bivalve. So surely it is only a matter of time. And I got to assist in identifying the Ammonite by saying, would you like me to send a picture of that to my fossil friend? Listeners, how do you recommend? A friend who knows fossils, not a friend who is a fossil. Get a friend who can identify fossils if you can't yourself.

If you don't have a friend who can identify fossils, considering learning how to identify fossils and being the change you want to see in the world. Chapter 22, in which Steerpike accompanies Barcantine overseeing preparations for the poet's recitation. A vituperative is the word I learned in this chapter. Bitter and abusive, which I think you can kind of make out just. by the construction of the word, but I don't think I've ever used it, nor necessarily seen it written down. Yeah, I'm not sure I'm ever going to try and use that.

The word of the day is petuporative. I will say as much as Barkentine is obviously awful. The descriptions around Barkantine and the sound of its crutch moving are some of the best bits of writing of this book. The harsh and rapid impact of its iron-like stub, upon the hollow stones was at each stroke like a whip crack, an oath, a slash across the face of mercy.

I mean, it's fantastic writing, which is why he's so repugnant, isn't it? Yeah. It's very evocative. His face described as wasp, scragy bird of prey, gale twisted thorn tree. Yeah.

I like how much he swears as well. You've got to remember he's not a man of God. He's a man of... Ritch of... Ruralman gasped. Yes. Very different kind of sacredness. Also, Steer Pike really bugs me in this action.

because he's got so, Barkentine has this thing where he drops a boulder down to the kitchens and that's how lots of people Yeah, a lot of people in the castle

then know that Barkentine is up and about for a day and things have to be done. Steer Pike has his creepy little room of mirrors where he spies on people. So he spies on Barkertyne and sees that he's ready

and then turns up oiled and ready to go for the day. He's going to all of this, he doesn't need his mirror shit for that. That's the one person. He could just listen for the fucking. boulder if he really has to be that kind of creep that turns up and doing certain things but he has to do it in his creepy little way instead i decided to hate steer pike a bit extra for that

yeah i was trying to work that out as well i was trying to read like oh is it that barcantine takes a bit longer some days then to get to the he doesn't say anything like that though you're right no he's just doing it because that's this creepy little thing that he does and then yeah when you give a manna the hammer every problem looks like an ale when you give a ham a manna secret tunnel with loads of mirrors and spy holes. Every problem looks like a voyeuristic nightmare. Yeah, yeah, that is, I think I have that embroidered on a pillow somewhere. Yeah, it's in one of those star tickets. Right. We get a good anthropomorphising ants moment in this as well, when Barkenten is doing all of his

horrible scratching. But there's a colony of ants having just received news from its scouts that the rival colony near the ceiling was on the mum. March was even now constructing bridges across the plaster crack. And that's another thing, Pratchett has the ants creating a tomb out of sugar cubes and the intelligent ants in the EU, which is also specifically equal rights. So I just enjoyed finding at least two connections directly to that book in this. Built perhaps by interdimensional ants. Could be.

The ants could just be hanging around in multiple universes, realities. I mean, Alsace, surely. stretches its bibliography to Gormongas yeah I'm trying well not since the library burned down oh fuck

oh my gosh we've played this whole thing wide open the librarian must have been running in there grabbing the books right there's a scene in one of the one of the

disc worlds where he's doing just that perhaps perhaps he was do you have any thoughts on this chapter before we move on no no I've forgotten this chapter now I'm thinking about the wrong attempt Chapter 23 In which Titus evanes duty

And Barcantine Oh Titus evanes duty and Barkentine Sorry I've written that sentence Bracquentee what Titan Do you know what I'd have just accepted it And Barcantine And Barcantin

I'm giving up But another nice boredom Time Passing thing Where the morning takes forever for Titus And no time for An infinity to Titus And a whisk of time skirt To Barcantine

Noon, ripest thunder and silentest thought had fled unfingered. I'll have you know. Maybe you'll be so blessed. But this is Titus runs and evades Barkington. And then Belgrove lies and Belgrove hasn't seen Titus. And Belgrove thinks of Titus, whose eyes had shone at the sight of the marbles in the fort. And he held on the lies he was telling with the grip of a saint. He's very nice.

He gets really, he gets so many points for that. He does. Barkentine taught me a good word in this, this bit. Spayvind or spavined, spavined, I think. You have the whole spayvind staff with you. Hell crap me. I know that's not the right cadence to read that sentence, but I don't know what the right one is.

But anyway, it's the disorder of a horse is hock. Incredible. So, I didn't Google it further because I don't want to see pictures. No, I do wonder how much time, Mervyn Pee, how much of this was in his head and how much time he spent with a thesaurus. I believe it's all in his head. I think some time might have been spent with a the the thoris. Maybe just flicking through and looking for interesting words at the very,

maybe flicking through a dictionary. Well, do you think this was in a the the thesaurus? So that's the problem. If it had been a really... Under which entry? Poxed, I suppose. Yes. Yeah.

I wouldn't be surprised. He's the first person who used this in this comic. Oh, yeah. No, I agree with that. I mean, this very specific concept. text definitely but like else. So chapter 24. You know, which is stand in is found for Titus

and the poet recites and the description of the herringbone brick pattern of the quadrangle. The bricks had breath in them. To walk across this quadrangle was to walk across an idea. Beautiful idea. And shout out to the countess in this section for standing up for Titus

when Barkentine is starting to rant, you know, where it's it, why is you not here? And she's doing this. What are you going to say about my son? I don't think she's standing up. for her son. I think she's standing up for the idea of not slagging off the earl of slagging of one of the royal family. Yeah, that's fair. That's the jest I got. I still liked her for it because it is in Titus' benefit. I think there's something about the, like, Barcantine, you as ritual are not as

important as the idea of the Earl in the chastisement. Yeah, yeah. And seeing him put in his place in any way. You are right, though. I think it is more that than specifically standing up for Titus. Yeah, but still. Nice to see. Yeah. Speaking of interesting words, quick trip to etymology corner. Always. Fuchsia is described as sole vessel of the blood on the distaff side.

Okay. Distaff. Words sounded familiar to me, but I know it in the context of spinning. It is a tool used for holding the loose fibres before they spun. Sure. I watch lots of videos about spinning because there's another thing I quite like to get into if I had a little bit more space. Well, when you have your loom room, surely there will be room for a wheel. Room for a spinning wheel, yeah.

Yeah. Although, I think we can all assume at some point I'm becoming an evil fairy tale witch that will be my final evolution. Oh no, I was talking about wax floorboards again. Oh, right, yeah. Whether wax floorboards can I know. I don't think the spinning wheel was turned her into an evil witch. No, but the evil witch had something to do with the spinning wheel. I have the spinning wheel

and then I lure someone in put everyone to sleep for 100 years. You can be a fate I suppose, couldn't you? Oh, I could be a fate. Or rumple stiltskin. And I... The two genders. And I'm glad you've enjoyed this appointment

with your career's advisor. Carry on. What's distaff? Right. So, Fuchsia is described as Vest of the Blood on the distaff side. In this context, it means the matrilineal nine. A distaff is a tool used

in spinning, as I said, but it has come to mean it's used in lots of context as matrilineal, as feminine, because it, as a visual, there's like a representation of domestic life. Okay. I nearly went down a really deep rabbit hole and I didn't really have time. So this did mostly come just from Wikipedia and then I'm saving the longer rabbit hole for another day. But in your own time, Egan. Proverbs in the Bible, description of a wife of no.

character and one of the lines from it is in her hand she holds the distaff and grasps the spindle with her fingers and it again is this representation of femininity a symbol yes and as a symbol of femininity it then became used as a reference for descending from the wife being part of the matrilineal line it's also sometimes used in sports um so you have distaff cups in horse racing which is you know based on matrilineal lines and i think mMA somewhere you has like a distaff cup cool that's used for like women's MMA

so yeah quick trip to etymology corner back to the book chapter 25 in which the child visits a dead tree oh lovely

did this tree appear in the last book I don't remember the dead tree from the last book but that's not to say it didn't because I read

the last book a year ago yeah yeah me too but it is beautifully described it rose out of a sword

is that how you say that word sepia in colour a treacherous basin this sick and rotting ground was deppled with gold where it was struck by the direct rays the lozenges of light elongating as the sun sank.

We've got our sunbeams again. We've got so many sunbeams. We've skipped over sunbeams. We have not had time to dally in each and every sunbeam, unfortunately. That is because we decided to cram 39 chapters into a single episode of the podcast. We did. In chapter 26 then, Titus is lost in stone and follows a bird.

Yet at this point, I am starting to wander in my head, exactly how how this place is laid out I think for the first time really I'm trying to imagine it Oh I've just decided not to Oh okay yeah It's made the reading experience a lot better

It helped then when he popped up In like out of a tunnel a while away Because I was in my head like Are we in a labyrinth now Is he going to find where the twins are? But no it was there Oh you thought plot was going to happen God, no.

He was described as being like in a tunnel with roots above his head. At some point he transitioned from being... But then I thought maybe that tree that sisters used to live under, but then, no, because that was a room of roots, wasn't it? Of course it was a room of roots, fancy. Yeah, not a tunnel of roots. You fool. You spaybind twat.

Right, I've got to stop this now because I heard Jack go to bed in the next room. I can't keep yelling about spayvind stuff. Okay, but a spayvine twat is something I absolutely want to embroider onto a pillow now. Again, great description, empty, silent, forbidding as a lunar landscape. Written, of course, before man landed on the moon. Yes, that was what I was thinking, because obviously I've been thinking about travelling to and from the moon a lot recently with the Artemis mission, which we did what...

Thought for one mad second you were going to say because of my plans for the next year. Oh, yeah, sorry, I'm also becoming an astro-class blowing astronaut. Also a fate or run more skills, stillskin. Right. No, the point of the way Titus, because of the way Titus has grown up and in this ridiculous place he's grown up, he has zero frame of reference for anything ever.

And the result of that is that he just catastrophes really fucking easily. Well, and he's seven. Oh, and he's seven. Yeah. And everything is very stressful when you're seven. I do remember. But yeah, he really does catastrophize this sort of,

oh, the headmas lied for me, but I went away, Oh, no, I'm lost forever. Yeah. And I do like that you literally get lost forever, forever and ever more. And then a fucking raven turns up. Lovely. That's got to be on purpose, isn't it?

That must have been on purpose. Let's give him this one. I feel like that was an intentional wink to our pal Po, friend of the pod. If he was alive, he'd have a podcast. All right, let's go to bed. A lot of chance, Franzy. We've got more. Well, we're going to move away from Titus now.

I don't think I've ever applaud you to help so many times in one episode and been left unanswered. Wait till we get to part two. She after 27, in which Emma makes her plans while still like Perloins poison. We finally managed to squeeze in some alliteration, alliterative treats. And then just very briefly, just nice as character moments, Emma fantasising about her party. imagining a riotous throng of males while she swayed coquettishly upon her silk-swaddled pelvis.

Helver hips movement this woman must have, because I was hurrying. He passed it earlier. We did miss Dr. Prune Squalor talking about her carriage must just be too intimidating. Yes, whatever she's doing with her hips. Like Cicera. Hammer Prune Squalers hip certainly do not lie, because that would be uncous. They certainly do not. She is a lady.

she was too busy being a lady to throw that knife accurately. She's certainly too busy being a lady to have deceitful hips. We won't speak of her bosom until later, when we're absolutely... It's a very deep bosom, yeah. And then Steerfike steals this poison and puts... When he takes it to his room, he doesn't keep it in what he's still in is, puts it in a beautiful vessel and puts it in the light just so,

make sure it's perfectly there in symmetry. Such a freak. Fuck you, steer. This, right, I've been trying to like genuinely work out beyond the obvious why I hate this man as I keep coming back to you. And it is things like this, is consumption of aesthetic without pleasure in it. It's not that he's looking and going, oh, that's pretty, he's looking at and going, and yes, it's right that it is as aesthetically as it should be. Is it American Psycho and the business cards? Yes.

That energy. Yeah. Is that the name of the book? Yes. which I'm never rereading. I've never read it. Jack told me enough about it. Yeah, I don't read America because I read quite a lot of... He very rarely says, no, I don't think you should read that.

Yeah, I read quite a lot of Bracenellis during my Edge Lordy also Chuck Polanick phase. See, I liked Chuck Polarnik, but I was a lot less sensitive then, and unfortunately, some of my memories have stayed around. Yeah, that's fair. And I remember some of Chuck Falunyuk's stuff. that I wish I didn't. Yeah.

Like, not identical authors, but as far as the kind of good lord shocking stuff. If you don't want to re-read Chuck Palinick, you don't want to re-brace Nellis. Anyway, we're not talking about any of that. We're talking about Mervyn Peake, which is a different kind of shocking.

Sorry, I was going to ask, does Stier Pike use that poison in this part? Because I was confused. I thought he was going to use it on what's his job. No, he steals poison a couple of times, and I think the intention is that poison is for Barcantine, and then he never actually poisons him because he ends up...

It doesn't even look like he's on the verge of, poisoning him in that scene there, does he? Yeah, that confused. I thought for a second it'd kill Nanny Slag, but that's not really implied apart from proximity. Yeah, I don't. Temporal proximity. Yeah, I don't think he killed Nanny Slag.

I think Nanny Sag was just quite old. Speaking of Chapter 28, in which Nanny Slag's poor weak heart finally stops. F5 in the chat for Nanny Slagg. That's a horrible sentence. I've been PC gaming a lot recently, and I've played multiple games in a row where F5 is the button for like quick

save. So every time I do it, the F5 in the chat comes back into my brain for a second and delights me. Yes, so RIP, Nanny Slag, which is quite sad. She did actually finally die after all that's threatening. Yeah. I do like that the book acknowledges she'd been sprightly once a vivacious purple creature and that she gets to be remembered for being younger and being brighter. Her eyes had long ago glinted with laughter. And the count, the way the count, the count, the way the count sort of quietly and solemnly honours her. She walks in and places the shawl down and leaves. And again,

don't love the countess not thinking to, you know, maybe comfort her daughter in this scene. Yeah. But I do love, she understands that this woman deserved a very great respect. And a lot of people did.

It's interesting, isn't it, that she built up a legend around herself. Yeah, in the next chapter, chapter 29 is Nanny's like's funeral. And, yeah,

the sort of fascination people have with going to see because it's hard to believe that she's gone because she was sort of this immortal mythical creature within the castle. Despite me trying to chivis along, I am going to quickly backtrack because it's possibly my favourite quote. And it does fit in with this as well

because just Fuchsia being oddly un-upset about everything and being upset about that and going to prune squalers very familiar obviously. But they're talking about Titus being missing and she says, and if nobody finds him, I will kill myself. Tutt, tut, tut, my little threatener, said Prune Squalor. What a tedious thing to say.

It was a weirdly good moment. In the relationship between Future and Dr. Prun Squalor, it's perfect. Yeah, all the rising around Future in this section, this idea of this weird zigzag growing up she's done, she hasn't really had an opportunity to mature properly. And this having this weird thing of, like, I'm grieving, and I understand how I should be feeling but I don't feel quite that and now I'm upset about that. Yeah. It's really good.

It's a really well-written depiction of grief. We already had that with her dad, didn't we? Yeah, the same thing, her grieving, her grief is, yeah. Her grieving her father before he's gone because you have that scene of her handling the pine cones with him. The pine cones of surprising emotion. This is also the chapter 29 is future going to Dr.

Prune's quarrel after the funeral and telling him about some of the things Titus has told her about. Oh, that's right, yeah. We do get one more great little pet name for Irma here, sweet nicotine. Sweet nicotine. It's lovely, actually, isn't it? Yeah. A lovely name for a girl.

Yeah, it's a lovely name for a girl. It's definitely going to be a gal, not a girl. Oh, a girl, yes. This is where we sort of learn that this apparition, the thing, the child would have been Cade's daughter. I like that that's you kind of going through your mental library of nouns before you remember what a child is, you know, the apparition, the thing, the child. Pretty much. Oh, and Fuchsia's remaining loyalty to Flai once she's learned from Titus that Flai is in the Foll. She's like, no, I've got to see him.

I love, he loved me. I want to take him something. Yes, seed cake. She'll throw some seed cake at him. Yes. Because they did that was that lovely scene, wasn't there in Titus room, where she and Nanny Sligan, they sat and had scones or something, didn't they? Yeah, they sat and took tea together. And in the strange description of how she's sort of grown up and zigzagging emotionally, I just want to quickly say, she grapples with each minute.

like a lost explorer in a dream who is now in the Arctic, now on the equator, now upon the rapids, now alone on endless tracts of sand. Oh, that's good. And we go from quite a nice bit of description. So chapter 30, in which Stierpike and Fuchsia visit Nanny Slag's grave and I wish death on the high-shouldered youth. Fuck you, steer pike. Turning up, trying to get there just before Fuchsia so he can be seen putting these roses down. And then getting excited by the idea that when she says it's all nonsense anyway, maybe he can make

her an ally. Yeah. That's not what she means by it's all nonsense anyway, not the way he means it. No. And it shows that he was being performative with the wreath. Yes. And like to her, I mean, obviously we knew anyway. And yeah, it's just grim.

We have the moment where he sort of contrives them tripping over together. Yeah. And tries to sort of act as if it could be a romantic moment, you know, horribly cold and calculating way. And I very much appreciate Fuchsia going, like, ah, no, your fucking grace and running. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry.

It's a low point. It's just that we've all known men a bit like this. Yeah, that is the hardest thing about reading steer pike in this strange, surreal, massively massive novel, we have known steerpikes. Yeah. And, you know, my

memory is notoriously spotty as far, as far as I know I may have lived some years in a castle. Probably. I mean, also, you're in England. You can't throw a wreath of roses without hitting a castle. Chapter 31, in which it is the morning of the party, but the doctor has had a rough night's sleep. Gosh, haven't they all?

Yeah. One of my favourite lines in the whole book is Emma Prune Squalor awaited the daybreak as though a clandestine meeting of the most hushed and secret kind had been agreed upon between herself and the first morning, Ray. Lovely. The doctor, on the other hand. Had a fucking weird night.

My note here was, do we need a description of a weird surreal dream in this book, which is a weird surreal dream? I'm imagining this. We're going deep in. Yeah. So there is a screen adaptation of this book, which I've not watched because I was avoiding spoilers, and I know I don't know watching a lot of it. But I know Atlanta, who listens to us, is a big fan of the adaptation. I do want to watch it at some point, but I imagine this scene is like a really surreal animated. sequence, like, you know, the really weird

episodes you'd sometimes get of, like, Looney Tunes or Tom and Jerry, kind of weird animated sequence? I was thinking it was like that Tree House of Horror episode, where you get the weird, like, 3D Simpsons bit inside the Simpsons. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I think, yeah, we're on the same.

I'm in the same kind of surreal. This is definitely something you'd animate. Ralph Baxhie, who did the, like, early, like, the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings animation. Oh, shit. Yeah, this is that, yeah, yeah. Yeah, this is Ralph Baxi. But, yeah, so just, running through quickly. I guess we've got the trying to rescue a drowning

fuchsia surrounded by poison bustles. Stere pike is... He likes me like the Dr. Moore because he doesn't be he genuinely care about that. Yeah. Steerpike running slash levitating with a swarm of rats. The countess floating on an iron tray using a frozen

flay as a fishing rod for her cats. Fine. Bellgrove, saddled and ridden by Titus. Nanny slags on a tightrope. Horrific line. swelter. Oh, God, yeah.

The Doctor Wretch to C-So via a volume forcing its boneless way inch by inch through a keyhole. And then we end on the wonderful mental image by comparison of Sepulgrove and sourdust jumping on the bed

wearing massive kitten and sunflower masks. Yes, that's very pagan ritual, isn't it? Yes, but also very childish. Oh, yeah. It's an interesting one. It's like the Wickerman kind of vibes, isn't it? Chapter 32,

in which it is the Day of the Barth and Bellgrove's getting ideas about it, Amber Prune Squalor. Yeah. And now it's the professors staring at the clock waiting for the class to end. This is such a long fucking couple of chapters, isn't it? It is great, this kind of incredible build-up to the party. But I do like, Belgrove gets the idea. All the other professors are telling him, Irma Prune Squalor fancies you.

And he's going, I know they're doing it to wind me up. I know they're doing it because they think I won't like that. And then I'll be avoiding the whole party and it will wind them up. but what if I did fancy Irma Prune Squad? What if she did fancy me? What if we did fancy each other? It sees himself sailing past the miserable batch of this

Emma on his arm, an unquestioned patriarch, a symbol of success and merry stability with something of the gay dog about him too, the light behind the bushel, the dark horse, the man with an ace up his sleeve. Oh, oh.

I like the way he very quickly constructs his own imagining of a romantic hero. I also like his, I would say fair, appraisal of Irma, a fine, upright woman with a long, sharp nose. But what about it? Noses have to be some shape or another. There is very much this idea that at no point are they necessarily attracted to each other.

They are fully attracted to the idea of being a husband and wife. And she's closest, she'll do. And he's closest. They have enough features about them. Yes. So she can latch on to his noble jaw and his patriarchal manner. and he can latch on to the fact that she's a woman. Yeah, that's pretty much.

She's a lady. Whoa. Right. Chapter 33, it is the final hours before the party. Now, we're nearly there, and Irma's finishing up her preparations, including a strategically romantic garden. I mean, it works.

Do you know what? No, I fully respect it. She got it, right? On this particular evening, there was a Hunter's moon. No wonder Irma had seen to it. obviously the most important parts of this chapter are the the hot water bosom

oh sorry what the hot water bosom the hot water bosom the hot water bosom a delightful choice the busts of what you make them it's a hot water bottle Alfred an expensive one

and the thing is she's gone to so much trouble here but as we learned in the previous chapter Belgrave is not that fast I'm too old for bums anyway Yeah, you're not really worried about bums. And then she's doing this thing of wearing the veil as part of her outfit and then the doctor eventually convincing her to ditch it. Which I love because just the idea of the veil as a fashion statement being normal enough is just another like this world is slightly really surreal around. I mean, a lot of this world is really surreal, but this part of the book is so normal.

The veil's like an extra surreal step to it. Yeah. Again, shout out at Preen Squalorl's improv skills. He manages to pull out an article he, he, read about how, you know, it's custom these days to walk upright, and the writer would know about full well and what grade of society to place any woman who is continuing to wear a veil after the 22nd of the month. Some things are done and some things are not done. Exactly. And it works. It's great. And it works. I like in this as well that we get a corresponding professors

getting ready, see in. Oh yeah. And they're getting their robes. Changing into their evening gown, stabbing its startled hanks of hair with broken combs, maligning one another, finding in one another's rooms, long-lost towels, studs, and even major garments that disappeared in mysterious ways. It's a little bit like sorority girls kind of... Yeah, like I'm seeing like a montage thing. Lots of girls in one house getting ready together. Actually, what it really reminded me of is how share I used to live in. And at one point, apart from one person who lived there, it was me and two other girls who were

also around 18 years old. And we all worked like bar jobs and things. And we would all make an effort on a Saturday night, even if we were going to work, because that's how we paid for drinks in those days. So there would be like an hour period on a Saturday where it was like pairs of tights being lent and flung from room to room and straighteners and Biscara flying everywhere

and the sole dude who lived there just hiding in his room under the covers until it had gone away. Yeah, no, it's really great. It's a very fun scene to read. Chapter 34 in which it's time for the party, the staff make an entrance,

Bellgroves entranced and hot water bottle slips. Once again, I do need to start by shouting out Cutflower. Yeah, this is the one I highlighted for your benefit, just in case. Oh, thank you, yes. In we go, La, in we go. Terribly gay now, terribly gay. We must all be terribly gay. Right.

Quite right, too. That's the ethos of the podcast. If only he had shouted out eyebrows. Then we would be in business. You would have your own emissary. But he does get this lovely moment, ending up being the first person. to enter the room because they have to enter one by one and be announced and he sort of prances in while he's around. Who could believe there were such vulgar monsters as death, birth, love art and pain around the corner.

It was too embarrassing to contemplate. By this time I was getting tired. Yes. More tired. And I did slightly resent how long it took him to make the point that Cut Flower was a good person to go in first. And I was genuinely worried he was going to take this long to explain the end of the end. of each of these 16 men, thankfully. No, after that we get like a little...

Actually, it's another really good list moment, if I can. Oh, yeah. Of flannel cat, like a lost soul for whom the journey was a mile, heavy, sloppy, untidy fluke, perched prism horribly alert, his porcine features shining white in the glow of the candles and his button black eyes darting to and fro as he moved crisply with short, aggressive steps. But it's sort of that device, so again, using how someone walks into a room as a

defining each character. Yeah, yeah. Oh, something interesting that occurred to me is this idea of the doctor and Emma being considered outsiders. They're talked about as the public for the professors. Yeah. Because they don't count each other as the public. And even though they are very much a part of Castle Life,

they are somewhat outside it. Yeah, and it was talked about in the last book, wasn't it? Yeah, they aren't actually part of Gormengast. And that's probably to their benefit, at least a bit. I feel like they could leave. like it would be it would be upsetting especially for someone like fuchsia but they wouldn't they could yeah i don't even really feel like the professors kind of can i mean they they they can but why would they

they if they've got you know rooms and food they're thoroughly institutionalized in a way it doesn't seem like prune squalor is yeah yes um and oh as the professors gather before they walk down to the party steer pike shoots at them with his catapult which is his credence to my he was educated by them at some point. I think I've ever come so close to saying the one word I won't say on this podcast so many times in an episode and it's all about this one character. Steer Pike, which begins with C, speaking of him, I think I'm really projecting some past trauma onto this man. He's a really good depiction of it, isn't he? We definitely both are. I mean, speaking of steer pipe, if we jump on to chapter 35, where Emma takes a quick break.

from the action and doesn't catch steer bike in the act of purloining more poison. Talk about a wax giraffe, of course, slice me edgeways. Yes, very much so. Bugger it. I'll move on quickly for that, because we're a few chapters before the end, and the next chapter is, I'd say the big one, this is the romance, and it's very much my favourite chapter. Certainly not, you hulk of flesh unhallowed?

Well, yes, quite. That's all I have to say about that chapter, so please. The romance between Emma and Bellgrove properly begins And they go out into the gardens And Throd does unfortunately interrupt For a while They stood by the fish pond In which the reflection of the moon shone with a fatuous vacancy

And they stared at it They looked at the original It was no more interesting than its watery ghost But they both knew that to ignore the moon On such an evening would be an insensitive, almost brutish thing to do I just love the idea that the moon was just shit that night A fuck's a point in it

You're not making an effort Come on, man Fatuous vacancy It's not even that it's shit Like it's a proper glorious full moon or something It's just And Go on, do a flip

It's like you're a real assail You're just standing out there With your lover Looking up at the moon And it's a bit fatuous and vacant Isn't it? You insist upon itself. Very much, sorry.

I'm just like I said, going those women. I am a mere woman. I said a mere woman. And she might have gone too far. She's talked about wharms. There's just this constant eggshells about the whole thing, isn't there? She's got such a defined imagining of how all this is going to go, that he is in constant danger of fucking love. But somehow it's really.

really easy for him to just keep going with it. And again, it's not really about each other. It's just about wanting the romance itself. But it's fine. I still really enjoy it. Yeah. I mean, to the point that I think it was in an earlier chapter, that it likens something about her to the Milky Way.

And she's like, why Milky? Yeah, it's a really nice moment where her brain interrupts with the romance that she's been trying to go for. Hang on. And then she presses her hands to her bosom of the word, darling. And unfortunately, the hot water bottle makes a noise. but luckily, Bellgrove sort of accepts it for a gurgle of love. There's a particular way where Belgrove's thinking of himself,

and he thinks, he's someone, you know, a damsel might trust in a lonely wood. But he also saw himself as a buck. His youth had been so long ago he could remember nothing of it, but he presumed erroneously. We tasted the purple fruit and broken hearts and hymonds. Which, by the way, Marvin. Marvin. Had tossed flowers to ladies on balconies, drunk champagne out of their shoes,

and generally been irresistant. I think this was the one where I actually physically noted kind of proto-Rid Cully. I don't think Rid Culley was doing all of that. No. But I think that there's a shared energy. He could have done. Oh, we're just back on Rick Culley standing now. Yeah, we've had so little cause to stand in this book that I feel like a... Can we just have... I've reprieved to our only slightly inappropriate

romantic interest of the unseen university. When I say only slightly inappropriate, I'm talking about a man at least in his 70. Yeah, but I think he has animal carcasses adorning his wall. You're a vegetarian. And I think is a 34-year-old vegetarian. But it's fine. He lives in a different dimension. That's just not the weirdest thing I've fancied this week. Anyway, yeah.

Do you have any thoughts on Emma and Belgroves romance? In that case, we do have to unfortunately talk about poor Professor Throd. Fine. Of Splint and Spireane, if you don't remember, because it's been a while since we podcasted about it. Spireane, Splint and Throd, one. They were the ones who followed the beardy man until he died. Throd is now... He's only getting to sort of newly have emotions and things for the first time,

because that weird guy he worshipped for a bit told him not to, which means he's then overcome and collapses at the sight of armour, and then the doctor performs some wonderful medical treatment that involves stripping poor Throd naked. That's a hammer. Throd comes to and runs away, and the last that was ever seen of Mr. Throd, the one-time member of Mr. Belgrove staff,

was a lunar flash of buttocks where the high wall propped the sky. Yes, so he'd fall into his death, or as he'd run away forever. Oh, I assumed he'd run away forever. That's how I chose to. Oh, right. That's how I first saw it, but that's when he said, hi, well, yeah. So he's run away and, well, he's quite, we say poor Professor Throdd, he may have run away to a beautiful new life, in which case, the cheery lunar wink of his bosom is fine. Battocks, not bism. I separate, yeah.

It's too late at night's to start worrying about things like that. The difference between buttocks and bums. Well, in this household, it really doesn't seem to matter. goodness the love gurgles unfortunately I suppose it really does matter with her as

gyrating but meticulously honest found this oh god right we've only got three chapters left and we can do this front scene unfortunately we do have to move away

from the great romance of Emma Brin Squaller and Professor Bellgrove very well fucking steer pike visits the twins and almost his experiences and Axe and Francine and I both root for the axe.

Again, I know you struggle with at some point there is a really long unnecessary bit of description but the description of Steer Pike reflected in the eyes of the twins. This was excellent. Not just me being biased against Steer Pike. This to be is a long description leading up to the moment of action

Whereas previously there have been long descriptions that I've started kind of skimming and then suddenly someone's upside down with a crushed skull. Right, yeah. Which is the only, I think, reasonable comparison to Tolkien I can make is that there's a lot of description to the point where my eyes start crossing and then suddenly someone important died. That is fair. Unfortunately, no one actually dies in this scene.

No. Despite what I would say is a wonderful loony, set up. Just a little part of that description. Let those who have tried to pass love letters through the eyes of needles or to have written poems on the heads of pins take heart. Crude and heavy-handed as they found themselves, they will never appreciate the extent of their clumsiness,

for they will never know how steerpike's head and shoulders lean forward through circles the size of bees whose very equidistant from one another. And it goes on and must have been drawn with a proboscis of a leg, a bee's leg or something. Anyway, eventually he's not killed by an axe, never mind. However. But we start to see the beginning of his downfall here,

because there is someone who was actively realised he is bad enough that he should die. Carcantine doesn't like him. They don't know why, but they know he needs to die. Yeah. Like, Barkantine doesn't like him. Barkentine thinks I shouldn't really be employing him. But these are the first people... The Countess is suspicious.

But it's going to take a while for the countess to get further than suspicious because She's still shaking the dust off the gears and she's going Yeah, it's like, hang on Hang on No wait, bring me a goat, hang on Wrong sex Anyway, sorry, I was about to make a really inappropriate joke Chapter 38

I wouldn't wait for it In which? Anyway, we should all be terribly gay No, in which rain pours the castle is lit and steer pike in his shadow have somewhere to be. And we haven't had, we haven't had that much in the way of really good weather descriptions apart from our sunbeams. So I do think we need to, that's a good point. We've spent a lot of time indoors. Yeah, we need a good weather description. I think we can take advantage to there being one here. The rain was loud on the roofs, flooding along the gutterings, gurgling in crannies

and brimming the thousand irregular cavities that the centuries had formed along the crumbling stones. That reminds me a little of when the chef, what's his name? Help me. As well, it dies. It's that kind of night then, isn't it? we get the rain. Yeah, the horrific storminess. Yeah. But in this, it's so dark and stormy. It was a dark and stormy night.

It was a dark and stormy night. And do you know what? That's the one description we didn't get. It's the only thing. Because it's too succinct. Yeah, no, it's far too easy. Everyone reacts by lighting up the castle. It's so dark.

The hero fan's a little, every available lantern, burner, candle and lamp. they're putting up trays and tins to reflect the light further long before any message could have been carried across the body of Gormengarst there wasn't a digit that hadn't responded to the universal sense of suffocation

not the merest finger joint of stone that had not set itself a light that's interesting it is this yeah the implication of a supernaturally dark storm almost one of those ones where you do just

want to put on every light in the house and cover the mirrors probably and well they're using the mirrors no they says there's an extraordinary variety of reflectors they're trying to spread the light as far as possible that's true but they do live in a slightly different world as I would imagine different superstitions

yeah and I only know I should cover up mirrors because of this podcast yeah that's fair also you don't need to be covering up your mirrors when they're that small poxy I'd assume no probably not I've forgot the bloody um the Thesaurus disease Spavind. Spavind. Spivined. Spivend. You got the hallowed hunk of flesh. I yell in the mirror every morning.

Oh yes, morning affirmations. You spivant. Bracket's positive. If I am but an unhallowed hunk of flesh, I need to be gay in face the day. La. La. La. Right, last chapter. Last chapter. Home stretch.

Quite a lot happens. In which... It's now been a solid 14 hours of Gorman gasp for me between reading and podcast. So if you're not signed up to a patron yet, could you, so that we can get Francine some therapy? No, it's fine. We just one more chapter, Francine, chapter 39,

in which Stair Pike finally enacts his murderous plans, but Barcantine drags him down into the murky depths of the moat. Sadly, Sterepike's not actually dead. Lovely end point for the section, by the way, Deanna, well chosen. Well, I thought it was a nice dramatic moment. And I thought you didn't... We left it on Svelter's death in the last round, didn't we? Look, if Mervyn Peake will put a death at a midpoint.

That's lovely. Whomst to mind-work you? Yeah, I did that on purpose. The two getting dragged into moat. Why be foreshadowing? Who the fuck knows? can be terribly gay either way. Especially the gayest thing about this book is the two protagonists, moving together as one thing like some foul, subacuous beast of allegory.

Listen, I know, it's not my place to say, but that's homophobic. I apologize to any foul, subacquous beast of allegory listening to this podcast. Okay, so, yeah, this is the death of Parkentine. This is the chapter. This is Stier Pike deciding at the last minute to change his murder plan. It's a horrible thing for me to be uncontrollably laughing over because what an awful scene. It is awful. This is our RIP Barkington chapter.

He gets one last really great bit of description. Hair dirty is a flybone web. His skin was equally filthy with its silted fishes. cheese like cracks and discolourations, an arid terrain, dead it seemed and waterless as the moon, and yet at its centre those malignant lakes, his vile and brimming eyes. Yuck, but incredible. We also learned in this that he did have a wife and child. He remembers his wife making paper boats.

Oh, isn't that a dreadfully sad image? Yeah. Snipec is lurking in the shadows, and he's watching Barkentine, as Bucking mutters to himself, and he comes up with this idea of, of burning his beard because the candles are right there and thinks to himself, what would be more diverting than to watch the irritable and filthy tyrant caught among the flames, his rags blazing, his skin smoking, his beard leaping like a crimson fish. He does this, and Barkantine cannot save himself, but he's going to take this fucker down

with him. Absolutely. And he's grabbing onto him, and he's burning. And it was not merely his life he was fighting for. that single that single word freezing the air had revealed what's their-pike of Ferguson that in his adversary

he was piecing himself against Gorman Gast before him was the living pulse of the immemorial castle and I put this in my notes under that's Hebris motherfucker That's Hebrous Motherfucker And just speaking of great words, great description He'd been out-generalled by a verminous setogenarian

Beautiful It's just lovely isn't it this? lovely in a horrible way that the idea that Gorman Garst incarnate here is this disgusting old man. Yeah. He is embodying the spirit of the castle and the spirit of the castle is trying to burn.

Yes. Because this is the parasite. Yeah, this is the cancer. This is the... Yeah. Less insightfully, I would say that I've got the start of a a kind of parody verse of dancing queen in my head there.

You're the dancing queen, young and keen burning, Barkentine. Okay, yeah, no, I can see it. I see where we're going with us. Because they're dancing. Yeah, yeah, they're kind of dancing around. If we could work on that in a less trying time. Yeah, no, I think we should. Listeners, if you want to throw your hat in the ring for that, please do.

Oh, please do, yeah. One last thing I would like to point out, and I think it's the last thing I have to say about this chapter of this bit of Gormingast, is you mentioned parallels. We sort of finished on Swelter's death last time. We're finishing on Barkington's death here. Parallels between Sourdust and Barkentie's deaths. Steerpike engineers the library burning

and sourdust dies of smoke inhalation. Sourdust does not burn, but he dies because of fire, because of Steerpike's actions and steerpike's actions of fire. Barcanty's... Sorry, sorry, steerpike's actions of fire sounds like you're trying to do damn with the kids. And then Barkentine drowns. Barkantine also dies because of fire but does not burn to death. Fixiates.

Yes. So they both expixiates. What is drowning, but... Smoke inhalation, but wetter. It sounded like you were going to be like really philosophical. No, no. I was going to say something almost exactly that, but hearing it from you's worse somehow. I don't listen to me.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I've been to listen to. tomorrow. Yeah, good luck with that, right. But yeah, I mean, sorry, we're laughing over the top of this, but this are a really good scene. Oh, no, it's amazing.

The clinging to him and this Greek fire of a person. This is like, I love that as a, it's not, is it a trope or is it just a, that's something we've seen occasionally, but just when someone is so full of zeal, or hatred or both, that they will take you out with them. And that's what matters. Imagine caring that much as you die about something.

Yeah, it's great. It is fantastic. And I mean, it's also, like, it's genuinely very satisfying to read any kind of comeuppance for Steyer Pike. Yeah. And this he risk, this realization that he has put himself against an entire castle and the castle is now,

and the castle is burning him out. And you think about how much duck shit he must have swallowed when he was in that moat. That's really satisfying to think about. It's not lovely. Right. Miraculously, I'm running out of things say about Gorman Gass. Francine, do you have an obscure reference video for me after all of that?

Yes, miraculously, it is short from some of the professorial scenes. His state of mind was not improved by finding the headmaster looming above him like Jove among the clouds. Jove, is it? I didn't realize that Jove just meant Jupiter. Oh. Originally, yeah. So by Jove was by Jupiter. And then became a minstoth, obviously, for God.

And whilst on... Sorry. I'd always assumed it was Jehovah. Yeah, no, apparently not, Jupiter. But it comes from the Latin pro-I-O-O-Vom, which was, so I-O-V-E-M, looks like it was Jupiter in Latin, which blind I-o, oh.

Yeah. Might have blown this thing wide open. Could have done. Might have said something really obvious. Might be unconnected. The point is, if any of you are still watching and listening, you must be pretty dedicated to the cause. So hopefully you'll appreciate whatever the fuck I was just trying to do.

Thank you. Right. That's everything we would say. about part one of Gorman Gass. Thank Jove. We're going to be back at some point next week with part two, which will start in Chapter 40 and go all the way to the end of the book if we have survived it.

In the meantime, of course, dear listeners... The episode is going to start by Joanna somehow reaching through the screen, pulling me back as I try and exit via the window. One of those things that you're brought on with the Shepherds Crook. Yeah. All right, I haven't done this in a minute. In the meantime, dear listener, of course, if you like to stay in touch with us,

at the truth shall make you fret you can join our discord there's a link down below follow us and instagram make you fret on blue sky at make you fret on facebook at the true show make you fret on facebook at the true show make you fret join us i slash ttsm ys myfrette email us email us the true show make you fret and if you want to support us financially and dear god why would you go to patreon.com forward slash the true show make you fret we need to exchange your hard-earned for some bonus nonsense and in the meantime you're just encouraging us though so for once i'm going to say i wouldn't in the meantime unless you want to see the video of this shit Oh my God, let me finish the episode, Francie.

No. I'm going to cling to you as we fall into the moment. In the meantime, dear listener, just detain you. Go, go. Go, well, you can. Goodness sake. I'm just going to give us a second. I don't think it's going to help.

I think this is the worst I've ever been on this podcast. Again, wait till we get to part two.