Elric's Returns are Diminishing21 June 2013tBack in the days when I was going out of my way to get as many Elric books as possible, I had little idea that there were the classic (or original) Elric books and then there were the ones that Morcock ended up writing later because of the popularity of the originals. As is generally the case, when one revisits a classic series to attempt to capitalise on it (though in many cases there is usually some form of reader demand as well) the quality of the story tends to drop. It is what I call the Law of Diminishing Returns – the more you do something the less enjoyable it becomes.tTake dating sites for instance. I know this has nothing to do with this book, and really, there is little that I can actually write about this book with the exception of having read it and that it was, well, pretty ordinary (it simply did not have the zest of the earlier Elric books) so I feel I should outline my Law of Diminishing Returns a bit more. Okay, the Law of Diminishing Returns is an law of economics (and one sometimes wonders if such a speculative 'science' can really have any laws, but then again economics is based upon the concept of scarcity of resources) and yes, my interpretation of the law does have connections with the economic law, but then I tend to bring it out into the social sphere as well because I believe that it also applies here.tAnyway dating sites: I have used dating sites, and in a sense I like them (depending on the site that is, and I am not talking about the ones where you simply go on line to get sex, you know, like Adult Friend Finder – I will not actually write the web address because Goodreads has a habit of actually creating a link, and if you really want to find it I am sure you can find it without me having to create a link) because it is actually a lot easier to approach somebody on the internet than at, say, a pub. However, what I have also discovered is that when you first put your profile up there you get lots of hits (or at least I do) but as time moves on the hits get less and less. The same with the responses (and yes, I have got responses) – at first you get a few, but over time they get less. Further, when I first start playing around with it it is a lot of fun, but after a while it simply gets boring and tedious.tHowever, that is when my second law comes in: the Law of Averages (not that there is any hierarchy to these laws, and if there was, I would put the Law of Averages first) and that is that the more you do something, the more likely you are to get the result that you want. The difference is that the Law of Averages requires persistence, and that is something that not may of us have. That means that when the Law of Diminishing Returns starts to take effect, one will then need to take into account the Law of Averages and start putting more effort into achieving your goal, because what is happening is that the honeymoon is now over and the period of work is about to begin. As they say (I don't know who exactly, and I am not sure if 'they', whoever they are, actually said it) it is a much better feeling to achieve something after you have worked for it than to have it handed to you on a silver plater (or something like that).
I first read Revenge Of The Rose eight years ago after stumbling across it in a thrift store. I was unaware that there was a "new" Elric novel (it was published in '91, so it wasn't new at the time) and brought it home with me.The interesting thing about reading a book Moorcock wrote in the 80's versus those written in the 60's and 70's is how much his writing style changed. It's inevitable that a writer will progress as they write, especially a writer as prolific as Moorcock, but I've been reading all the Elric books in chronological order and the effect is slightly jarring. Much like Fortress Of The Pearl, Revenge Of The Rose is a very different beast from those early Elric books. Even within the original series, there is a change in Moorcock's style, from the sort of slap dash early sword and sorcery method to a more refined approach. Elric Of Melnibone still stands as perhaps my favorite Elric novel with it's sense of doom and foreboding. I don't know exactly where in the timeline Moorcock wrote that one versus the rest of the early series, but I get a feeling it was later in the game.Revenge Of The Rose is a good story, fairly epic in scope. There are some great, fully fleshed out characters among the supporting cast, particularly Wheldrake, who brings a touch of humor to the otherwise grim world of Elric.As the last novel written about Elric, Revenge Of The Rose stands as an excellent contribution to the legend, even as it stands apart in terms of style.
Do You like book The Revenge Of The Rose (1994)?
Originally published on my blog here in May 2003.The longest and most recent Elric story, The Revenge of the Rose is much more complex than the earlier books featuring this hero. Like most of them, it reflects Moorcock's concerns at the time of writing, and is much more literary in flavour as were the other novels he wrote around this time. It takes the same familiar fantasy genre form as the others in this particular omnibus (they are all quests), but it has a twist.The plot stems from a Hamlet-like meeting between Elric and the ghost of his father, who commissions him to recover his soul, taken by a trio of warrior sisters. This quest is part of a power struggle between two Lords of Chaos, one of whom is Elric's patron Duke Arioch, and takes place across several planes of the multiverse (these elements coming from the common background to all the Eternal Champion stories). He joins together with a group of characters from these planes, including the fictional Victorian poet Wheldrake, who appears in several Moorcock novels, and, most interesting, a bizarre family of psychics who are wandering the multiverse. (The character from this family, Mother Phatt, bears a striking resemblance to how one imagines Jerry Cornelius' mother would become if she went senile.)The most interesting part of the novel is the first, which takes place mostly in the fascinating Gypsy Nation. The background to this section, with its rolling cities, must be one of the most unusual in the fantasy genre. The rest of the novel seems to pale by comparison, but this section alone would make it worth reading. I've never really been a fan of the Elric stories, which seem to me to lie at the most hackneyed end of Moorcock's writing; but The Revenge of the Rose is the one which I would choose as the best of them.
—Simon Mcleish
Le cycle initial d’Elric comportait sept volumes qui formaient un tout cohérent. Quinze ans plus tard, Moorcock va intercaler deux tomes intermédiaires dans le cycle. La Revanche de la Rose est l’un d’eux. Il a l’inconvénient de briser la linéarité du cycle et de tomber comme un cheveu sur la soupe.Il s’agit cependant un roman d’heroic fantasy efficace et qui exploite bien l’univers (pardon, le multivers) qu’a posé Michael Moorcock. L’affrontement Loi-Chaos est très bien rendu et on retrouve l’ambiance baroque qui a fait le succès de l’auteur.
—Bertrand
Good book. This book is more action packed then Michael Moorcock's later works on Elric. However, typical of the later works of Michael Moorcock, the novel has very heavy emphasis on the multiverse and the introduction of new, heavily story-centered main characters.Spoilers include Elric meeting some ancestors and the introduction of other sentient-like swords. In addition, Elric does not use Stormbringer to give him strength throughout the entire story. He does not use typical herb-like drugs to give him strength either but rather uses dragon venom once, which sustains him during the entire duration of the novel.
—ERNEST MORE
