Norrell, a peevish, suspicious country squire who is (unbeknownst to anyone) the country’s only practicing magician, having spent decades in secluded study.ĭespite his ruthless gatekeeping of his chosen profession, as the story begins, Norrell has become convinced that the time for the restoration of English magic is at hand, and begins seeking publicity and political support for his efforts. There are only theoretical magicians and historians of magic, though their efforts to expand or continue their studies are usually shut down by Mr. However, the golden age of English magic has long since passed they are not even on the decline at this point, as practical magic has functionally been extinct for centuries. Magic is an open and established fact in the story, something that everyone learns a little about in school. The story is about two magicians attempting to restore English magic. The writing is very droll, with whimsical descriptions and footnotes, deadpan descriptions and somewhat over-formal dialogue. That is a genre and era that I am not particularly familiar with. The book’s style is that of a sort of parodic or modernized version of the 19th century English novel, at least to my understanding. This book is not quite the same late 19th century Victorian gothic as Penny Dreadful JS & Mr N is set in the earlier part of that century, in the last decade of the Napoleonic Wars and the few years beyond. I wanted to hit up some fiction this month, and was struck by the idea to read Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell because, beyond just being one of those books you’ve seen around someplace, it was brought back to (my) cultural consciousness last year when its author, Susanna Clark, published a new novel, Piranesi.

I was in the mood for a light touch of the gothic from having watched the Showtime series Penny Dreadful over the past few weeks, a very fun and over-the-top mashup of classic Victorian characters and modern horror tropes.

Jonathan strange susanna clarke