Mental Health and Decline in Titus Groan's Fake Empire
How the Gormenghast Trilogy is much more than a political analogy
NB - As this is a commentary on both Tutus Groan and Gormenghast, it contains references to plot points from both novels. Several key eventualities and conclusive occurrences will be discussed.
Once Gormenghast has been entered, it becomes impossible to leave. There are exits, of course, and the physical body can pass through them. Its permanence attaches itself to the mind. This is true for both reader and character.
Gormenghast, for all its expanse, is a shadow if its former self. From scale and ceremony, its easy to gauge a sense of what it once was, but we occupy the remnants. Within those overgrown, dank surroundings, we have followed the interactions, both malign and horrifying, of numerous complex, fascinating and bizarre individuals.
Treachery, subterfuge, exploitation and murder have all occurred within these walls, and over the course of over 1,000 pages, an entire ecosystem unfurls; albeit one of decay and ruin.
Layered upon the dilapidation of the surroundings, is the decay of the mind which permeates almost everyone who passes through the grounds, corridors and basements of this seemingly accursed place. Gormenghast, whilst a commentary on many socio-political elements, is also a narrative on mental health and dysfunction.
Taking the Groan family as an initial example, there is not one of them who possesses a sense of inner balance, or sense of symbiosis with the world around them. The Countess has retreated both from her familial responsibilities and most human contact, spending her days surrounded by an army of white cats and woodland birds, which she feeds by hand. Her children are of little or no interest to her; her husband even less (this is a stance which she seems to maintain after Sepulchrave’s unfortunate fate - one which was brought about by complete mental collapse). The only thing of value which she perceives outside the creatures which blanket her every step, is the majesty and ritual of Gormenghast.
Fuchsia is a myriad of frustrations, innocence, disappointment and frustration; the culmination of which is tragic and its effects innumerable. She shares several concerns of her younger brother, but even they drift as the story progresses, much to the disappointment and sadness of Titus. She feels inconsequential and of little value; her diminutive social status within the framework of Gormenghast dictating her own self-worth, adding to her fragility and ultimate decline.
The heir to the legacy, Titus Groan, is a quizzical young man who rejects many of what he sees to be archaic and unnecessary rituals, and questions the very structures and governance upon which his privilege is based. He craves love, affection and care, and can find only rejection and indifference. The small glimmers of what he desires come from sources such as Bellgrove, the kindly headmaster, with whom he shares a game of marbles whilst being punished for disappearing (an early example of the young heir’s wanderlust and desire to escape what he feels to be a giant prison). Ultimately, he is disillusioned and convinced that wonder lies far beyond the walls within which he is kept.
Clarice and Cora are of particular interest, for they represent a very interesting combination of gothic literary trope and psychological patterns. What could have easily been brushed off as eccentricity and peculiarity takes on a very different light when read a quarter into the twenty-first century. They are a tragic pair, not so much malevolent than malleable, and it is with sadness that we watch them destroyed in such a brutal manner.
Mervyn Peake, by all accounts, suffered greatly with his own mental wellbeing. This may be a reason as to why the emotional elements of the novels are so sharp, accurate and resonant. Not a single character is played for the sole purpose of ridicule. It’s a continually humorous and acerbic piece of work, and has been cited as a satire on many occasions, but the delicacy and startling accuracy with which mental health (and the fragility thereof) is displayed in the Gormenghast series makes it a wildly unique experience to read. There is a sense of empathy for every life which exists within these walls. That’s what makes the endless tragedy sting all the more bitterly.
Even the behaviors of characters such as Flay, whose unyielding loyalty and adherence to ritualistic patterns and maintaining the ‘way of things’ goes far beyond mere servitude.
This brings us to Steerpike; possibly one of the most conflictive and enchanting protagonist/antagonists to ever appear in a work of fiction. This is another example of why the Gormenghast books are so anomalous. The structure in which characters dominate the pages is atypical and lends itself to the disorientating and otherworldly feel to the narrative. Steerpike is as atypical as the literary approach, in that he’s an inarguable monster, but there is always at least a modicum of sympathy and, at best/worst, understanding of his motives. It would be nice to believe that Steerpike’s desire to seize complete control of Gormenghast was down to a philosophically based sense of anarchism and anti-establishment sensibilities, forged from the abuse and subjection he felt as a member of the serving classes, but it’s probably more down the fact that he’s a monster. The gaslighting, manipulation and murders are unforgivable, but it’s hard to feel completely cold when his end is delivered.
Steerpike’s escalation of diabolical acts is in a state of concurrent ascension to the overall fragmentation of the societal and personal elements of Gormenghast. Everything falls apart around him, but the way in which Peake describes his inner monologue is fascinating. From what was once a determined and calculated mind, now exists only a reactive and instinctual one; a fox who hears the coming of the dogs, residing itself to a painful and bloody fate.
As whatever remains of Gormenghast’s grandiosity is washed away in a relentless storm, so too is the resolve of many of the characters. Whilst it appears that the Countess is about to reconnect with her son after 17 years, they are both emotionally and physically separated. Fuchsia is gone, as is her father. Cora and Clarice suffer a horrendous fate, as do Flay and Sepulchrave.
So too, tragically, did Mervyn Peake at the age of 57, long before his time. Early onset dementia was the attributed cause of his own personal decline; the end of a life which had been plagued by mental health issues. One can only hope he found solace in the world he created, and that he was a source of connection and companionship to the disparate souls who occupy these pages.
Enjoyed this so much - such an insightful commentary Colin!
Even though I’m still finishing off re-reading Titus Groan I had to race straight over to check this out, because given the passage of time and changing attitudes, and knowing I’m approaching the books with (I assume/hope!) greater awareness than I would’ve on my first read decades ago, this is the area I’ve been worrying about the most. Would Peake’s narrative stand the test of time, or would his writing now appear horribly inappropriate and dated?
As I knew Peake’s writing came from a place of personal experience I’ve been hopeful this area would’ve been treated with empathy and understanding, but It’s a real relief to read your feedback and know I don’t have deep disappointment lying ahead in a work I’ve loved my whole life.
I read somewhere that Peake had a nervous breakdown after the war and then visiting Bergen-Belsen as a war artist, and it was after this experience that his mental-health issues began - something I wasn’t aware of during my previous readings. On this reading I found myself wondering if Lord Sepulchrave was to some degree an avatar for either Peake, or for some of the people he would’ve known during this period. The lurid visual of the fire and someone having the thing they love most, their connection to stability, reason and rational thought ripped away from them so violently, felt to me like Peake must’ve been deeply influenced by the wartime atrocities he was witness to.
And picking up on the astute points you’ve made about Steerpike and his inner monologue - another detail I read somewhere was from his son. He said he believed Steerpike was influenced by aspects of a specific Nazi who had been sentenced to death by the war crimes tribunal. Apparently Peake met the condemned man in his cell hours before the execution, which had a massive impact on Peake. Apparently Peake’s sketches of the man are remarkably similar to his sketches of Steerpike.
And this seems appropriate in relation to your thoughtful assessment - because I so agree about how lovely it would be to believe Steerpike’s choices are motivated by anarchistic, anti-establishment sensibilities, but as I read he most often reminds me of many of our populist politicians - and the pathocracies we’re seeing emerge in our governments today with ever greater frequency.
I’m still gathering my thoughts on Cora and Clarice. A lot to think about there.
I also found an absolutely amazing YouTube video on Peake’s art and bg which I thought might be of interest to anyone wanting to discover more about him: https://youtu.be/QE8M_dSLzh0?si=8A29IzXnN-ScM-JI
Excellent, Colin. You raise many central themes here that run parallel to what I've been thinking as I reread the books.
The sense of Gormenghast as long past its prime, as a place, a polity, and an idea, certainly pervades the book, and puts me in mind of Taoist criticism of Confucians that said "Ritual is the dry husk of faith." By the time we encounter Gormenghast, ritual is the only thing holding the place together: there is no real faith and feeling left, which is perhaps why mental breakdown is so constant (on the books' own terms; Peake's own problems certainly contributed). Each crisis features a breakdown in ritual, at times is even presaged in ritual: most obviously, Titus' Earling, with his dropping the ritual objects into the lake, foretells his own role in breaking lines of descent. (And this reminds me of the climax of the Gempei Wars in Japan that resulted in the founding of the first Shogunate: the imperial heir, a child, is drowned at sea (the Inland Sea) after the battle of Dannoura, losing the imperial sword (one of three ritual symbols of imperial rule) into the sea. Warrior rule followed.) But the dry husk is itself a prison: the characters are all trapped to some degree in the rituals of the place and when ritual breaks down, freedom emerges. Think of Flay in his initial exile discovering the beauty of his caves and woods in the absence of his daily duties in the Castle. The problem is, without ritual, there's nothing, and nothingness gives no markers by which to orient oneself. Which is a pretty clear path to madness. Too much freedom.
This may be why Steerpike has a certain ambiguity to him. The appeal of freedom lurks in his apparent anarchism. But he would substitute for ritual his own will, with no gain of freedom for anyone else.
Speaking of Taoism, the symbolic (and real) role of water in washing away aspects of Gormenghast, cleansing it perhaps, with the great flood but again foreshadowed in the rain-soaked day of Titus' Earling (and hinted at in the downpour that created the "inland sea" where Swelter met his end, and that washed away any evidence that his and Sepulchrave's disappearance into the Tower of Flints might have left)... well, water is the supreme Taoist image of the power of the humble, always seeking the lowest point, giving way before brute force, but always returning and capable of eroding away the most obdurate rocks of real stone or institutional "permanence". There's a Taoist reading of the books there for the taking, I think.
A final plaintive note: I'm engrossed in the experience of rereading the books, but cannot force myself to rush through them, and so am WAAAY behind our supposed schedule. Need another month of reading and discussion at a proper Gormenghastly pace. Partly into the second book -- the third is still barely a distant rock on the horizon. And I owe a book review of Michael Mann's On Wars (over 900 pages), so I've got other reading duties as well! Whine whine, sorry, but I'm enjoying the ride with y'all, so I'm hoping it doesn't end too soon.
Cheers!