Review by Catherine Cheek
When I heard that Ian Grossman had a twin brother who was also a writer, and moreover, that his twin had authored a fantasy novel described as an adult version of Harry Potter, I knew I had to get my hands on a copy of The Magicians, by Lev Grossman. It came highly recommended, which probably colored my opinion, because I found it captivating, erudite, and at times bitter, but in a good way, like espresso.
Quentin is a nerdy, introverted kid. He’s the top of his class at an already prestigious high school, and although he can’t match the charm of his friend James or gain the love of James’ girlfriend Julia, he knows that academically he can overcome everything set before him. He is very unhappy, and takes solace in fantasizing about Fillory, a magical world he read about as a child (and still can’t quite let go of.) He wants to believe in magic, and when he meets someone who offers to let him apply to Brakebills, an elite college for magicians, he jumps at the chance. After a mysterious and arduous test, he gains admittance.
Quentin quickly finds that he is not the most brilliant student at the school, nor is he (to his even greater surprise) the unhappiest. The first part of the novel deals with Quentin and his fellow students as they grind away at the excruciatingly difficult coursework under the supervision of their demanding professors. Grossman manages to make the study of magic seem so dull, arduous and grueling that I never once fantasized about being in Quentin’s shoes.
After they finally graduate, Quentin and his friends from the “physical” magic discipline move to Manhattan and coast along on a life of pointless debauchery. This is where comparisons to The Great Gatsby manifest. Like many who have too much money and power, the young magicians want for nothing except adversity. They drink too much, sleep with one another constantly, and fester in the same unhappiness they all had before Brakebills. They have become what Alice, Quentin’s girlfriend, most fears. At one point, she warned him against this, fearing they would become as feckless as her parents.
“So you have to promise me, Quentin. Let’s never get like this, with these stupid hobbies nobody cares about. Just doing pointless things all day and hating each other and waiting to die.”
Finally, just when things seem their bleakest, one of their old classmates comes up with what he thinks is the perfect solution to their ennui.
My favorite part of the novel, Fillory, was a pseudo-Narnia. As Narnia has four Pevensie children who undertook adventures and helped Aslan the lion, Fillory had the five Chatwin children, who helped the magical rams Ember and Umber defeat whatever ills plagued Fillory. Grossman uses the parallel of Fillory to poke holes in not just Narnia, but in a meta sense, he pokes holes in the entire concept of a fantasy story. What would happen if, instead of children, the people who journey to a magical land are jaded magicians? What if instead of blindly obeying the gods of the magical land, they ask hard questions? What if they don’t care at all about wrong or right, but are just searching for some meaning in their lives?
Some people have drawn comparisons between this book and Harry Potter, but this is a mistake. First of all, Harry Potter was written for young people, and it doesn’t deal with adult themes. Harry is a jock whose attitude towards his studies is average at best. He cares more about saving the world and spending time with his friends than he does about hitting the books. Quentin and his friends are hardcore nerds for whom studying is as natural as breathing. Harry loves Quiddich, and his success on the field gains him respect. Quentin and his friends despise their magical sport, welters, and the Dean has to force them to play. You know pretty early on that Harry is going to get some government position and marry Ginny Weasely and have chubby redheaded babies, living in a cozy townhouse in some respectable magic suburb. Quentin and his friends seem doomed to misery.
Like Gatsby, they have everything they could possibly want except happiness. It should have been depressing, but their unhappiness made me sympathize with them. Who hasn’t, at some point, flirted with nihilism? What if you had the power to do anything in the world, but had nothing to do? What if you could go anywhere, including to a magical world, but couldn’t escape yourself? But as lonely as they are, they stay together. And as aimless as they are, they’re willing to carry through the plan to find a quest to give their lives meaning.
I can’t say this book was flawless, but it captivated me in a way that few fantasy novels do anymore. It made the study of magic seem plausible, and the people who study it as broken and corrupted as power would make them. My main complaint was that the novel ended “on the inhale” as one of my teachers puts it. I would have liked a tighter resolution.
But I hear there’s a sequel.
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