Review: Pawn of Prophecy

Pawn of Prophecy by David Eddings

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


While I was cleaning off my shelves yesterday, this series caught my eye. It had been almost 20 years since I'd read them, and I wanted to decide whether I should keep them on the shelf, box them, or give them away. In order to make up my mind, I started reading.



I was happy to discover that Eddings was a much better writer than I realized. I'd remembered his humor and the witty back-and-forth dialogue among the characters. I'd remembered the running gags (such as Barak's horses and their dislike for carrying the giant Cherek). But I'd forgotten that Eddings was actually good. The first real hint of that shows up in the prologue, where he masters the voice of a nineteenth century text. Some of his phrases were especially strong, as when he talked about the "eternal summer" of Garion's youth. All of this left me thrilled. The Belgariad had been one of my first entries into high fantasy, and I was happy to see that it wasn't crap.



That said, I noticed more features about the book that got on my nerves this time around. Eddings had a very subtle sort of misogyny in the book. Polgara was held up as this paragon of womanhood, yet she spends most of the book scolding men. The men all seem to accept this and tell Garion that he'll have to get used to soothing a woman's scolding.



The other big problem I had was the racism. I understand that this was high fantasy, written during the Cold War. I understand what Eddings was doing by having each nation affiliate itself so strongly with its chosen god. However, the result of that affiliation is that each nation wound up with a character--and the divisions between nations take on a strong sense of racism. As a Cold War text, the primary divisions are between East and West--although one of those apparently "Eastern" countries is due south. The map of the world is suspiciously European, down to having the Viking-like Chereks live in what would appear to be Scandinavia. And the best place of all? Riva--a suspiciously England-ish island to the north. The enemies (Nadraks, Thulls, Malloreans, Murgos, and Grolim) seem to be analogues of Iron Curtain nations--with the Malloreans perhaps as China. Torak, the enemy god, seems to be both Marx and Hitler.



I did enjoy this book, as Eddings's writing is really quite good. But I can't read it with the same carefree joy as I did when I was 12. Despite having enjoyed the book, I chose not to reread the rest of the series. Once Ce'Nedra shows up, the misogyny is even harder to avoid, and I had no desire to read about her stomping her tiny feet as she threw a tantrum. I did decide the box the series, though. The books are good, and they're a fundamental part of my development as a reader.



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