Shardik
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| Shardik | |
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| Author | Richard Adams |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Series | Beklan Empire |
| Genre(s) | Fantasy novel |
| Publisher | Allen Lane |
| Publication date | 1974 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 526 pp (first edition, hardback) |
| ISBN | ISBN 0380509970 (first edition, hardback) |
| Preceded by | Maia |
- This page refers to the novel by Richard Adams. For the Stephen King character, see Shardik (Dark Tower).
Shardik is a fantasy novel written by Richard Adams in 1974.
Contents |
[edit] Plot introduction
Shardik takes place in an imaginary region called the Beklan Empire. A lonely hunter, Kelderek, pursues Shardik, a giant bear believed to embody the Power of God; both of them become unwillingly drawn into the politics of the entire empire. The story's key themes include the personal struggles of sin and atonement, the strength and potential held in children, and the responsibility of adults to protect and nurture children in hope of a better future.
Adams, famous for writing stories from animals' point of view (Watership Down, The Plague Dogs, and Traveller), here creates a story in which the animal, Shardik the Great Bear, is an antagonistic force that generates the entire plot and yet whose status remains ambiguous. Shardik's point of view is narrated to the reader in the first chapter only, as a confused sequence of action in which he flees a forest fire; this act is interpreted by the Ortelgans as Shardik seeking them out as prophesied, yet could easily result from mere instinct in an animal remarkable only for its size. Shardik is never explicitly confirmed as a divine creature, remaining an enigma for the characters and readers to impose their views upon.
Scenes of a slaver torturing both the slave-children and the main character may be extremely disturbing to some readers. However, Adams' preface states, "Lest any should suppose that I set my wits to work to invent the cruelties of Genshed [the slave trader], I say here that all lie within my knowledge and some - would they did not - within my experience", which may refer to certain anecdotes recounted in his autobiography, The Day Gone By.
[edit] Plot summary
Kelderek is a young hunter nicknamed "Play-with-the-Children" because of his simple nature and love of small children. In the forest near his home on the river island of Ortelga, he sees an enormous bear. The Ortelgans worship the bear-god Shardik and once ruled the entire territory now known as the Beklan Empire, but their territory and religion are now limited to a small barony of river-islands on the empire's outskirts.
Convinced that this bear is an incarnation of Shardik, Kelderek communicates this belief to the local priests and barons, eventually resulting in a military campaign to retake Bekla. The bear is sedated and caged by the priestesses to be carried forward with the Ortelgans but awakens from his slumber during a battle they are losing; as if in divine intervention, he breaks free, crushing the opposing army.
Shardik's worship is restored to central prominence in Bekla with Kelderek as the high priest to the recaged bear, but temporal power is held by the military barons. Still idealistic and unworldly, Kelderek is dismayed by the brutality and corruption that quickly surrounds him. When the bear escapes and flees again, it is Kelderek alone who follows in pursuit. The two of them stagger through the wilderness for a long time. Behind them, the capital city is torn apart by factions of rebels, and lawless chaos spreads through the entire empire.
On the brink of madness after days alone with no sleep, Kelderek follows the bear to a mysterious place called the Streels of Urtah. Here, Shardik enters one of the ravines comprising the Streels, and is presumed dead. A shepherd (later revealed as a guardian of the Streels) informs Kelderek that any who enter there are beings of great evil who are destined to die, with one past exception: a woman who entered the Streels but was able to climb out again, doomed to die horribly but by her death bring about greatness. This woman gave birth to a son as she left the Streels, a son who later grew to be a great hero who led the ancient overthrow of the Ortelgans from Bekla. As this story is told, Shardik emerges from the ravine and flees again into the woods.
Kelderek continues to follow Shardik, meeting many foes along the way, until he reaches Zeray, an outlaw town beyond the borders of civilisation. Here he re-encounters Melathys, a former priestess of Shardik. Having lost Shardik and his faith, Kelderek is captured by Genshed, a cruel slave-trader who already has a large group of children to eventually sell but is meanwhile tormenting them for his own amusement. Treating the children with his customary kindness, Kelderek is mocked and threatened by Genshed, who is on the point of killing him when Shardik erupts from the woods, mad and half-starved. The bear attacks Genshed, mortally wounding him before itself collapsing in the river. Kelderek, his faith and kindness restored but now tempered with knowledge of the world, returns to the town of Zeray with the children and attempts to re-establish a lawful society.
The epilogue skips forward a number of years. It is told from the perspective of a newcomer from Zakalon, a distant kingdom to the east of Bekla. This man, Siristrou, is the leader of the first embassy from Zakalon sent to reciprocate the first visit of a Beklan to their country. The formerly lawless border town is now the home of hundreds of orphans and refugees working together to build a better future. Kelderek is its mayor, widely regarded as a fair and wise leader, and is married to his love, Melathys. Kelderek takes the traveller into his home and tells him of the bear Shardik, now known as a great animal who taught the people of the land the meaning of both kindness and hardship. In the final passages, Siristrou stirs the logs in the fireplace and plays a game of spotting images in the flames: an island, a glowing knife, a barred cage, an old woman, a deep ravine, a shaggy bear; he recognises these images in turn, and finally remarks "That's a beautiful fire."
[edit] Characters
- Kelderek
Kelderek is a young hunter and the protagonist. He is called "Kelderek-Play-With-The-Children" because he seldom socializes with other people his age but instead prefers to play with the children of Ortelga, especially a game called "Cat Catch a Fish." Soon after seeing the enormous bear, he goes to the Ortelgan temple-island of Quiso to tell the Tuginda (chief priestess) that Shardik, the divine bear in which is invested the power of God, has returned as prophesied.
- Melathys
Melathys was born on a slave farm in the Beklan Empire. When she was a small child, the Beklan army captured and emancipated the farm, but a wounded solder brought Melathys with him to Quiso and offered her as a novice to the priestesses of Shardik, hoping that the Tuginda could heal his battle injuries. (Melathys at this age has a brief cameo in Adams' other Beklan book, Maia.)
When Kelderek comes to Quiso with news of the divine bear, Melathys is still a young woman, but already second in authority only to the Tuginda. However, when a small party (including Kelderek, the Tuginda, and Melathys) find the bear, it is of such a frightening size and ferocity that she loses confidence and runs off, effectively abdicating her position as priestess.
Melathys remains largely absent until the end of the story. Weak and destitute, Kelderek and the Tuginda find her in the rogue town of Zeray. Shardik is missing and all three are quite vulnerable to various brutes, murderers, and other undesirables. Since leaving the others, Melathys had fled here and briefly allied herself with Bel-ka-Trazet, a former High Baron of Ortelga who had resisted the identification of Kelderek's bear with the divine Shardik, and who briefly introduced some organization and justice to the town. Illness has since claimed him, though, and she fears that soon Zeray will lose the small amount of order the Baron had added and that she will soon die. The three live in the Baron's house under the protection of his bodyguard, Ankray. The ailing Tuginda also forgives Melathys for her betrayal.
However, news that Shardik is nearby soon reaches the group. Kelderek sets out to find him while Melathys stays behind to take care of the Tuginda. Finally, the rebel baron Santil-kè-Erketlis leads his army into Zeray, making it safe enough to leave the Tuginda with them and reach Kelderek with a smaller detachment. She finds him, with Shardik dead and having suffered greatly after being captured by the slave trader Genshed. Invited by the Southern aristocrat Elleroth, Kelderek and Melathys take up the governance of Zeray and the surrounding country of the Transvrako, which the South has plans to civilize and through it extend contact with neighboring empires. They live out the remainder of their lives in Zeray, leading humble lives and carrying out the divine duty of serving children they believe Shardik showed to them.
- Zakalon
Zakalon is an empire similar to ancient Persia neighboring the Beklan Empire. As it is revealed near the end of the novel, little is known of Zakalon. It appears to be a kingdom far more advanced than the Beklan Empire, with a dazzling capital, studies in metaphysics (and presumably other areas of philosophy), and horses, of which the citizens of the Beklan Empire were previously unaware.
- Siristrou
Siristrou is a metaphysician from the empire of Zakalon and the first "ambassador" to the Beklan Empire.
[edit] Places
- Quiso
Quiso is a small island in the river Telthearna, just east of Ortelga. It is the home of the Tuginda, her priestesses, and other women who constitute the cult of Shardik.
The island is narrow, and roughly elliptical, oriented in with its upstream extremity pointed northwest and its downstream extremity southeast. It consists mostly of beaches and a large, central mountain where the Tuginda and her women dwell. Part of the north face of the mountain was carved into a series of enormous, steplike ledges, which converge on a single point at their base. Near the northern extremity of the island is a quarry where much of the stone that makes up the architecture of the island was mined.
[edit] Associated information
Adams later wrote a novel called Maia that takes place earlier in the same world. Several characters appear in both novels.
The early editions included hand-drawn pictures by Alfred Wainwright, perhaps better known as a fellwalker.
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