> Babelio : https://www.babelio.com/livres/Golding-Le-Dieu-scorpion/202585

> Avec ce recueil de trois longues nouvelles associant Antiquité et Préhistoire, le lecteur a d'abord affaire au Golding faiseur de mythes, plutôt qu'au bouffon des “Hommes de papier” et du “Journal égyptien”. J'ai eu de la difficulté à embarquer.
—Danieljean (Babelio) ( )

Difficult and Lacking Detail

I am a fan of William Golding and I appreciate his attempts to illuminate the subject of prehistoric humans. Unfortunately, the three novellas included in this collection were very difficult for me to read, especially without context.

As I read the stories, I was frustrated with the lack of detail and context. Although I could place the characters and their actions, the stories dragged tremendously. After I read quiet a few reviews, I feel that I better understand the point of the stories. Nevertheless, the felt like a chore to read, especially compared to some of Golding's other works. ( )

Three novellas about kingship. William Golding is a novelist with deserved reputation, and I find these shorter pieces quite as rewarding as his hit, "The Lord of the Flies." We visit an unnamed prehistoric community, Egypt before the pyramids, and a fantastic Rome. I had a fine time. ( )

"There was not a crack in the sky, not a blemish on the dense blue enamel. Even the sun, floating in the middle of it, did no more than fuse the immediate surroundings so that gold and ultramarine ran and mingled. Out of this sky, heat and light fell like an avalanche so that everything between the two long cliffs lay motionless as the cliffs themselves."

Not my favorite work by Golding, but that's like complaining about bacon on your pizza instead of pepperoni. "The Scorpion God" and "Clonk Clonk" were written in the 70s while "Envoy Extraordinary" was published two decades before--and the latter somehow felt more modern to me. Maybe it was all the hints at future inventions failing abysmally in ancient Rome that rang in sympathy with the shortcomings in our own times. Or in every time. We still don’t have jetpacks. Now matter how powerful your smartphone may be, it’s not taking you physically through the clouds, over oceans, to another continent. We’re far closer to 𝘔𝘪𝘯𝘰𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘺 𝘙𝘦𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵 than anything remotely Star Trek. Like Orban before the Byzantines, he and his invention were before their time, and he was forced to seek out Mehmed II.

I’ve read plenty of commentary to “The Scorpion God” to see if I’d missed something. I mostly didn’t. The style was disappointing. The narrative was as flat as the characters. The point was to be had for the taking—I just found the inkwell caked and empty for the stylus. And “Clonk Clonk” . . . I really couldn’t give a fig. Whether it was from (purportedly) seventy thousand years ago or the night before reading in bed. And I like figs. It was all so rushed and populated with so many unmemorable characters, that I once again will have to check other reviews to ensure I got what I indeed thought I had.

The third installment was the charm, though. “Envoy Extraordinary” felt both ancient and new; mythic and modern; as funny and tragic as our own predicament in 2017. America is a toga-less Roman Empire, after all. Instead of reading the viscera of birds and sheep, we’re trawling nets through social media. Instead of the gladiatorial arena, we’ve got war on a 24-hour news cycle. Instead of a Caesar we’ve got . . . I think you get the point. Ink in the inkwell after all?

I’m being too critical, once again. Golding is an astonishing writer. One-third of that greatness in any book is a treasure. However, once you’ve read the open-eyed glory of 𝘋𝘢𝘳𝘬𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘝𝘪𝘴𝘪𝘣𝘭𝘦, it’s difficult not to be too difficult on a lesser work.

Did someone say there was bacon on that pizza? ( )

"Accidentally read the last of the short novels first. The one involving steam power, printing presses, and gunpowder in ancient Rome. - I give that one a rating of 3.5."

"The Scorpion God completed. A story of the Nile. The rise and fall of the river. And the human who is declared a God. Who is to make the river rise, and make the river go down again. - 3.5 stars."

"I have no idea how to "take" the middle short novel. Apparently the point of it is that the only way women can be in control is if all men have the intelligence of fruit flies and are gay. I do not believe I've ever read anything more horrible in my life than the middle short novel of this book." ( )