Unpublished GORMENGHAST novel discovered in Mervyn Peake's attic

[Werthead]

No, seriously.

Mervyn Peake started work on the fourth GORMENGHAST novel, TITUS AWAKES, in 1960 but his Parkinson's Disease rendered him unable to write (or complete revisions on the third book, TITUS ALONE, which was published in an unrevised form in 1959) more than the first few pages. According to the article, he asked his wife Maeve to complete the novel, giving her notes and directions on where the story could go.

His wife apparently completed this endeavour prior to Peake's death in 1968, but never moved to publish the book. The manuscript was recently rediscovered in the attic of Peake's house by his granddaughter, and the Peake family are now looking at publishing it.

Interesting news, although I suspect there will be much scepticisim until more information is revealed.

 

[j d worthington]

It would hardly be the first such discovery. Given the problems he was having, I rather expect even the original portion would have suffered; and I'm very dubious about someone else finishing it; however, I certainly am curious, and would be more than happy to have my doubts dispelled....

 

[GOLLUM]

HMMM....interested but skeptical party here.

If it were to be published I would probably still purchase it.

 

[thepaladin]

I know he was working on a sequal to the Titus Alone. There is a fragment and a title (Titus Awakens) I'm aware of, but my understanding was that there was no evidence he'd gotten very far before he got too sick to write. I guess I'll wait and see, but you'd think it would have come to light before now. Still I guess anything is possible. (I mean what are we doing here if we don't think anything is possible.)

 

[j d worthington]

I guess I'll wait and see, but you'd think it would have come to light before now....

Well... not necessarily. They are still finding things that Poe wrote; just recently a 900-word version of one of Lovecraft's essays came to light (original manuscript, as I recall), and this will be published in a future Lovecraft Annual. So such things do happen a bit more than we may be aware of.

However, if I read what was said above correctly, it is admitted that he didn't get very far, but had asked Maeve to complete it, which she did. How much of the final product is hers? Only time (or an examination of the manuscript) will tell, but I would think it would be very difficult for anyone to quite capture Peake's style (or, if you prefer, idiom) in the Titus books... certainly some of the most carefully crafted fantastic works of the last century....

 

[Stephen Palmer]

Very intriguing (I love the Gormenghast books) but he was probably too ill to make any sense... parts of Titus Alone suggest how ill he was...

 

[Lamont Cranston]

It would hardly be the first such discovery.

There was the Jules Verne novel Paris in the Twentieth Century.
What are some others?

 

[j d worthington]

There was the Jules Verne novel Paris in the Twentieth Century.
What are some others?

I mentioned some above: various pieces by Poe which have surfaced over the years; essays and forgotten fiction by H. P. Lovecraft -- even the original manuscripts for Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath and Charles Dexter Ward took some detective work to track all the pieces down; and, as those were never published under after his death, for a while they were thought to be at least incomplete, as I recall. Then, iirc, there's Tolkien's Sigfried and Gudrun..... And there's Mary Shelley's Maurice:

Mary Shelley: Maurice, or The Fisher's Cot

Various pieces by Louisa May Alcott have resurfaced, as well; so have things by Le Fanu, M. R. James, Lord Dunsany's Pleasures of a Futuroscope....

Few, of course, take as long to surface as this has, at least with major works; but with minor works, it is much more frequent....

 

[Rothgar]

I've read before that there is a big difference between versions of Titus Alone. Supposedly the editor altered Peake's intentions for the story. Does anyone have comments on which published versions are the best to read or truest to the way Peake intended? I haven't been able to find an answer anywhere yet.

 

[j d worthington]

My memory may be playing tricks on me with this, but I believe the Methuen edition which was put out in the mid- or late-1980s is the best one to go for, as it reinstated the chapter(s) which had been excised and published separately as "The Party at Lady Cusp-Canine's", as well as going back to Peake's original manuscript in other ways.... If someone knows differently, please inform....

 

[Peter Winnington]

"Please inform...." OK, here goes. The major changes to Titus Alone that you are thinking of were made from the MS by Langdon Jones at the end of the 1960s when the Titus books were simultaneously reissued by Penguin and Methuen. The king Penguin edition of the early 80s incorporated minor corrections to all three vols, and most editions since then (e.g. not the Folio Society's, which was completely revised in-house) follow these texts. (I have not checked the current omnibus edition from Vintage, for which the text was reset.) More details on the Peake Studies site (particularly Part A of "Peake in Print" and the FAQ page), links to which I cannot post, since I have just registered here to provide you with this information...

 

[GOLLUM]

Thanks Peter, that's most informative.

Welcome to Chrons.

 

[Rothgar]

From Sebastian Peake's Blog Mervyn Peake Some information about his daughter finding the completed Titus Awakens.

I was looking at the most recent editions of Gormenghast, it looks like both the Omnibus from 2005 and the trilogy from 2007 are published by Overlook. I would think they would both have the same content, though the trilogy version may not include the partial Titus Awakens or the 12 critical essays.

And it sounds like there will be another version published some time next year. "2011 will also see the release of a new illustrated edition of the Gormenghast trilogy, complete with 60 never-before-seen drawings by Peake which his son is currently placing within the novel."

 

[j d worthington]

"Please inform...." OK, here goes. The major changes to Titus Alone that you are thinking of were made from the MS by Langdon Jones at the end of the 1960s when the Titus books were simultaneously reissued by Penguin and Methuen. The king Penguin edition of the early 80s incorporated minor corrections to all three vols, and most editions since then (e.g. not the Folio Society's, which was completely revised in-house) follow these texts. (I have not checked the current omnibus edition from Vintage, for which the text was reset.) More details on the Peake Studies site (particularly Part A of "Peake in Print" and the FAQ page), links to which I cannot post, since I have just registered here to provide you with this information...

Ah, thank you for the information. As I say, my memory on this is rather hazy, so it helps to have someone more informed provide the correct answers....

 

[Peter Winnington]

In my previous post, I wrote of the UK editions of the Titus books. Since Rothgar asks about the Overlook US editions, here goes: first published in three vols in 1988, with critical essays at the end of Titus Alone, they were grouped into an omnibus volume four years later (with the collage cover by J.K.Potter that Rothgar reproduced). The essays and the few lines of a "Titus IV" (Peake's term) were maintained at the end of the omnibus BUT the editors failed to update the page references in the essays: they identify quotes from the individual vols, but the pagination in the omnibus is continuous.
The single vols and the omnibus remained in print until a couple of years ago when Overlook decided on a new ed. using the covers of the UK Vintage editions. They dropped the critical essays (promising to maintain them on their website, but I haven't found them) and provided a new introduction to TA by David Louis Edelman. This ed. is missing from "Peake in Print" because Overlook never sent me the promised copies (nudge, nudge, David Shoemaker).
The texts of the novels are to all intents and purposes the same as the UK editions. Until the Overlook ed appeared in 1988, US readers knew only the 1st ed of TA, and not the 2nd revised by Langdon Jones. This explains some of the discrepancies between US and UK assessments of TA during the 70s and 80s.
Does that clarify matters?
Again, all this information and much much more can be found in the "Peake in Print" section of the Peake Studies website (write that in one word, add dot com, and you're there).

 

[Peter Winnington]

Me again. I've just re-read Werthead's post at the top of this thread and decided I should set the record straight – at least so far as I know it.
Werthead writes: "According to the article, [Peake] asked his wife Maeve to complete the novel, giving her notes and directions on where the story could go." My understanding is that Peake's notes were to himself, as was his custom; Sebastian Peake is quoted in the article as saying: "Following his death, my mother decided to see whether she could continue the Titus story."
I conclude that it was her decision to write a fourth volume. That is certainly the impression she gave me.
I believe that she wrote in the mid-70s, not immediately after Peake's death, when she concentrated on her memoir, A World Away. It was at the end of the 70s that she asked me to comment on a complete draft that runs to 197 typed pages. I note that the family have discovered four MS notebooks. The TS is surely there as well. It does not open with the precise words quoted by the Telegraph but Titus is indeed awakening in the barn and feeling icy cold.
There are occasional echoes of Peake's phraseology in it, but it is all Maeve's work, and none of Peake's.

 

[Rothgar]

Thank you very much Peter! I have been unable to find that much information anywhere on the web in the last year. And I see that you are being modest. You have written several books about Mervyn Peake, including a biography. It is wonderful to have expert advice. Here are the links you had mentioned, and thanks again for the info.

Link to Peake Studies PEAKE STUDIES

Link to Peake in Print Part A of Peake in Print. Books authored by Mervyn Peake

 

[Peter Winnington]

There's a further piece by Sebastian Peake in The Guardian today (18th January).

 

[Stephen Palmer]

This is all good stuff.

 

[Werthead]

Me again. I've just re-read Werthead's post at the top of this thread and decided I should set the record straight – at least so far as I know it.
Werthead writes: "According to the article, [Peake] asked his wife Maeve to complete the novel, giving her notes and directions on where the story could go." My understanding is that Peake's notes were to himself, as was his custom; Sebastian Peake is quoted in the article as saying: "Following his death, my mother decided to see whether she could continue the Titus story."
I conclude that it was her decision to write a fourth volume. That is certainly the impression she gave me.
I believe that she wrote in the mid-70s, not immediately after Peake's death, when she concentrated on her memoir, A World Away. It was at the end of the 70s that she asked me to comment on a complete draft that runs to 197 typed pages. I note that the family have discovered four MS notebooks. The TS is surely there as well. It does not open with the precise words quoted by the Telegraph but Titus is indeed awakening in the barn and feeling icy cold.
There are occasional echoes of Peake's phraseology in it, but it is all Maeve's work, and none of Peake's.

Interesting. This seems to directly contradict the original article:

In July 1960 he had written her an introduction for the new novel,

Although I have no problem believing the Telegraph might have made a few mistakes in there