3 / 5 Stars
In December 1979 I decided, as a Christmas present to myself, to get Urshurak (406 pp, Bantam Books, September 1979). It's hard to imagine this 40 years later, but at the time, Urshurak was a big deal.
Back in those days, when you went to the 'fantasy' section of Waldenbooks, you saw The Lord of the Rings (LOTR), some Conan titles, Stephen R. Donaldson's Thomas Covenant books, and that was pretty much it.
Urshurak, with its 16 full-color plates and 80 black-and-white drawings, signaled an effort by Bantam Books to take the genre seriously both in terms of marketing and book design.
Illustration from Urshurak used for a 1995 Bros. Hldebrandt trading card
The story goes that the Brothers Hildebrandt conceived of the project as a film treatment, and when that fell through, arranged with editor Ian Summers to incorporate their storyboards into a novel.
Unsurprisingly, Urshurak borrows quite heavily from LOTR, which by '79 had become synonymous with the Hildebrandts due to the success of their Tolkein calendars. Many of the characters and settings in Urshurak are counterparts to those from LOTR, and the plot, as well, is derivative of Tolkein's work. Signifying an awareness of more Inclusive sensibilities, as well as an eye towards casting a variety of actors, Urshurak adds a female (the Amazon Zyra) and two black men (Ali Ben Kara, Shandor the Wizard) to the Fellowship, along with the standard-issue Ranger, Dwarves, and Elves.
Illustration from Urshurak used for a 1995 Bros. Hldebrandt trading card
After re-reading the novel for the first time in 40 years, I have to say that the narrative, which necessarily has a stripped-down, condensed character (it's recapitulating LOTR within the span of 406 pages), is passable. What gives the novel three stars is its illustrations, which, even in an era when digitally-composed fantasy art is a pervasive feature of the genre, remain pleasing in their bright colors and composition.
(I was unwilling to risk cracking the binding of my copy of Urshurak to make scans of the artwork; to see the art, I direct you to this Blog Post).
Advertisement for Captain Company, 1994, June 1980
Summing up, looking at Urshurak after the passage of 40 years it's best regarded as a progenitor of the Young Adult lineage of fantasy novels that is currently exemplified by the 'Harry Potter' and 'Golden Compass' franchises. I venture to say that kids who like those books likely will find Urshurak an entertaining read. In that spirit, I am retaining my copy of the book to bestow to my nephews, in another 8 years.........
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1 comment:
Alas, my copy of Urshurak also has badly aged binding. I already had to glue some pages back in, and some of the glue is not holding. At the time, a trade paperback was probably the best, if not only, deal the Hildebrandt's were likely to get, but the durability is poor.
Had it become the event they had hoped for, then perhaps a finer edition would have followed. But it's true, the story itself does not match the illustrations. Nichols could have used an editor who understood that more adjectives and adverbs do not make for better writing. They are, in fact, one the greatest weaknesses of th undisciplined writer.
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