It’s not really his fault that he wins.

The main character, James, is the reincarnation of King Arthur, and as said reincarnation, he spends the first half or so of the book dithering over whether or not he accepts Merlin’s call. Some incredulity at the call is understandable and congruent with the story’s shape; James manages to wobble back and forth on whether he’ll follow up on this for full half the story, only coming in to participate in his own struggle after repeated urging.

The problem isn’t the hesitation. The problem is that James spends half the book hesitating, painting himself not as King Arthur, a leader of men, but as one who must be led to water (and then instructed on how to drink). He then spends the second half of the book making only a few real decisions; by the point of his accepting the call, much of the actual work of the battle is done, sent out into the world to have what effect it will. He takes some action, it is true, by choosing a take-it-to-the-people campaign style contrary to professional advice, but the only such event we see in person is the one where Morgian hands him his PR win on the silverest of silver platters. The rest are delegated to summary in one of Waring’s scenes.

Note the contrast to Waring. As I mention in the Creational Story article, Waring is effective in his antagonism. He chooses; he does stuff; he succeeds, if only incompletely. He demonstrates a passion for his goal which James….

I spoke in part IIb of how James’s sense of destiny never truly integrates with his character, becoming something from within rather than from without, an understanding of the world he possesses instead of mystic gifts of unknown origin. James has another problem, though, one connected to the thin royalism of the piece. James, when he belatedly becomes invested in the plot of the story he is the main character for, in the reestablishment of the reign of King Arthur, becomes passionate very, very suddenly, at least to the reader’s eyes. He starts talking in grand, involved terms, laying forth a vision, and the only question I have to ask is: where did this all come from?

James at the beginning of the book is not a man invested in the proper role of a king- disgusted with its abandonment and abuse or desirous of its restoration or simply intent on incorporating its virtues into himself. James seems, indeed, to run his life entirely parallel to all questions of kings and of kingly character and of the kingly role in blessing the people. He continues this characteristic for the first half of the book, dithering on and on about the destiny offered to him.

Then, suddenly, when the plot needs him to be an inspiring and genuine speaker, he bursts out in monologues on the ideal of kingship, on the king’s ability to beautify and lead. His genuineness, note, is not strange; he has been an honest, straightforward man, physically if not always emotionally valorous, and it’s easy to believe he can put a rod in his spine and speak out what he believes in front of the public. But the content of the speech comes out of nowhere. We never see him ponder these things; we never watch him grope with the questions of kingship. He develops straight from uncaring neoteny into full-blown, thought-out royalism, into a complex aesthetic-cultural-ethical vision of the future which tries to drip passion, whether or not it succeeds therein.

Where did all that come from?

The problem isn’t the end-state or the development. The problem is that we do not see the protagonist change and so cannot understand or participate in it. He simply went from ‘normal dude offered kingship’ to ‘king expressing high ideals’ the moment he decided to accept the mantle, to all appearance. Some moments of reflection are present, no doubt, but the reader gets only to know they theoretically exist. We do not experience these. For a small change, such pass-over is the right choice. For a change as large and as crucial as this in the protagonist, for a change which speaks to a maturing and ripening of thought, we expect to be present. How else are we to know him?

James is a very normal protagonist. He is physically brave, emotionally a bit hesitant until he learns his lesson, with a sudden blossom of high-faluting visions of the future he will bring which spring to all appearances from nowhere. He is not King Arthur, and so his placement as King Arthur hurts the narrative badly. His deeds are small, and his reward is large. The consequence is that this King Arthur does not draw men in or inspire- which is, I believe, the death-knell for any good depiction of King Arthur. A good novel might be written with such a protagonist, but this story seeks to be a King Arthur story, and James is not King Arthur.

God bless.