The Deptford Trilogy: Fifth Business, The Manticore, World of Wonders

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Dunstan Ramsay is the narrator of both Fifth Business and World of Wonders (he is not the protagonist in the last novel). He also appears as a major character in The Manticore and as a supporting character in several other novels by Davies. Ramsay is a gentle schoolmaster with surprising depths and is probably a stand-in for Davies himself. (Since Davies has said that the main business of a writer is to be an enchanter, a weaver of spells, a magician, [2] Dempster/Eisengrim may stand for Davies.) Ramsay counsels his students to write in "the plain style," as Davies does—to highlight the story rather than the writer.

This section possibly contains original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding inline citations. Statements consisting only of original research should be removed. ( October 2016) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message) The Deptford Trilogy by Robertson Davies has received critical acclaim since its publication in the 1970s. The three novels, Fifth Business, The Manticore, and World of Wonders, have been praised for their intricate storytelling, complex characters, and exploration of themes such as identity, guilt, and redemption. Critics have also noted the trilogy’s use of Jungian psychology and mythology, which adds depth and richness to the narrative. Forgive yourself for being a human creature, Ramezay. That is the beginning of wisdom; that is part of what is meant by the fear of God; and for you it is the only way to save your sanity.”Ramsay's deepening obsession with hagiology leads him to travel to Europe to meet with the Bollandists (a society of Jesuit scholars who chronicle the lives of saints) after they agree to publish one of his articles. During his trip, he develops a close relationship with elderly Jesuit priest Padre Blazon, who specializes in chronicling the earthly side of saints' lives, believing that most saints are much more flawed and human than history might choose to remember them.

The Deptford Trilogy by Robertson Davies is a literary masterpiece that explores the themes of identity, fate, and the human condition. The trilogy is set in Canada and spans several decades, from the early 1900s to the 1970s. The novels are deeply rooted in the literary context of the time, drawing on the traditions of Canadian literature and the wider literary canon. To be sure The Fifth Business by Robertson Davies seems in many ways a rather old-fashioned book, the 1st part of the author's Deptford Trilogy, a tale involving the curiously prolonged linkage of Percy Boyd "Boy" Stanton & Dunstan Ramsay, for whom "Boy" Stanton represents a lifelong friend and a lifelong enemy. What drives the story is the fact that while the two characters are so very different in almost every way, their lives seem oddly inseparable. But it’s some sort of really Strange Magic, as ELO sang at the time I met my wife in the Seventies...I know flattery when I hear it; but I do not often hear it. Furthermore, there is good flattery and bad; this was from the best cask. And what sort of woman was this who knew so odd a word as “hagiographer” in a language not her own? Nobody who was not a Bollandist had ever called me that before, yet it was a title I would not have exchanged to be called Lord of the Isles. Delightful prose! I must know more of this. As part of our problems with our identity is our place in the world. Boy Staunton is very concerned with this and his second wife, who pushes to have him appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario. Staunton compares his place with that of Ramsay, a lowly schoolmaster, unmarried at that. Eisengrim feels it very strongly, too, though in a different way. He felt excluded as a child when the local village children taunted him because his mother was a “hoor”, he felt it in the World of Wonders fair, in Sir John’s theatre and continues to feel it despite his success. Eisengrim/dempster’s father, a minister, feels it too when he is found unsuitable to be a minister because of his wife’s actions. This is, of course, the perennial artist-in-society theme, a staple theme of literature from Shakespeare via Dostoievsky up to Joyce, though perhaps less prevalent nowadays. Like most writers, Davies comes to the not very original conclusion that artists are different from the rest of us.

The Manticore is the story of David Staunton, a successful lawyer who is struggling to come to terms with his past. David seeks the help of a Jungian analyst, Dr. Jung, to unravel the mysteries of his psyche. The novel is a journey of self-discovery, as David confronts his demons and learns to accept himself for who he is. The final book, World of Wonders, is the narration of Magnus Eisengrim, né Paul Dempster, from his traumatic childhood via his kidnapping by Willard, the conjuror, (who buggers him regularly till drugs prevent him doing so) to his successful career as a great magician. His activities and growing-up in the World of Wonders fair and Sir John Tresize’s travelling theatre are discussed in considerable detail as is his fight with the intellectual Cambridge-educated novelist, Roly (Dempster is avowedly anti-intellectual) whom he first meets in Tresize’s theatre and later as part of a group making a television film starring Eisengrim. The dénouement, of course, is the resolution of the mantra first openly uttered by David Staunton at Eisengrim’s show – Who Killed Boy Staunton? – which most readers had probably worked out for themselves. One of the most common themes in critical responses to The Deptford Trilogy is the idea of personal transformation. The novels follow the lives of several characters who undergo significant changes throughout the course of the story. For example, in Fifth Business, the protagonist Dunstan Ramsay must confront his past and come to terms with his role in a tragic event that occurred in his youth. In The Manticore, David Staunton embarks on a journey of self-discovery and learns to confront his own demons. And in World of Wonders, Magnus Eisengrim transforms himself from a shy, awkward boy into a charismatic performer. Lloyd Alexander called The Dark Portal "a grand-scale epic" that is "filled with high drama, suspense, and some genuine terror", [15] while Madeleine L'Engle said that "Robin Jarvis joins the ranks of Kenneth Grahame, Richard Adams, and Walter Wangerin in the creation of wonderfully anthropomorphic animals. Audrey and Arthur Brown tell us a lot about ourselves." [16] Peter Glassman, owner of the New York City children's bookstore Books of Wonder, obtained a copy of The Dark Portal while on a trip to London. He greatly enjoyed it and would now and then come across others who had as well. [17] The author of The Outsiders, S. E. Hinton, once told Glassman that The Deptford Mice novels became her son's favorites after finding them in Britain, but she could not understand why they were not yet available in the United States. Glassman would eventually obtain the rights for his company, SeaStar Books, to publish the trilogy and make it more readily available to American readers. [18] Adaptations [ edit ] Cancelled film [ edit ] Something about the Author: Facts and Pictures about Authors and Illustrators of Books for Young People (181ed.). Cengage Gale. 5 November 2007. pp.94–95. ISBN 9780787688059.

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Some of the elements of character Percy Boyd Staunton's life resemble that of Davies' friend Vincent Massey. Both men became rich from their father's agricultural businesses. Both men enlisted in World War I, went into politics afterward and held cabinet positions, and strengthened Canada's ties with the mother country. Massey was appointed as the first Canada-born Governor General, Boy is likewise appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario. The most convincing parallel is that Boy becomes the chair of the board of Governors which runs the school at which Ramsay teaches, much as Robertson Davies spent his career at the University of Toronto as the Master of Massey College. But the Staunton character is highly fictionalized. Davies has said that aspects of the character are more reflective of his father.

Hailed by the Washington Post Book World as “a modern classic,” Robertson Davies’s acclaimed Deptford Trilogy is a glittering, fantastical, cunningly contrived series of novels, around which a mysterious death is woven. The Manticore—the second book in the series after Fifth Business—follows David Staunton, a man pleased with his success but haunted by his relationship with his larger-than-life father. As he seeks help through therapy, he encounters a wonderful cast of characters who help connect him to his past and the death of his father. The trilogy consists of Fifth Business ( 1970), The Manticore ( 1972), and World of Wonders ( 1975). The series revolves around a precipitating event: a young boy throws a snowball at another, hitting a pregnant woman instead, who goes into premature labor. It explores the longterm effects of these events on numerous characters. In "World of Wonders", the final book of the Deptford trilogy, Magnus Eisengrim, now a world famous stage magician, relates his life story to several friends and colleagues as they work to complete a film about the life of the renowned 19th century theatrical magician Robert-Houdin.

The second novel in the series, The Manticore, starts off after the death of Staunton and is almost entirely taken up with a narration by David Staunton, the son of Boy Staunton, in the form of a Jungian analysis of Staunton fils by the Zurich-based Dr. von Haller. Staunton fils, of course, goes over many of the events of Fifth Business but, clearly, from a different perspective and, also, adding in a few things, not least of which is his sexuality (he is single and has had sexual intercourse just once, with an older woman, when aged seventeen, arranged by his father). Staunton fils is very much under the shadow of his father, even after the death of the latter, and much of what he does is because of his father – setting up a career contrary to his father’s wishes, for example. This book is, for me, the least satisfactory book of the three, firstly because Staunton fils is not a very interesting person and secondly because the Jungian analysis seems so crude.