Phantastes

Phantastes: A Faerie Romance for Men and Women is a fantasy novel written by George MacDonald, first published in London in 1858. It was later reprinted in paperback by Ballantine Books as the fourteenth volume of the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series in April 1970. The story centres on the character Anodos ("pathless", or "ascent" in Greek) and takes its inspiration from German Romanticism, particularly Novalis. The story concerns a young man who is pulled into a dreamlike world and there hunts for his ideal of female beauty, embodied by the "Marble Lady". Anodos lives through many adventures and temptations while in the other world, until he is finally ready to give up his ideals The tale starts the day after Anodos' twenty-first birthday. He discovers an ancient fairy lady (whom he learns to be his grandmother) in the desk which he opens with a key that he inherited as a birthright from his late father. After the fairy shows him Fairy Land in a vision, Anodos awakes the next day to find that his room, crafted after natural elements, is taking literal form and transforming into a wood. He discovers that he has been transported to Fairy Land. Anodos then encounters a woman and her daughter in a cottage who warn him about the Ash Tree and the Alder Tree, who seek to destroy him. He is told that the spirits of these trees can leave their tree-hosts and wander throughout Fairy Land. He then explores the world of the fairies, which live in flowers, causing them to glow. The flowers, he is told, die if the fairies leave. He then has a nightmarish encounter with the spirit of the Ash Tree, escapes, and finds rest in the warmth and love of the Beech Tree's spirit. After this, he finds the statue (fondly called "my Marble Lady" by Anodos) by Pygmalion. After he sings to it, the statue flees from him. He pursues the lady and finds a woman he believes to be her. However, this lady is actually the Maid of the Alder Tree in disguise. The spirit of the Ash Tree joins the Maid and is close to killing Anodos when he is saved by Sir Percivale (who chopped the actual ash tree with an axe). Anodos then meets a woman and her daughter who believe in fairy tales and the magic of Fairy Land, despite the disbelief of the woman's husband. Anodos also finds his shadow, an evil presence that follows and torments Anodos throughout the rest of the story. Anodos finds a palace that mysteriously belongs to him, and it contains a room with an inscription that reads "Sir Anodos." In the palace, he reads the story of Cosmo of Prague. Cosmo is a believer in fantasy who sacrifices his life to free the soul of his lover from an enchanted mirror (whether the event was a fictional story made by an author from Fairy Land or if it was a recording from an event in Anodos' world is left ambiguous). Anodos spends much time in the palace, relating his various wanderings and readings. In one such wandering, he comes upon corridors filled with still statues. Hearing the last vestiges of song from the corridors, and considering the statues as recently frozen into immobility upon his approach, Anodos ventures deeper and deeper into the halls. He dreams of the marble lady, that she alone has an empty pedestal among the statues. He later finds this pedestal, and, figuring a way in which to trick the statues into continuing to dance as he enters the room, he eventually sings to the pedestal. The marble lady materializes, but Anodos attempts to grab her. She flees and disappears. Anodos follows, going down into a strange subterranean world with gnome-like creatures (like the German Kobolds) that mock him.