Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell

Jonathan Strange arrives in London with Arabella, now his wife, and the new gentleman-magician is the talk of the town. Drawlight and Lascelles have already heard of him, and they talk about him insultingly in front of Norrell because they fear that Strange will interfere with their influence over Norrell. The first meeting between the two magicians goes poorly because Norrell feels threatened and finds Strange arrogant, while Strange finds Norrell to be both arrogant and selfish, due to Norrell’s hoarding of magic books. Strange missteps by insulting an essay by Portishead, who continues to denigrate the Raven King in The Friends of English Magic. Strange announces that he will publish a rebuttal; he doesn’t know that The Friends of English Magic is Norrell’s project. Lascelles is glad to share that information. Arabella tries to smooth over the tension.

After the meeting, the two men cannot stop thinking about each other. They meet a second time. In spite of himself, Norrell is impressed and elated when Strange spontaneously creates a spell to cause the mirrored reflection of a book to change places with the actual book. Strange doesn’t know how to make the real book come back. Norrell, usually so careful with his books, immediately agrees to take Strange on as an apprentice.

Norrell soon finds himself allowing Strange to use his books. It is hard for him at first because he of his habit of hoarding knowledge and books from others, but Strange, whose natural talent for magic is immediately obvious, wins Norrell over with his curiosity. The only fault Norrell finds with his pupil is that Strange allows himself to be distracted by his wife; Norrell doesn’t care for people, so marriage is a foreign idea. The conversations between the two magicians are so fruitful that Norrell is finally able to contribute to the war effort. They use magic to send nightmares to their enemies, Napoleon Bonaparte and Emperor Alexander of Russia. These disturbing dreams disrupt the court at Russia. Strange, who is observant, realizes that Norrell frequently engages in lies and omissions to hide knowledge from him. The ministers are very happy at how productive Norrell is with Strange at his side, but Drawlight and Lascelles, who fear the waning of their own influence, are unhappy about it.

Over the course of a day, the man with the thistle-down hair contrives to have the marks of kingship—an orb, a crown, and a scepter— fall into Stephen’s hands, along with many other riches and prizes that Stephen is sure he doesn’t deserve. The people who give him these treasures don’t even question why a man of African descent and a servant (which the English of the time period frequently see as the same thing) should be the recipient of these treasures. At the end of the day, the Lord of Lost-hope congratulates Stephen and praises his own cleverness in making sure that Stephen receives all of these kingly objects. Stephen realizes they are at some other house where a new magician (Strange) is puzzling out a spell. The fairy is frustrated because he believes the man is just as stupid as Norrell. Strange must not be quite so stupid as the Lord of Lost-hope thinks, however, for Strange hears the fairy and Stephen talking, although he cannot see them.

Jonathan and Arabella Strange have been a social success in London, more so than Mr. Norrell because they are seen as attractive and cheerful people. They call on Walter Pole, who has asked for Jonathan Strange’s help in discovering the fate of two British ships that have disappeared. At the Poles’, Arabella encounters Lady Pole. Lady Pole tries to tell Arabella about the enchantment she is under, but the enchantment prevents her from sharing that information, forcing her to instead tell long, nonsensical stories about acts of magic from long ago. She is able to tell Arabella that Norrell’s magic has cursed her. She makes Arabella promise to tell Strange about Norrell. Walter Pole concludes his appointment with Jonathan. Walter makes Arabella promise not to repeat anything Lady Pole said to her—a promise that is at cross purposes with the promise Arabella made to Emma Pole previously.

After the visit, both Stranges describe odd experiences. Arabella Strange describes hearing a bell ring, although Walter told them that all the bells in the neighborhood have been muffled for the sake of his wife. Arabella also describes how, for just a moment, she felt the coldness of Lost-hope, but she cannot explain it. For his part, Jonathan Strange says that when he saw Stephen Black, he thought for just a moment that Stephen was dressed as a king.

The war against Napoleon goes poorly for England, and the only people who prosper are Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, the demand for whose services increases with every fresh success. There are a few problems, however. When Jonathan Strange saves a ship caught on a sand bar, the Navy officers complain that he knows little of ships and that his magic has unintended consequences—the sand he moves appears elsewhere, making it impossible to navigate without new charts. People begin to complain that he is too showy.

The War Office, under the leadership of Lord Liverpool, sends Strange to Portugal for a year to fight alongside Lord Wellington in the Napoleonic Wars. At first, Mr. Norrell is opposed to his partner’s departure because he has come to depend on Strange as a peer. He claims as well that a magician in battle will popularize “that wild, mischievous sort of magic“ (302) that was the mark of the Raven King. Strange responds cleverly by reminding Norrell that “the practice of magic makes the theory so much easier to understand” (302).

Norrell relents because of the intervention of Drawlight, Lascelles, and Childermass. They convince him that it would be better to send Jonathan Strange abroad so that he cannot compete against Norrell at the auction of magical books from the estate of the Duke of Roxburghe. They remind him that he has already loaned out many books to Jonathan Strange; they keep to themselves their knowledge that Norrell has sent many important books back to Hurtfew to prevent Strange from reading them.

Jonathan Strange outmaneuvers Mr. Norrell in order to take 40 of Norrell’s magic books with him into the field. Wellington is dismissive of Strange at first. After taking the advice of a chaplain who has made himself indispensable in Wellington’s army, Strange ingratiates himself with Wellington’s soldiers and learns that bad roads impede the progress of the campaign. Wellington accepts Strange’s offer to build good roads that disappear once Wellington’s troops use them. Many of the French believe that walking on the roads as they disappear will land one in Hell, so instead the French make their way slowly over rocky mountain paths to avoid all the roads, even the natural ones.

Childermass can’t find the book of Robert Findhelm, the source of the prophecy that Vinculus gave to Norrell. Childermass discovers that Clegg, a thief and sometime-servant in the household of Findhelm, was supposed to take the book to the last person capable of reading the created script of the Raven King, but Clegg ate the book during a drinking contest. Clegg is Vinculus’s father, so this story suggests that Vinculus has the book. Meanwhile, the Lord of Lost-hope tells Stephen that he is looking for Stephen’s true name.

Strange becomes indispensable to Wellington in his battles against the French in Spain. One day Strange performs a piece of “black” magic that was last performed by the Raven King. He resurrects some of Napoleon’s soldiers to discover where they hid cannons that they stole from Wellington. Strange eventually discovers where the cannon is, but he doesn’t have enough theoretical knowledge to send the soldiers back to Hell. His mental health fractures as the dead men follow him around. Wellington orders his men to burn the dead soldiers and wins the campaign in Portugal with Jonathan Strange by his side.

After three years of fighting, Jonathan finally returns to England. Arabella tells him about her conversations with the man with the thistle-down hair, some relation (she believes) of the Poles. Once again an apprentice to Norrell, Strange cannot settle back into his subordinate role, for while at war he grew accustomed to relying upon improvisation. He agrees to go back to being Norrell’s pupil after Norrell promises to share some of the rare magical volumes at Hurtfew.