A review by mantissss
Tyll by Daniel Kehlmann

adventurous dark funny mysterious fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

"John Dunne wrote me an ode. Fair phoenix bride, he called-"
"Little Liz, he was paid, he would have called you a stinking fish too if he had been given money for it. What do you think I would call you if you paid me better!"
"And I got a ruby necklace from the Kaiser, a diadem from the King of France."
"Can I see it?"
She was silent.
"Did you have to sell it?"
She was silent.
"And who is John Dung anyway? What sort of fellow is that, and who is fearful Nick's bride supposed to be?"

This sequence alone, the one with the "best gift" Elizabeth Stuart had ever received, makes the book worth a read. Like Tyll, this book hides its substance behind a smokescreen of magical realism and humor. And what a smokescreen it is. Deadpan and matter-of-factly, the book deals its humor out with a certain modern sensibility, unfazed when faced with witch trials, forced confessions, and the ever-egotistical games of stately delegates at a peace conference. Is it "Your Highness" or "Your Majesty" this time? Such skepticism, such questions, spoke to me of a terribly comedic sense of absurdity in things, masterfully brought to the fore by Kehlmann.

All this is true, he says, even what has been made up is true. And Nele, without understanding what that's supposed to mean, claps. 

Behind this lurks the meat of the book, themes presented with such moving humanity it transcends the book from its genre. Writing historical fiction places one at the mercy of being too far removed from their subject, unable to see past the names, dates, and biographies, but Kehlmann finesses this risk with ease. Shifting perspectives told me here and there of differing "truths" held by these characters, reflective of the sensitivity and empathy with which the writer approaches his subjects. To the Winter Queen, the Winter King blames her fully for their change in fortunes, as she had persuaded him to take the crown. To the Winter King, he had persuaded her, "as he had persuaded everyone else."  Truth, memory, and reality in this shifts as smoothly as I did reading, from one page to another, courtesy of the magnificent prose. Sometimes, I even forgot that such a nobleman as von Wolkenstein never existed, presuming merely because of his role in the book, he must've later had been a real-life pioneer in German poetry.

"A Calvinist Kaiser?" she asked.
"Never. Unthinkable. But a former Calvinist elector who has found his way into the Catholic faith. Just as France's Henry once became Catholic or" -he tapped himself with a gentle gesture on his chest- "we became Protestants..." 

Another facet in this book would be the politics, and its consequences. The 30 Years War was a religious war, and Kehlmann doesn't forget this. Neither does he forget the contradictions of such motives. Most emblematic of this is Dr. Kircher, a Jesuit scholar taken directly from the annals of history, and placed in this book as the writer of forced confessions in witch hunts.

Later he admits that his life's work, from dracontology to witch hunts to Egyptology were all absurd lies, and it's revealed that he directly partakes in the same "witchcraft" which he condemned Tyll's father to death for.

(Really dig how Kehlmann references a real work: the Sacred Magic of Abramelin.) Thus the Jesuit is presented in his hypocrisy, just as how the Protestant became Protestant only because it meant being king. And resultant of factors like these, the war happened and lasted for 3 decades, and a man and his son pull an empty cart from village to village in search of food, because "it's all we have."

"What's wrong?" asked Nele, who had walked over to Tyll.
He looked up. "I don't know."
"What happened?"
"I've forgotten."
"Juggle for us. Then it'll be better."

So this is how the book is to me, behind a veil of magnificent prose tinged with absurdity. But really, who's to say it is a veil? Inherently, the whole matter is absurd. What started as a constitutional crisis in Bohemia became a hellish Europe where the Four Horsemen of The Apocalypse reigned. Even though the war was waged based on the seemingly resolute determinant of religion, soldiers constantly changed allegiances to whoever could feed them. Kehlmann writes with moving humanity, and when considered, can't much of human matters be absurd anyway? And there's no figure better to demonstrate this than his Tyll Ulenspiegel.