'The Isle of the Torturers' – Clark Ashton Smith

After yesterday's post on 'The Empire of the Necromancers', a little chat on Twitter pointed me in the direction of two other tales, of 'Zothique', that should be read at the same time. Now, my prior reading of Clark Ashton Smith's work (I haven't read a lot but I'm getting there) hinted at an inclination to give the narrator an easier ride than the villain of the piece. Bad things happen but there is some kind of natural justice (Karma? I don't know) that will shield bystanders from the worst of the fall out. Reading 'Empire' was a bit of a shock then in that the best you could hope for, from that 'natural justice', was that you got to die all over again; for good this time but even so... Evil will fall but it will also take much that is good with it. That's pretty dark then and I found myself wanting more of that (it has been one of those days...) so I thought I'd give 'The Isle of the Torturers' a go and see what happened. Well, it kind of went like this...

Between the sun's departure and return, the Silver Death had fallen upon Yoros. Its advent, however, had been foretold in many prophecies, both immemorial and recent. Astrologers had said that this mysterious malady, heretofore unknown on earth, would descend from the great star, Achernar, which presided balefully over all the lands of the southern continent of Zothique; and having sealed the flesh of a myriad men with its bright, metallic pallor, the plague would still go onward in time and space, borne by the dim currents of ether to other worlds.

If there was ever a tale, of Clark Ashton Smith's, that made you just want to hug your children and tell them that it would be ok, 'The Isle of the Torturers' is at the very least a strong contender. A tale that begins with a King seeing his land devastated by an otherworldly plague... and then gets a lot worse (for him). A tale that plumbs the depths of human depravity to the extent that you will finish the read and be a little pleased for King Fulbara that his fate was as straightforward as it ended up being. It's like 'grimdark' fiction woke up, for a bit, in 1933, stretched it's legs and then settled back down for a longer sleep.

There are two strands to the plot, the advent of the Silver Death and the reception that King Fulbara finds on the Isle of the Torturers. Both carry their own darkness and would probably work just as well as stories in their own right (maybe a vignette in the case of the Silver Death in Yoros). Ashton Smith's masterstroke here is to combine the two and come up with something that is greater than the sum of its parts. Maybe the ending is signposted a little too clearly, near the beginning, but it's worth for prose that, for me, was gorgeously atmospheric but deadly underneath; just like Zothique itself.

I was pretty much in awe of the way that the torture scenes were depicted. What you do see doesn't leave a lot to the imagination but it's matter of factly told and not there to shock. What was shocking for me was seeing Ulbara led to his fate along a path of lies that he knew were being told, there was just no way to step off that path.

Going back to the torture though... While it's a very obvious device to use, Ashton Smith basically saying there was even worse stuff, that he wouldn't talk about, works really well at placing these activities in context and getting the reader's imagination to fill in the gaps. What was brilliantly done though was the more insidious torture that takes place over a couple of days; I saw through it eventually but for a while I was in the same place as Fulbara was, full of hope that was about to be dashed.

I saw the ending coming, from a way off, but it is still powerful stuff that made me do a little cheer, odd but true. Sometimes, a hero figure can be in such dire straits that going out on their own terms is the victory. King Fulbara paid a heavy price but he won and you've got to respect that.

'The Isle of the Torturers' is as grim and dark as you like but there is more than one way to win a conflict and Clark Ashton Smith takes us on that journey with great ingenuity and a keen sense of what Zothique can be. I'll definitely be reading more in this setting.

You can read 'The Isle of the Torturers' over Here.