The Last Wish: Introducing the Witcher

There was a video game called "The Witcher" that was fun and thought provoking. I didn't play through "The Witcher 2," but I saw the trailer for "The Witcher 3" and my interest was rekindled. I decided to read the books that the video games were based on. They were great! They are about Geralt of Rivia, a witcher (mutant monster fighter) in a European folklore fantasy setting. It was interesting reading the books after playing the video games. "The Last Wish" is a collection of short stories contained within a frame narrative, and the first story is about Geralt curing a striga's curse. This story was also shown at the start of the video game. The video game's representation of that event matches the short story play by play. Similarly, the quote from the "Witcher 3" trailer is taken, almost verbatim, from another short story. In general, the video game felt very faithful to the books. The setting, the tone, the character, and the philosophical issues were all similar to those seen in the books. The character of Geralt is wonderful, and the game does him justice. That is to say, if you liked the video games, I highly recommend the books. The books, however, are better than the video games. The setting is analogous to our own. The moral dilemmas that the books raise are meaningful ones that people grapple with all the time. The protagonist is noble, if damaged, and the storytelling is great. Before I extol the virtues of the books, however, I will say that the writing style is not my favorite. Sapkowski leaves a lot unsaid. It sometimes isn't clear when the book is transitioning from a short story to a frame narrative, for instance. This also means that dialogue also contains a lot of implicit actions. I am used to a writing style where dialogue has exposition interspersed, so I expect a conversation to happen in a mostly synchronous manner without much time passing between one person talking and another, but Sapkowski often has a significant passage of time. That's not to say that it's unclear -- I can usually figure out what was done based on the dialogue, but it does often take some rereading. Geralt also likes to leave things unsaid (while he does have long monologues, he just as often makes his point with no words or few words), so this could also be a perverse instance of the medium matching the message. Now the virtues. While the setting is European folklore inspired fantasy, I think that it matches our setting more closely than a lot of books set either in our world or a world very close to ours. In Sapkowski's world, humans invaded a continent inhabited by many other sentient species and conquered them (and most of those sentient species had done the same thing a few millenia past). Now, there are attempts at a tentative peace. Witchers themselves come from an older age when monsters were rampant and threatened survival. Now, more often than not, the threat is not some stark monster, but human greed with a benevolent mask. Cities provide protection from natural threats, but people don't know how to deal with the intercultural exchange that comes from living with many other different people or with the anonymity that comes from living with many other people in general. Centralized power has helped the sciences and arts flourish, but it has also led to corruption and war, and despite growing resources, many people still are poor. The world is bigger than most people know, and most people aren't experts in the world around them, so most people have a hard time separating myths from reality. A person has to work to make money to live, and a person also has to comport themselves so that they can sleep at night. That's a pretty good description of Earth in the twenty first century. Europe exploited or colonized much of the world (and many of the people that it conquered were simply the conquerors on a more local scale), but the world is now attempting a tentative peace. We still carry the legacy of an age where we had to fight for mere survival (witness, for example, the popularity of guns) even though the struggles we face today are things like neocolonialism. A country that was founded on the notion of freedom and immigration has become nativist and struggles with pluralism. People, lost in the crowd, fall through the cracks, so children get left behind, and mentally ill people become homeless. Most people in the most prosperous nation on Earth don't think that the government is working well, and it has been at war for 214 years since 1776. With knowledge all around us, it's hard to tell myth from reality. And we have to make money to live and live so that we can sleep at night. But how? Most of our age old wisdom is what got us into this mess! Who do we treat with compassion, how do we identify monsters, and what do we do when we find one? One of the reasons that I like the books better than the video game is that the books feature moral dilemmas more strongly. One of the first short stories, "The Lesser Evil," features two parties trying to convince Geralt to help them against the other. His response to both: "Evil is evil... Lesser, greater, middling... Proportions are negotiated, boundaries blurred... if I'm to choose between one evil and another, then I prefer not to choose at all." While most of the time in the video games is spent killing monsters, most of the time in the books is spent musing about philosophy, politics, and why Geralt refuses to kill things that most see as monsters. People invent many monsters, according to Geralt, because then "they seem less monstrous themselves." Some of the moral dilemmas are confusing. In one story, Geralt kills a group of people who are preparing to massacre a village, and he feels guilty about it because he might have been able to avoid anyone dying. In another story, Geralt kills a group of thugs (rather than disabling them, which would have been easy), but never indicates that he felt remorse. This isn't an issue of ambiguity, but rather a lack of attention to some issues. His stance on most issues, like pluralism, is fairly consistent at least. Sapkowski also uses framed narratives to great effect. In framed stories, we often read of Geralt saying that he can't do something because of the Witchers' code, but in a framing story, he says, "I have at times hidden behind a code. People like that. Those who follow a code are often respected and held in high esteem. But no one's ever compiled a witcher's code. I invented mine. Just like that. And keep to it. Always -- Not always." Geralt is tormented, and framed narratives allow him introspection. All in all, "The Last Wish" is great, and I'm happy to keep reading more books in the series! Note that "The Last Wish" is the first book, and the next book is "The Sword of Destiny," which is only available as a fan translation, and not "The Blood of Elves."

The start of the Witcher may seem like very generic fantasy, which if you stopped reading after only a handful of pages you should know you are depriving yourself of one of the best fantasy stories I've ever read. One of the things which might be easy to miss at least at the start is how brilliantly the author uses familiarity and tropes to achieve greatness. In many places cliché fantasy is used to elevate this story, building off of it, rather than relying on it. It is hard to explain how, but through reading this book you will be referenced to many famous fairy tales only to be taken in a new direction with them, often darker, more satisfying and exciting. In addition to the excellent way in which this story references, builds from and evolves classic fantasy and fairy tales is the way in which this story asks questions about modern morality. There is never a good and evil, black and white or right and wrong; instead choices bare consequences and even the seemingly correct choice can cost in ways later on. The book is constantly reminding us of this when we see acts of good result in grief and pain. The worst characters in the story are almost always explained, implied or through the other characters of similar background to have sense and reason behind their actions and no one is left to be a meaninglessly vile person, nor a perfectly good. Even if each character does not have their backstory explained, other characters of similar circumstances almost always come about whom can shed light on the how and why and thus give depth to otherwise minor characters. The way the book is written also deserves praise, rather than going chronologically it jumps around, but still manages to tell a story that moves in one direction, this being almost perfectly done so that things are revealed at just the right time and other passages you've read sudden make sense. The story itself meanwhile is a larger tale spaced across multiple short ones, some practically standalone, others an important piece in the big picture. That isn't to say there weren't some problems with this story. I feel that it did suffer from some regrettably subtle sexism. The sexism in this book is not your grandfather's sexism, or even your father's, but only would be argued if compared to today's standards. Gone are the books about women only occupying roles neither seen nor heard as a mere servant wife. Gone are the days when women in power serve only as cautionary tales or are lectured by Father Christmas that they should not use weapons. The women in this book range from comely to fierce, some are cunning and very in control and ultimately it would paint a very good picture if not for their interactions during the course of the actual story. My biggest complaint is how Geralt himself handles the women. With very few exceptions he is always the wiser and stronger of them and like a James Bond movie, has no problem getting them into his sheets whenever, where ever he wants. Women as objects comes up over and over again as they are often depicted without clothes, removing clothes or begging to remove them (I'm not kidding about this). Do men act this way? Not really, they are interested in women, but not wanton in the same way. Additionally I find the heteronormativity of the book to be very disappointing. So you might say that the women in this story are themselves very strong and the only exception to that rule is when Geralt is involved, where he is the exception to all rules, treating men in the exact same way. This is a valid statement, except Geralt is the main character and it is undoubtable that the writing is with a male audience in mind. It just drips testosterone in how he overcomes his challenges, bests women, they are alluring and he gets them in the end. Never is there a man showing off like the women do, never are the men coy and never are the women who are trying to be alluring unattractive or unclothed in a non-sexual manner. The most disappointing aspect of this is that the author seems to be aware of gender issues in the way the world interacts if you remove Geralt from the equation and ignore the wanton naked women, but unfortunately falls short to achieve true balance in this regard. Ultimately besides my complaint I enjoyed this book immensely and would recommend it to just about anyone, adding the minor warning.

I really enjoyed this. I decided to read the first book before watching the Netflix series. This book is a good mixture of fantasy with a bit of humour. I haven't looked forward to sitting down and reading a book like this in a long time. Can't wait to read the next one! Give it a go if you are into fantasy, sorcery, dwarves, elves, fighters, thieves, monsters or the supernatural. It's in a short story format which works well.

The book looks clearly misshandled. The cover and almost half of the pages are deformed.

Bevor es ans Eingemachte geht: es handelt sich bei diesem Band um eine Kurzgeschichtensammlung! Die Geschichten darin wurden ursprünglich unabhängig voneinander veröffentlicht. Daher kommt es zu sehr vielen zeitlichen und örtlichen Sprüngen! -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ich hatte das Glück, noch vor Entdeckung der The Witcher-Spiele die Charaktere unvoreingenommen vor meinem geistigen Auge zu sehen (die Darstellung der Charaktere gefiel mir in den Spielen nicht so sehr). Man merkt bereits auf den ersten Seiten, dass Andrzej Sapkowski ein erwachsenes Publikum anspricht, denn sowohl die Themen als auch die Ausdrucksweise sind sehr darauf ausgerichtet. Wer ein Jugendbuch sucht, ist hier eher an der falschen Adresse. Mit The Last Wish beginnt die Hexer-Saga und bietet sozusagen ein Intro in die Geschichte an sich. Darauf folgt der Band The Sword of Destiny. Alle beide sind - wie bereits eingangs erwähnt - ursprünglich als Kurzgeschichtensammlung konzipiert worden und finden zeitlich vor den eigentlichen Bänden (ab Blood of Elves) statt. Der Leser wird ganz in Ruhe in die Welt des Hexers eingeführt und erlebt einige Aufträge mit, bei denen er mehr über die Kreaturen lernt, mit denen man in der von Herrn Sapkowski geschaffenen Fantasy-Welt zu tun hat. Ich möchte nicht zu viel vom Inhalt verraten, um Lesern nicht den Spaß an der Reihe zu zerstören, doch eins sei gesagt: die Bücher der Reihe sind allesamt spannend bis zum Schluss. Man erfährt mit der Zeit immer mehr über den Hexer und dessen Vergangenheit, aber auch über dessen innere Konflikte, die ihn dazu bringen, so zu handeln, wie er es tut. Eine Liebesgeschichte spielt sich neben all den Abenteuern nebenher noch ab, allerdings nicht auf einem so schmalzigen Level, wie man das eventuell aus anderen Fantasy-Reihen (bspw. Die Elfen) kennt.

Mycket nöjd

Di solito non mi piacciono i libri di racconti, ma questo è il modo migliore per presentare il personaggio di Geralt di Rivia e la mitologia mitteleuropea che fa da sfondo alle sue avventure (e in cui a volte riconoscerete la versione dark di fiabe note).Un fantasy più cupo,più cinico ma anche più maturo di quelli a cui siamo abituati, in cui il protagonista non porta sulle spalle il peso di salvare il mondo,ma ne fa semplicemente parte.E che facendo sfoggio di saggezza e di una falsa indifferenza che imparerete ad amare,gira in lungo e in largo a fare il suo lavoro(il cacciatore di mostri).É il primo di una fortunata serie di romanzi(i successivi non sono raccolte di racconti)da cui sono stati tratti i videogiochi della saga "the Witcher".Ah,e in inglese costa meno,a leggerlo ci si allena e i nomi dei personaggi vengono rispettati (cosa che non sempre avviene nella traduzione italiana).