“Von Bek”, by Michael Moorcock

 

600 pages, White Wolf Publishing, ISBN-13: 978-1565041929

Over the course of the mid-to-late 90s, White Wolf Publishing produced this massive omnibus collection of Michael Moorcock’s “Eternal Champion” stories, a recurrent aspect in many of his tales. Von Bek was the second in this series featuring the character Captain Graf Ulrich von Bek and includes the tales The War Hound and the World’s Pain, A City in the Autumn Stars, The Dragon in the Sword and The Pleasure Garden of Felipe Sagittarius. Ulrich von Bek (and his descendants) are an unusual family in Moorcock’s Multiverse, as they function both as an aspects of his Eternal Champion and as a companions to him. While the von Beks are referred to as “the oldest blood in Germany”, due to the interdimensional origins of the family they are, in fact, of royal Melnibonéan blood and, as such, are also prone to albinism. Oh, and besides all that, the von Beks are the hereditary Keepers of the Holy Grail, charged to keep it safe until such a time as Lucifer is reconciled with God. This can only happen when Lucifer and the von Beks are able to cure the “World’s Pain”; for this reason, their ancient family motto is “Do you the Devil’s work”.

The von Beks are some of Moorcock’s more typical antiheroes, although they were created several years before his ultimate antihero, Elric of Melniboné. I say “von Beks” for, again unusual for Moorcock, this aspect doesn’t necessarily manifest the same way twice: and so we have Graf Ulrich Von Bek (17^th Century), Manfred Von Bek (18^th Century), Ulrich Von Bek (20^th Century), another Ulric Von Bek (again from the 20^th Century, and an avatar of Elric), Count Ulrich Rudric Renark Otto von Bek-Krasny (aka Count Zenith the Albino, and another avatar of Elric), Renark Von Bek (the far future), The Rose Von Bek (related via marriage to a certain Edwin Begg) and several more, besides.

The War Hound and the World’s Pain is the first of the novels that feature one of the many “von Beks”, aspects of the Eternal Champion. Captain Graf Ulrich von Bek is a scholarly 17^th Century German aristocrat who, haunted by his participation in “Magdeburg’s Wedding” – the Sack of Magdeburg between May 20^th and 24^th, 1631 – has become an independent mercenary. Over the course of his travels, he comes upon a castle on a mountain in a forest evidently devoid of life, where he rests and recuperates. Eventually, von Bek meets the owner of the castle, who is none other than Lucifer, but a sympathetic Lucifer unfamiliar to most, as he is pained by a silent God whose purpose for the world can no longer be easily discerned. Moorcock’s Satan is a philosophical chap who, far from being the foe of God and his creation, in fact seeks to cure humanity of its suffering by retrieving the Holy Grail; he also assures von Bek that he is among the damned, but offers him a possibility of salvation: after Satan gives von Bek a tour of an admittedly grim but not too-bad Hell – and after Satan offers to redeem his lover, Sabrina – von Bek undertakes to find the Holy Grail and heal the world’s pain. This is perhaps my favorite of Moorcock’s works, merging as he does historic events and metaphysical themes, although his interpretation of Satan, I’m sure, will ruffle Christian feathers. It’s also deep; I mean, the themes and interpretations almost require an advanced degree in German philosophy to disentangle but, I promise, if you stick with it, the payoff is well worthwhile.

The City in the Autumn Stars is the second of the von Bek books, in which Ritter Manfred von Bek, fleeing Paris and the French Revolution, heads to the fictional Mirenburg, Germany. After various encounters with a multitude of characters – none of whom are very reasonable to this man from the Age of Reason – von Bek must admit at long last that the world does not change, especially after losing the enchanting Libussa, Duchess of Crete, and the mysterious Holy Grail. As with The War Hound and the World’s Pain, there are deep political and philosophical debates featuring the meaning and purpose of revolutions, the abuse of power in the name of “progress” and the human need to dominate the natural world. When asked about the results of the French Revolution, the late premier Zhou Enlai is reputed to have said “Too early to say”. While doubts have been thrown upon this quote, the point is the same: ironically, the further Moorcock transports us from our own times into The City in the Autumn Stars the closer he brings us to the present and compels us, with his usual symbolic finesse, to realize that the problems of the failed French Revolution are still with us.

The Dragon in the Sword is the third von Bek book, only this von Bek is the companion to the protagonist, rather than the subject of the book. Once again, the Eternal Champion is called forth to right interdimensional wrongs. John Dakar, who became Erekosë, is this time Prince Flamadin, who desires only to be reunited with Ermizhad, his long-lost love. Instead, he is pulled into the dimension of the Six Realms where he meets one Ulrich von Bek, who has likewise found himself in this strange otherworldly realm, having escaped from the Nazis on Earth. The Six Realms are an area where six different worlds inhabited by very different cultures and races come together through a number of planar gates. Flamadin soon learns of a plot by the forces of Chaos to conquer all the realms and knows that it is his mission as the Eternal Champion to stop that from happening. This is not because of some love for the forces of Law but rather, as is a common theme in Moorcock’s Eternal Champion works, because Balance is all important: too much Chaos breeds anarchy, while too much Law breeds stagnation.

Lastly is a short story, The Pleasure Garden of Felipe Sagittarius, which takes place in an alternate 1940s Germany where WWII never happened and Adolf Hitler is an officer in the German police force under the command of an aged Otto Von Bismarck. Metatemporal detective Ulrich Von Bek must solve the mystery of a murder surrounding intelligent plants and a strange gardener in a tale that, frankly, while an interesting bit of alternative fiction, didn’t live up to the premise.