Review: 'Stardust' by Neil Gaiman

I was slow to come to the work of Neil Gaiman. For a long time I felt like I was missing out on something, or that his books were something that I should have read. Niggled by this feeling that I was missing out on something good, I marched myself into Waterstones and joined the legions of existing Gaiman fans. ‘Stardust’ follows Gaiman’s belief in the necessicityof fairy-tales, bringing together questing and adventure, with a deeper meaning. He dots the quest narrative with darker elements, not too far removed from the Grimms’ Märchen. Witches, murder, false imprisonment, and ruthless lords all appear. Gaiman himself classed ‘Stardust’ as “a fairy-tale for adults.” All this brought together, ‘Stardust’ presents an strange, sometimes threatening, but ultimately engaging fairy-tale world. 

‘Stardust’ tells the tale of young Tristran Thorn, an ordinary youth, who is of less than ordinary parentage. Raised in the small village of Wall, Tristran spent his childhood preoccupied with stories of far-flung lands and longs for adventure. Tristran pines after local beauty, Victoria Forrester, but with little success. One night, as the two see as shooting star fall, Victoria promises Tristran whatever he desires if he retrieves it for her. On this promise, Tristran crosses the wall into Faerie and in the traditional way of romance fiction, he undertakes a quest to win his lady’s favour. Tristran will encounter living forests, lions, unicorns and he will unearth important information about his own lineage and status in the world. 

Despite only reaching about 200 pages, ‘Stardust’ has an astoundingly intricate plot and structure. Subplots are carefully introduced and incorporated. As a sort of a bildungsroman, the novel starts at Tristran’s very earliest origins. As in ‘twinkle in his father’s eye’ early. The novel opens with the story of young Dunstan Thorn and the coming of the fair to Wall, a fair which only occurred once in every nine years. Anything that Gaiman mentions has some import and significance. He writes in the register of traditional fantasy fiction in the vein of C.S. Lewis and others, with intermittent witty, modern dialogue. It’s for this reason that ‘Stardust’ doesn’t get too antiquated. Gaiman is careful not to cast aside tradition either, bringing in nursery rhymes and folklore that we’re all familiar with.

While ‘Stardust’ shares the simple narrative form of classic fantasy fiction, it would be a grave injustice to dismiss it as basic or lacking that something that we can engage with. While it follows a classic romance narrative of the young hero, seeking to win the favour of a fair lady, it also provides the something with a little more meat. Tristan’s story shows us how we pursue certain plans and ideals, but these can be radically changed. While we hang on to these ideals, they can lead us down drastically different paths and sometimes they are for the best. I quite like that idea. Tristran’s journey also works well as a kind of analogy for reaching adulthood. The idea of the wall as threshold into another world is both reminiscent of Lewis’ 

Narnia, but also could stand for Tristran’s crossing into the world of adulthood.

Overall, ‘Stardust’ is an excellent re-configuring of the fairy-tale form. It has all the key elements, he just twists them and turns them into something a little more modern. I feel the main strengths are Gaiman’s carefully wrought plot and his sharp, funny plot. Nobody realised it until they read it, but Gaiman knew that everyone wanted to hear a fallen star shout ‘fuck.’ He knows what’s good for us, that Gaiman.

9/10.