The Assembly of the Severed Head

The Assembly of The Severed Head makes demands,as well it might,of its readers.We must agree to fall into step with what is primarily an oral prose poem.We must tune in to its incantatory voice.We must accept that the colour of the novel lies essentially within the vivid action of the four caincs, for all the vivid and inventive envelopes of scene setting.But then, what extraordinary rewards! Here is a truly memorable novel, possibly a great one, standing at the intersection of the oral and the written.A monk in a Cistercian monastery painstakingly writes down on calfskin the stunning stories of the Mabinogion,the Matter of Wales,dictated to him by an old court bard,Cian Brydydd Mawr.Anxious that he may be forfeiting his place in heaven by doing do, he nevertheless also comes to see the remarkable parallels between Christianity and the old stories.This is the novel that Lupton was born to write and perhaps only he could have written.It's underpinned by a long and wise understanding of the oral tradition and of the Mabinogion,and it is by turns spiritual,magical,passionate,tender,visceral and gory.It is beautifully crafted.And its backbone is a humane engagement with the power and function of story.Kevin Crossley-Holland.