Alan Garner's The Owl Service … reveals that he is not a man to rest on the laurels awarded him by those enthusiastic children who read with pleasure The Weirdstone of Brisingamen, The Moon of Gomrath, and Elidor. For The Owl Service … is entirely different from his other three, having in common with them only that it is fantasy and takes off from legend. But because certain of Garner's tendencies as a writer are noticeable in all of his books and because these tendencies play an important part in the final effect of The Owl Service, it is rewarding to go back to the beginning and consider his work as a whole.
Garner is one who, from the start, has found his inspiration in Scandinavian mythology, Celtic legend, and Hebridean and British folklore. Rich is his knowledge of old spells, of the Mabinogion, and such volumes as Murray's The God of the Witches, Robert Graves's The White Goddess, and Watkins's The Old Straight Track…. Old Britain and its ancient powers and presences waiting to be released over the English countryside are what are felt most strongly in the first two books. Garner has a splendid sense of place. When he shows Colin in The Weirdstone searching for the old straight track, and its eventual revelation by moonlight, he is at his best, involved purely in scene and feeling and overtone.
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