Hood-winked: A Quartet of Robins and Marians

I am re-posting this article which has seen the light of day at least twice before because one of the novels mentioned is the sequel to novel I am reading now.. and being knocked off my feet by, Jennifer Roberson's Lady Of The Forest. More about that in the next post. In the meantime, I invite you to be Hood-winked again.

Originally posted 10/22/08.
Being as the 1950s British television series The Adventures of Robin Hood was what brought me to adore medieval England, it has been of some interest to me that books I have been reading of late have Robin Hood as a character. What's more, each of the portrayals has been so unique, I just can't prevent myself from writing about this. I know there are many more examples, and I would love to hear about them in the comments to this post. These four are just my latest encounters of a divres kind.

Lady of Sherwood
Jennifer Roberson
Kensington (August 1, 2000)

The sequel to Lady Of The Forest has Marian living tenuously in her father's manor just as Robin comes home from the Crusade just after King Richard's death. This is the standard Robin Hood, portrayed as a historical character but sensitively and appealingly. To put it another way, he's a real guy and a nice one at that. He fights the bad guys and wins and his Merry Men are there as loyal friends of both him and Marian. Lots of romance.

Shield of Three Lions: A Novel
Pamela Kaufman
Three Rivers Press (July 23, 2002)

Robin and Marian are minor characters in this one, but would they leave an impression? Sure would! (Sorry..) The heroine/hero/heroine comes back to England after spending, um, time with King Richard in the Holy Land, and on her journey is waylaid by Merry Men north of Nottingham. First she meets Marian, installed in a sweet little cottage, quite the airhead, telling her about how Robin and she are betrothed but that he believes in abstinence before marriage. Of course, when the heroine meets the guy later that evening he puts moves on her, revealing himself as quite the cad, a womanizer taking advantage of superstardom. Not a nice guy, unless you like that sort of thing. I have to admit to having my sensibilities offended -- not all that seriously -- with this rather casual portrayal of my hero.

Pride of Kings
Judith Tarr
Roc Trade (September 5, 2001)

This is one of Judith Tarr's "say what?" novels, fantasies where cultural expectations -- at least mine -- get mind-boggled. I had read her earlier book, Rite of Conquest, in which she portrays William of Normandy as the, ahem, savior of Britain, and Harold Godwinson, a personal favorite of mine, as the feckless (her word) champion of keeping England in chains... say what?! In this one, King John is the Good Guy.. again say what?! I had thought the one commonplace in historical fiction was that John was always a jerk. I have to say though that Tarr's fantasies are quite well done, engaging, and in this one she did a wonderful job with John, making him the Good Guy but not a nice guy.

But I digress... Robin Hood in this one is a three foot tall pointy toothed leader of the wild magic that wants to destroy the worlds -- all of them.. no mention of Marian, fortunately for her I think. He is clearly a nasty S.O.B. and his Men not only not Merry but not even MEN.. humans, that is.

The White Cutter
Davidson Pownall
Random House Value Publishing (February 22, 1992)

Now this book gives us the most peculiar Hood of all.. not Robin, as he is only called "Hood" here and there is no sign of Marian whatsoever. The story itself is about a young boy who is a mason, and a Freemason, and how he is manipulated as part of an experiment by the four "true rulers" of England.. interestingly, Tarr's books also have a Four Guardians. The comparison ends there, as here they are King Henry III, Simon de Montfort, the Bishop of Lincoln Robert Grossteste, and Henry de Rains, the King's mason. The writing is lovely, with lots of architectural terms used in a literary way.

But as soon as Hedrick enters Sherwood, it gets weird -- and I don't mean "wyrd". At first I thought what I was going to say in this article was that Hood turns out to be some kind of guru who has his rather socialist society doing a Cult of Personality gig. For instance, he is conducting social engineering experiements with how many wives is the correct number. Then you find something out.. spoiler here, so read on at your risk.. that Sherwood is the king's secret second kingdom, starting with Henry II, and his character changes with the character of each King. Henry III is part of this cabal of social experimenters trying to seed a new world order of architecture that will lead to peace and joy and other good stuff. The experiments are reminiscent of Nazi concentration camps.. and Hood is the cold-blooded Wizard of Oz. Pay no attention to the King behind the curtain.

From a legend made flesh, to something out of Playboy, to a beastlike demon, and finally to a sort of medieval Dr. Memgele, you gotta admit the guy sure tickles authors' imaginations. As I tried to pull every live body in my neighborhood to play Robin Hood with me - I was Robin, of course - I certainly never suspected my lifelong hero would be put through this many changes!