Piranesi (novel)

The novel tells the story of Piranesi, who lives in a place called the House. The House is a collection of seemingly infinite halls and vestibules, filled with statues. These statues depict things that aren't present in the House. While the House only contains clouds, in the upper halls, and the sea, which fills the lower halls, as well as birds and fish in each, the statues depict everything from a beekeeper, to a man wreathed in snakes, to a gorilla. The House is occupied by only two living people, Piranesi and the Other, whom Piranesi refers to as such. Piranesi works with the Other in search for "A Great and Secret Knowledge" hidden within the House. Piranesi records his life and activities in detailed entries in his journals. Eventually, Piranesi begins to notice the Other's strange statement and words, as well as inconsistencies in his own journals, and proof of the existence of more people. These occurrences all call into question his understanding of the world in which he lives. As the 16th person Piranesi is aware of, whom he names 16, gets closer and closer to making contact with him a sinister truth is uncovered about the Other, which leads to Piranesi's eventual reconciling with the nature of his relationship to his world, and the one he originally inhabited.[1][2][3][4][5][6]

Piranesi was published in hardback, e-book and audio format on 15 September 2020 by Bloomsbury Publishing. The audiobook version is narrated by actor Chiwetel Ejiofor.[7][8]

Piranesi received reviews of unanimous admiration.[6][9][10][11][12][13][14][15] Sarah Ditum of The Times gave the novel a rave review, writing, "After all that time, she has produced a second novel that is close to perfect."[16]

Ron Charles of The Washington Post called it "infinitely clever" and praised Piranesi's acceptance of his imprisonment for unintentionally making the novel "resonate with a planet in quarantine" due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[17]

Publishers Weekly called it an "inventive" novel, praising Clarke's subtlety in progressing the novel's storyline.[18]

The title of the novel alludes to the 18th-century Italian artist Giovanni Battista Piranesi, who produced a series of sixteen prints entitled Imaginary Prisons which depict enormous subterranean vaults with stairs and mighty machines.[9]

Piranesi contains several references or allusions to C. S. Lewis's series The Chronicles of Narnia.

When describing the character Dr. Valentine Andrew Ketterley, the text notes that he is the son of a "Ranulph Andrew Ketterley" and that "the Ketterleys are an old Dorsetshire family." Both the names and the description of the family are evocative of Andrew Ketterley, a key figure in The Magician's Nephew who describes his family as "a very old family. An old Dorsetshire family." This connection is further strengthened by the quotation from The Magician's Nephew given at the front of the novel, which was also spoken in that book by Andrew Ketterley.[4]

In the "Statues" entry of Part I, the narrator of Piranesi notes that he dreamt of a faun "standing in a snowy forest and speaking to a female child," likely a reference to Lucy Pevensie meeting the faun Mr. Tumnus in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.[19]

In addition, there are several similarities between the House of Piranesi and the so-called "Wood between the Worlds" of The Magician's Nephew.[5][11] Both are alternative worlds (distinct from our own) that must be reached through supernatural means, both contain life but of a less variegated nature than that in the characters' original worlds, and both induce a state of forgetfulness in newcomers that induces them to believe that they have always been in the new, supernatural, world.

The story of Piranesi has also been compared to the parable of the cave by Plato, who is an inspiration of Digory Kirke in Narnia.[20] In the story of Piranesi, Piranesi is unable to leave a world filled with nothing but statues, which represent a greater reality which he is simultaneously ignorant of. In Plato's Allegory of the cave a character, possessing no knowledge of the outside world, is imprisoned within a dark cave with nothing but shadows, reflections of the actual world, projected on the cave wall.