The wake
by Paul Kingsnorth · first published 2014
9mentions
5recommended by
8HN commenters
2016–2023first – last mentioned
63% recommend38% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Historical novel of an Anglo-Saxon freeman resisting the Norman conquest in the Lincolnshire Fens, told in a de-Latinized English shadow tongue. Readers say it gives a strong sense of place and time.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
After his sons are killed at the Battle of Hastings and his family and farm are destroyed by the Norman invaders, Buccmaster leads a group of fighters on a quest of revenge.
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If you're open to a bit of interesting fiction, _The Wake_ by Paul Kingsnorth is a post apocalyptic novel set after the Norman invasion of 1066. Kingsnorth wrote the book in an invented version of old english: https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/27232308-the-wake…
on “Half of England Is Owned by Less Than 1% of Its Population, Researcher Says” ↗i remember feeling outrage when i first realised just by being born in a country one is subject to the country's laws. completely non-consensual. tangentially: book recommendation: "The Wake" by Paul Kingsnorth. fictional account of life in England following the Norman invasion of 1066, written in a unique form of english. Here's the part I am reminded of - the narrator is enraged when the…
on “New homes will now require solar panels in South Miami” ↗…good, isn't it. There are some stellar Reddit, Discord and Youtube communities forming around OE. All intertwined really. That crossover period is really understudied. At least by me. A great book is The Wake by Paul Kingsnorth, in a pseudo/shadow English about the English resistance to Norman incursion.
on “When did the English discover the Anglo-Saxons? (2018)” ↗…Changes to English society and life. Would feudalism have been imported anyway? - No diaspora of English nobility, many of whom left rather than become subject to Normans Paul Kingsnorth's novel The Wake is an intriguing historical novel imagining how the Norman conquest affected everyday English folk.
on “What would have happened if the Normans had lost the Battle of Hastings?” ↗I actually just picked up 'The Wake' a couple of weeks ago. There is definitely a learning curve to Kingsnorth's "shadow tongue," but once you get the hang of it, it is very immersive and rewarding to read. It really gives you a sense of…
on “'The Wake' Is an Unlikely Hit in an Imaginary Language (2015)” ↗If this is interesting to you, I highly recommend Paul Kingsnorth's 2014 novel The Wake. It's written in a sort of de-latinized English and tells the story of an Anglo-Saxon freeman living through the Norman conquest in the Lincolnshire Fens, where much of the local economy was about catching…
on “To Pay Rent in Medieval England, Catch Some Eels” ↗From the Wikipedia article you linked: "Man Booker Prize long-listed The Wake (2014) by Paul Kingsnorth is a historical novel written in a shadow version of old English telling the story of another resistance fighter in the fens whose actions are regularly compared to Hereward."
on “'The Wake' Is an Unlikely Hit in an Imaginary Language (2015)” ↗Sounds very reminiscent of The Wake by Paul Kingsnorth[0]. Will check it out, thanks! [0] http://paulkingsnorth.net/books/the-wake/
on “Ask HN: What are the best unknown books you have read?” ↗…reading Shakespeare without commentary? So many things of that language are no longer colloquial. Maybe generated text can recover that and train us. Or imagine the "dark tongue" from Paul Kingsnorth' "The Wake" to have been real: we've come quite a bit in expressiveness.
on “Giving GPT-3 a Turing Test” ↗