History Characters / JonathanStrangeAndMrNorrell

* FairyGodmother: To Stephen Black, in a {{Deconstruction}} of the trope -- having an incredibly powerful being with a set of customs and morality far removed from humanity's intent on being your friend and champion is described as a hellish life.

Norrell is a miserly, reclusive, arrogant Yorkshire gentleman who, at the beginning of the book, is thought to be the last practicing magician in England. His dream of restoring magic to England becomes possible once he gets the opportunity to aid a Government minister in a very personal matter - but he finds that he must consort with dangerous and elemental forces, and unwittingly unleashes terrors that have been safely sealed away for hundreds of years.

* AdaptationalHeroism: In the miniseries Norrell's more proactive, which means that his darker traits are exaggerated (see below) - but he is similarly more driven in his more heroic acts, such as [[spoiler:rescuing Arabella]].

* BrokenPedestal: In his youth, he was an avid admirer of the Raven King, and spent years trying to summon him - only to grow to believe that the King didn't care about England and should thus be hated and vilified in return.

* InsufferableGenius: He believes himself to be the greatest - and only - magician of his age, and acts with according haughtiness. While neither part is true (there are other magicians, notably Strange, who by the end of the book is arguably - in the series, definitely - considerably more powerful than he is), it's fair to say that he is actually genuinely knowledgeable and talented... for a 19th-century magician, that is.

* JerkassWoobie: it's very hard not to feel sorry for him in the miniseries when he comes up against his former student, who is everything he fears: a magician who is younger than he is, more dynamic and DrivenToMadness, one comfortable with the dark arts that Norrell worked so hard to suppress and one who is arguably far more powerful than Norrell - and certainly far more dangerous. He is quite obviously terrified of Strange who quite literally laughs off anything Norrell throws at him. The tired, sad line he responds with speaks volumes, not only of his fear of Strange, but ''why'' he's so arrogant and obsessed with making English magic 'respectable'.

* NonActionGuy: he's terrified of the idea of going into battle and his spells are more technical, in contrast to the more daring and adaptable Strange, who learns to cast on the fly and becomes renowned throughout Europe for his exploits in the service of the Duke of Wellington - in the miniseries, even facing direct combat. This is most aptly displayed when the two finally come to blows in the miniseries. [[spoiler: Strange, despite being half dead from the effects of exhaustion, madness and the Man with the Thistledown Hair's spell, effectively has him on the run and laughs derisively at his fairly pitiful response.]]

* OrderVersusChaos: Norrell is fond of discipline and study, and represents order - as opposed to Strange, who is drawn to primal, instinctive magic and represents chaos.

* PossessionImpliesMastery: Subverted. Norrell's hoards all the books of magic, but Strange, who only has access to books ''about'' magic after the two split, proves himself to arguably be Norrell's superior in magical power by the end of the book - certainly, by the end of the series, there's no doubt that he's by far the more powerful of the two despite [[spoiler: the fact that he's dying]].

Strange is a young, foppish landowner who discovers within himself a natural talent for magic and starts practicing it in order to impress his childhood sweetheart, Arabella. He becomes Norrell's first and only student and soon begins to rival him in ability. As his skills develop, Strange embarks on a path to rediscover the dark, hidden magic of the past - and in so doing, sows the seeds of his own tragedy, and becomes a very dangerous gentleman in his own right.

* AdaptationalAngstUpgrade: Book!Jonathan is absolutely heartbroken when [[spoiler:Arabella supposedly dies]] - but TV!Jonathan has a complete ''breakdown'' and attempts [[spoiler: to resurrect her with black magic,]] despite knowing that no good can come out of it.

* BadassBookworm: He plays a vital role in Wellington's campaign armed with nothing more than chests of books - and often magic he has to make up on the fly.

* ByronicHero: Circumstances turn the affable, light-hearted Strange into a brooding, crazed loner - and in the book's alternative history Creator/LordByron (who he becomes friends with, after initially not taking to him) models the protagonist of ''Theatre/{{Manfred}}'' (a classic example of the trope) after Strange. After he cools down a little at the end of the book, he notes that he'd become this largely thanks to spending too much time around his lordship.

* ClearMyName: [[spoiler:Thanks to Norrell and Lascelles, Strange is widely considered to be a madman and a wife-murderer - and this opinion on his character is only rectified once Arabella returns to England.]]
* CoolButInefficient: He is fond of showier types of magic, often to the detriment of their practicality - e.g. his sand horses, while visually striking, take too long to drag a stuck ship and rearrange the coast to create even ''more'' navigational hazards.

* TheGenericGuy: He is initially described as being unremarkable in both appearance and personality - lacking in striking vices, notable virtues, and considered quite handsome but not universally so.

* HappilyMarried: To Arabella - in the series more so than in the book. In the book, they're affectionate, and Strange does everything he can to impress her (and later [[spoiler: save her]]), while she is amused and tolerant of his being easily distracted by magic. In the series, they're much more visibly in love with each other, trying for a baby, and [[spoiler: her apparent death]] absolutely ''destroys'' Strange.
* HeartbrokenBadass: [[spoiler:His belief that Arabella is dead makes him intentionally lose his mind - which exponentially increases his magical power.]]

* MassTeleportation: The most obvious demonstration of his power takes this form, and he gets so good at it that when a Spanish city is found to be ten miles further away than the maps say it is, it is considered more convenient for Strange to move it closer than to change the maps. His steady rearrangement of the Spanish countryside (including once swapping the positions of two churches on what was essentially a drunken bet) and the Spanish complaints about it - and Wellington's total apathy to said complaints - become a RunningGag. He does it most spectacularly on his second campaign, when Napoleon is bearing down on Brussels, briefly moving Brussels to somewhere on the Great Plains of America. Wellington's response is merely to raise an eyebrow, take notice of some Native American warriors trotting past, remarking that they look like good fighters, and telling one of his aides to ask them if they want to join the battle.

* NightmareFetishist: He is drawn to all that is "unEnglish" and "otherworldly" - for example, the King's Roads enrapture him, whereas both his wife and Sir Walter Pole are creeped out by their description.

* QuirkyCurls: In the miniseries, he has a mane of wild, flyaway curly hair - to showcase his whimsical, intuitive approach to life and magic, and to visually contrast him with reclusive, conservative Norrell, who wears a wig.

* SanitySlippage: [[spoiler:a rare self-induced example.]]
* ShelteredAristocrat: Types one and three rolled into one. Strange is a young, foppish landowner. His mother's relatives pampered him in order to compensate for the lack of love from his father. As a result, he grew into an amiable and good-hearted - but also arrogant - man.

* SurpassedTheTeacher: While he lacks Norrell's sheer encyclopaedic knowledge, his raw magical ability easily surpasses Norrell's by the end of the series, to the point where he literally ''laughs off'' Norrell's pathetic attempts at combat magic. His grasp of magic is far more intuitive and naturalistic, and implied to be closer to magic in its truest sense - certainly, he's the one to finally figure out how it works. As Norrell laments when trying to find his way back into Hurtfew; “This is the genius of my enemy! Lock a door against him and all that happens is that he learns first how to pick a lock and second how to build a better one against you!”

* TarotMotifs: He is closely associated with the Knight of Wands - a card which symbolises energy, a visionary outlook on life, a commitment to making ideas come to life, and a disregard for consequences.

* WildCard: Repeatedly described as "contradictory", "whimsical" and "unpredictable" - just the sort of person who may resort to BlackMagic during war, or decide to publish against himself.

The daughter of a clergyman, Arabella Strange is a charming, intelligent, caring and humorous young lady. She has loved Jonathan Strange since she was a girl, but wishes him to make something of himself: not for her own sake, but for his. When he - quite unexpectedly - heeds her advice and becomes a magician, she joins him on the exciting journey into the realms of English Magic. Knowing that with his new profession comes jealousy, rivalry, and danger, she seeks to protect him from these as best she can.

* ChildhoodFriendRomance: With Jonathan.

* HappilyMarried: To Jonathan - more obviously so in the series, where they're much more passionate, than the book, where their relationship is more of a wry friendship with romantic overtones.
* MoralityChain: She is much more concerned with the moral and the ethical than her husband, and often tries to steer him to the path of good - and she is more or less the one person he's actually inclined to listen to, in this regard. Indeed, Jonathan's affection for Arabella is one of his most notable redeeming features. It is partly a product of this and his grief that once she dies Jonathan goes straight off the deep end.

* TrueBeautyIsOnTheInside: She's described as "moderately pretty" rather than beautiful - but her good humour and vivacity make her incredibly attractive to those around her.

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* ChekhovsSkill: [[spoiler:He is a butler, used to managing a household - which comes in handy once he's the ruler of Lost-Hope]].

* TheJeeves: Not only is Stephen an exemplary butler - his knowledge, skills and duties far exceed those pertaining even to the most distinguished members of the profession.
* KlingonPromotion: [[spoiler:He kills the Gentleman - and becomes that particular land's new king]].

* MeaningfulName: [[spoiler:"Stephen" means crown - a motif associated with the character]].

* NoNameGiven: [[spoiler:Stephen's real name - the one his mother gave him - has been lost to the ages; when the book ends he is referred simply as "the person who had been Stephen Black"]].

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* AdaptationPersonalityChange: In the book, he is a whimsical and superficially charming - if absolutely psychotic - creature. In the series, he is decidedly sinister in both appearance and behavior, with none of his book counterpart's sense of fun and mischief.

* BlueAndOrangeMorality: As a classical example of TheFairFolk, he is not malicious ''per se'' - merely very ''different'', with no notions of regular human morality, love, ethics and societal norms. He's casually sadistic, yet also cannot comprehend racism; he shows a genuine liking for King George, yet is more than happy to murder him. It gets to the point where [[spoiler: Stephen apologises to the Gentleman for having to kill him, acknowledging that the latter is merely acting according to his nature and trying to express friendship to him.]]
* TheCaligula: He's not a good, emotionally stable ruler, to put it mildly. Just when you think he can't get more terrifying and degenerate, he'll surprise you - and Stephen - with some new misdeed.

* FairyGodmother: To Stephen Black, in a {{Deconstruction}} of the trope - having an incredibly powerful being with a set of customs and morality far removed from humanity's intent on being your friend and champion is described as a hellish life.

* TheHedonist: He is mostly concerned with having fun - usually at the expense of others.
* ItsAllAboutMe:
-->The gentleman looked doubtful. Any reasoning that did not contain a reference to himself was always difficult for him to follow.
* KickTheDog: A lot of his actions fall under this category - even though he has no idea as to how cruel they actually are. For example, he (in just one task) burns a house to the ground with women, children and the elderly inside, strangles a woman with her own pearl necklace, and breaks into an elderly widow's home leaving her exposed to a bitter and probably lethal winter cold.

* StalkerWithACrush: To Stephen Black.

Norrell's man of business, manipulator and closest advisor - a clever, wily Yorkshireman with all the reverence for magic, plain-speaking and thrift that characterises that ancient and noble county. Once a common pickpocket, now a man of many talents - with magic and divination among them - and of murky, enigmatic motivations; he seems to have a bigger investment in seeing magic return to England than he lets on.

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* BlueCollarWarlock: Norrell, who promotes the respectability of magic, is appalled to discover that his servant wields the sort of magic that he despises - though [[{{Hypocrite}} he does ask Childermass to cast spells from time to time]], which Childermass calls him out on, pointing out that ''Norrell'' taught him most of the spells he knows.

* DeathGlare: One of his favourite facial expressions - so stern that it can shame even Norrell.

* KavorkaMan: In the book, being described as looking like a twisted old tree, yet three of the maids in Norrell's household have fallen for him, as does the youngest and prettiest of Vinculus' wives, being typically TallDarkAndSnarky. In the series, he's on the more roguish end of TallDarkAndHandsome - though still a consummate DeadpanSnarker.

* MysteriousPast: He used to be a common pickpocket, which is all that is known of his past. The only solid clue is in the book, when Vinculus draws the Tarot Cards for him and an amused Childermass remarks that he's got Childermass' life laid out in front of him, but doesn't know how to read it. It is unclear as to why he puts up with being Norrell's servant, although both book and miniseries imply that he's chiefly driven by his desire to restore English magic - specifically, the magic of the Raven King.

* ServileSnarker: He's the master of the eye roll, the biting remark - which he deploys equally to all levels of society, including Norrell himself - and the DeathGlare, and has been "a law unto himself" since coming into Norrell's employ.

* TallDarkAndSnarky: He fits the stereotypical image of what a magician should look like remarkably well - to the point that Drawlight decides that ''he'' must be the magician of Hanover-Square upon seeing him.

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* SnakeOilSalesman: His street magic is a load of cobblers, like the mouth organ he uses to speak with the voice of the Thames - though interspersed with the rubbish is some genuine prophecy (and not just the Raven King's prophecy, either).

A lively and charming nineteen-year-old engaged to marry a Cabinet Minister, Emma Wintertowne becomes the subject of much London gossip when she dies before the wedding - and is subsequently resurrected by Norrell. However, something seems to go wrong with the magic, making Emma increasingly listless, eccentric, and tired - one might even say insane. And being insane is a very difficult thing to reconcile with being the wife of a Minister of the Crown.

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** CameBackWrong: Played with - it's not the process itself that undoes her, but rather the Gentleman's enchantment. [[spoiler:Once she's free of it, she returns back to her normal self, though changed somewhat by her experience.]]

* EnglishRose: She fits this description - but then, she goes mad.
* IncurableCoughOfDeath: Her unspecified illness.

* LoopholeAbuse: In the miniseries, Lady Pole thinks of an ingenious way to work around the spell that prevents her speaking or writing of her magical predicament: she creates a tapestry out of her dresses, showing her, the gentleman and Stephen Black at Lost-Hope. Sadly, Norrell's efforts ensure that Mrs Strange does not get the chance to truly comprehend it and write about it to her husband.

Idle noblemen who, in Norrell and his magic, see their chance to hop aboard the most fashionable new thing. They appoint themselves to be Norrell’s deputies and go-betweens (and, in Lascelles' case, the editor of the Norellite periodical, ''The Friends of English Magic''). They promote Norrellite magic and fight for its dominance over English life - all to improve their standing in society.

When they find their position threatened, they demonstrate some of the remarkable feats that they are capable of - none of which do them very much credit, and none of which they can bring themselves to be even remotely ashamed of.

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* AmbiguouslyGay: Drawlight is described as very feminine in appearance and demeanour, and is interested mostly in fashion, interior decorating and gossip - but not in women.

* DirtyCoward: Drawlight, who bitterly admits to being afraid all the time after encountering Strange in Venice - though by this stage, Strange terrifies almost everyone.

* IdleRich: The well-off Lascelles regards jobs as best left to lower classes - though it is also noted that he is envious of the positions those of his peers who ''have'' taken jobs have achieved through hard work, which is why he opts to attach himself to Norrell.

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* {{Foil}}: The two of them are foils to Norrell and Strange: both pairs feature an older, more learned magician and a younger, more innately talented one - but where Norrell and Strange are suspicious rivals, Honeyfoot and Segundus are friendly and co-operative, and by working together they achieve things they could not have managed alone.

* WellDoneSonGuy: Segundus is implied to want the approval of his peers and most particularly Jonathan Strange - which it's implied he would have, if Strange wasn't usually distracted.

The legendary John Uskglass, more commonly known as The Raven King, is the person accredited with bringing magic back to England after a long absence and codifying it. Born human but brought up in Faerie, he conquered Northern England at the tender age of fourteen or fifteen and proceeded to govern it for the next 300 years (along with two other kingdoms - one in Faerie and one on the far side of Hell). A wise and benevolent ruler, he eventually left England for Faerie, though some prophesize that he might be coming back...

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* TheAce: He is both a just, capable ruler and an incredibly powerful magician - an unrivalled combination of talents.

* TheArchMage: Incredible feats of magic are credited to him in histories, such as stealing the moon out of the sky so its reflection could travel through his rivers, banishing winter from his kingdom for four years, and enchanting all his subjects so they build a tower in their dreams (which possibly saved them from the Black Death). He's apparently so powerful he can challenge the Devil, if the latter actually exists. Plus, there's the small fact that he hasn't aged for over seven hundred years. As it is, from what we ''do'' see, he can casually [[spoiler: perform a BulletCatch, turn said bullet into a starling with an offhand flick of his hand and resurrect the dead]] - furthermore, when [[spoiler: Stephen]] is imbued with his power, it's mentioned that he could destroy all of England with but a thought, and [[spoiler: it takes the combined efforts of the two most powerful magicians in England at the time to even get his attention]].

** His name was used by multiple pretenders in the late 15th and early 16th century (except for the Summer King, who didn't give a name) - in the same way that RealLife pretenders Perkin Warbeck and Lambert Simnel both claimed to be one of the surviving 'Princes in the Tower' - and his banner, the Raven-in-Flight, is used as a symbol by 'Johannites', a variation on RealLife Luddites. In general, Sir Walter is likely not to be far wrong when he complains that most of Northern England would give up rule from London in favour of a returned Raven King in an instant.

A pragmatic, fashionable, well-spoken man, Sir Walter Pole is a Cabinet Minister who has inherited his family's immense debts and is thus forced to look for a rich bride. He eventually finds a suitable match in Emma Wintertowne, and their engagement becomes the talk of the town - especially when the young bride dies days before the wedding and is resurrected by Mr Norrell. Thus Sir Walter becomes the political face of English Magic and plays a vital role in bringing magic into the public consciousness.

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* NiceGuy: Is generally and near-universally regarded as a kind and decent man, even by Stephen, who has more than adequate reason to resent English people in general and Sir Walter's family in particular, and at the end of the series, his wife - who's got a fiery temper and has spent many years under enchantment, largely as a result of his unwitting choices, and who might understandably blame him (if unfairly, since it was Norrell's fault and Sir Walter didn't have a clue what was wrong) - lets him down gently.

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* DeadpanSnarker: As in RealLife.

* MrFanservice: InUniverse he is noted to be a focus of many teenage crushes and something of a flirt, to the misfortune of his wife. As in RealLife, Wellington and his wife had a very unhappy marriage, as it was essentially a ChildhoodFriendRomance gone wrong - he loved her as a young man, wanted to marry her, was turned down for being poor and without prospects, returned a war hero and married her thirteen years later... only to find out that the marriage wasn't as he'd hoped. The book isn't wrong when it notes that his wife was a small and unhappy woman whose opinion was not much cared for by her husband. However, he did still love her, in his own fashion.
* MundaneUtility: Is much more impressed by magic of this kind - i.e. better roads for marching on, mud to impede French cavalry - than flashier stuff.
* TheNickNamer: Almost exclusively refers to Strange as Merlin.

* TheStoic: No matter how spectacular Strange's magic, gets, he's more or less entirely unfazed by it. He has little reaction to the Neapolitan undead and his main reaction to Brussels being moved temporarily to America is to glance out the window, notice some Native American warriors riding past, remark that they look badass and send someone to inquire if they'd like to join the battle. He is also unfazed by Strange apparently going completely insane, despite knowing far better than most how dangerous he's capable of being, simply dismissing it as Strange going through a DramaQueen phase. Hilariously, he actually turns out to be right on the last part - while Strange was DrivenToMadness by/as part of his quest to [[spoiler: save Arabella]], he later remarks that many of his more dramatic affectations were products of spending too long around Lord Byron.

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* BadassBoast: He delivers a chilling one to Norrell when he traps him in his library. [[spoiler: The answer to the question, by the way, is no.]]

* FreudianExcuse: the miniseries provides him with one by implying that his defensive pride, arrogance and reclusiveness stem from mockery that he received as a young man for his studies in magic. The revelation of it, with the single line below, does a great deal to make him more sympathetic.
--> Do not laugh. It is cruel to laugh.

* JerkassHasAPoint: in the miniseries, he snaps at Sir Walter and Lord Liverpool when they demand that he confront Strange while trying to blame Strange's madness and the threat he poses on Norrell. As Norrell correctly retorts, he warned them repeatedly of the powers that Strange was meddling in, and not only did they refuse to stop Strange, but they encouraged him, and now it's coming back to bite them.
* JerkassWoobie: it's very hard not to feel sorry for him in the miniseries when he comes up against his former student, who is everything he fears - younger, dynamic and DrivenToMadness, being comfortable with the dark arts that Norrell worked so hard to suppress and arguably far more powerful than Norrell - and certainly far more dangerous. He is quite obviously terrified of Strange who quite literally laughs off anything Norrell throws at him. The tired, sad line he responds with speaks volumes, not only of his fear of Strange, but ''why'' he's so arrogant and obsessed with making English magic 'respectable'.

* PossessionImpliesMastery: Subverted. Norrell's hoards all the books of magic, but Strange, who only has access to books ''about'' magic after the two split, proves himself to be Norrell's equal, if not superior, in magical power by the end of the book - by the end of the series, there's no doubt that he's by far the more powerful of the two despite [[spoiler: the fact that he's dying]].

* UnskilledButStrong: Strange lacks Norrell's vast knowledge, but he's far more intuitive, imaginative and better at improvising, having been forced to adapt based on his lack of knowledge. By the end of the book and the series he's by far the more powerful magician out of the two, shrugging off Norrell's pitiful attempts at battle magic with mocking laughter, [[spoiler: despite being near death]].

Portrayed by Brian Pettifer and Edward Hogg in the BBC adaptation.

* PoisonousFriend: He plays this role towards Stephen Black, ruining his life and encouraging his resentment of Englishmen.

* PoisonousFriend: To Norrell, driving away any other possible influences on him, much to his detriment.

* IllGirl: She starts out as this. And then it gets worse.

* NiceHat: In the series, he wears a (very well-worn, but obviously well-loved) top hat.

* RealityWarper: If half of what is credited to him (both in legends and in Vinculus' claim that the events of the entire story, Strange and Norrell's very existence included, are simply the King's spell to restore magic to England) is true, he easily qualifies. At the very ''least'', he's capable of [[spoiler: resurrecting the dead, which we see him do with Vinculus]].

* TheQuietOne: He's noted as being softly spoken.

* TheCaligula: He's not a good, emotionally stable ruler, to put it mildly. Just when you think he can't get more terrifying and degenerate, he'll surprise you - and Stephen - with some new misdeed.

* TheResenter: carries a deeply buried resentment for English racism and as the book goes on, grows to dislike and distrust the English more and more (and not without reason), though he remains loyal to Sir Walter [[NiceToTheWaiter (who was genuinely kind to him, and is mentioned to have shared what he had equally]] with Stephen when he was an ImpoverishedPatrician), and fond of Lady Pole. He's also sympathetic to Arabella, largely because he's familiar with her plight.

** Specifically he is prone to DisproportionateRetribution, and he sees nothing wrong with faeries kidnapping the occasional person, and has been done so himself on occasion.

In the BBC miniseries he is portrayed by Samuel West.

* TeleportersAndTransporters: The most obvious demonstration of his power takes this form, and he gets so good at it that when a Spanish city is found to be ten miles further away than the maps say it is, it is considered more convenient for Strange to move it closer than to change the maps. His steady rearrangement of the Spanish countryside (including once swapping the positions of two churches on what was essentially a drunken bet) and the Spanish complaints about it - and Wellington's total apathy to said complaints - become a RunningGag. He does it most spectacularly on his second campaign, when Napoleon is bearing down on Brussels, briefly moving Brussels to somewhere on the Great Plains of America. Wellington's response is merely to raise an eyebrow, take notice of some Native American warriors trotting past, remarking that they look like good fighters, and telling one of his aides to ask them if they want to join the battle.

* {{Asexuality}}: Only interested in books, and believes that women and marriage are a detriment to magicians.

* {{Asexuality}}: He remarks upon women's beauty, and frequently compliment's Stephen's looks, but never expresses any sexual behaviour. He seems to instead collect attractive individuals in the same manner one would collect dolls or obtain pets.