History Literature / JonathanStrangeAndMrNorrell

* FairyGodmother: The gentleman's interactions with Stephen Black can be considered a very dark deconstruction. 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 - especially when said being insists on "helping" at times where his aid is not needed or wanted, and in manners that often make things worse while refusing to believe this no matter how many times he is told so.

* AgeGapRomance: A very mild example between Strange and Arabella, with six years between them. [[spoiler: Flora Greysteel is also noted as having had a serious crush on him, to the point of being interested in marrying him after Arabella's apparent death, despite the fact that she's 18 and by that point he was about 36. However, while he liked her and saw her as a MoralityPet, he wasn't interested - largely because he'd correctly deduced that Arabella was still alive - and they remain JustFriends.]]

** Jonathan Strange. He plays a vital role in Wellington's campaign, armed with nothing more than chests of books.

** Strange in his respect for women, servants and Jews (he criticises the DoubleStandard of SlutShaming, considers his Jewish student to be the most talented of the lot, and and states explicitly that if not for [[spoiler: Arabella's apparent death]], he'd take female students too - unfortunately, propriety would require chaperones etc).

* OneSteveLimit: Averted; there are [[https://www.tumblr.com/tellsadstoriesofthedeathofkings/177399328357/a-list-of-every-person-named-john-in-the-entirety 18 charcters named John or some variation thereof]]. This is [[ShownTheirWork more plausible]] than it might sound since [[https://www.galbithink.org/names.htm almost one in five men in the UK at the time were named John]].

* ReligionIsMagic: Throwaway lines indicate that religion shares some characteristics with magic. Hell and Heaven are apparently accepted as existing, and Strange mentions that a piece of the Host diminishes his powers. An InUniverse footnote wryly notes that magicians are more interested in how they can make use of Angels, Demons, and Fairies than their moral alignment while priests are scaresly interested in anything else. Its state that the Church was ''very'' quick to crush magic related heresies.

* RitualMagic: The most common form seen, and certainly Norrell's preference. However it weakened over the centuries as the natural world forgot its treaties with the Raven King. Some forms are stricter in their requirements for proper form and ritual to impose certainty, particularly summoning.

* WithGreatPowerComesGreatInsanity: It's noted how fairies who have the most powerful magic often have the same level of sanity as humans in madhouses. On the other hand, Norrell and Strange weren't insane when they performed their greatest feats of magic, and neither were the Aureate magicians of the time of the Raven King.

* InSpiteOfANail: In spite of the fact that Northern England was formerly a separate country, ruled by a magician-king for 300 years, and that fairies were demonstrably proven to have existed, England and Europe at the time of the novel are almost exactly as they were in history. Sir Creator/WalterScott, UsefulNotes/TheDukeOfWellington, Creator/FranciscoDeGoya, and Creator/LordByron all show up, and are shown or implied to be just as they were in RealLife. There also doesn't seem to be a tradition of magic in any other countries (such as France, which might otherwise have given Bonaparte an edge in the Peninsular War) even though it's shown that fairies are not confined to England.

* DancesAndBalls: PlayedForHorror Steven and Lady Poole end up spending '''years''' dancing the night away at Lost Hope as the "guests", read hostages, of the its master the gentleman with the thistle-down hair which leaves them utterly exhausted.

* OneSteveLimit: Averted with Jonathan Strange, John Segundus, John Childermass, and John Uskglass. There are other Johns as minor characters in the book as well.

* TheFairFolk: They're so self-centered and hedonistic that if it wasn't for their powerful magic they'd quickly end up extinct. It's debatable whether the gentleman with the thistle-down hair even understood the concept that other people might have different opinions. It's stated that Julius Caesar once served as judge of the Fairies, because at the time ''every Faerie alive'' stood accused of some crime or had close ties to an accused, so none were fit to stand in judgment. Despite being a key element of the story, only two members appear.

* InSpiteOfANail: In spite of the fact that Northern England was formerly a separate country, ruled by a magician-king for 300 years, England and Europe at the time of the novel are almost exactly as they were in history. Sir Creator/WalterScott, Creator/LewisCarroll, Creator/FranciscoDeGoya, and Creator/LordByron all show up, and are shown or implied to be just as they were in RealLife.

* InSpiteOfANail: In spite of the fact that Northern England was formerly a separate country, ruled by a magician-king for 300 years, England and Europe at the time of the novel are almost exactly as they were in history. Sir Creator/WalterScott, Creator/LewisCarroll, Francisco Goya, and Creator/LordByron all show up, and are shown or implied to be just as they were in RealLife.

* BlackMagic: Strange practices some during the Napoleonic Wars, using it to raise slain Neapolitans from the dead as horrible, sapient zombies in order to get information from them. They are finally burned "alive" after the living soldiers are too creeped out to be around them - although, to his credit, Strange does try several times to reverse the spell on them (tragically, the reversal was quite simple, but no one remembered how). As a rather dark HistoricalInJoke, this act is suggested to have inspired the artist Goya's production of hellish paintings of war and witchcraft.

* ReligionIsMagic: Throwaway lines indicate that religion shares some characteristics with magic. Hell and Heaven are apparently accepted as existing, and Strange mentions that a piece of the Host diminishes his powers.

* PoisonousFriend: The gentleman's relationship toward Stephen Black, ruining his life and encouraging his resentment of Englishmen. Drawlight and Lascelles similarly drive away any possible influences on Norrell other than themselves, to his detriment.

* TrueLovesKiss: [[spoiler: In the BBC series, Strange releases Arabella from her enchantment with a BigDamnKiss, appropriately for a fairy tale.]]

* DoubleStandard: At one point, Lascelles has an affair with a married woman, Maria Bullworth, who believes he will run away with her. Of course he does nothing of the sort, and when the affair becomes public her reputation is ruined, her husband casts her off and she is forced to live on her father's charity, secluded in the country. Lascelles, naturally, gets off scot free without any judgement from polite society. You can hardly blame Mrs. Bullworth for wanting to get revenge on him with magic.

''Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell'' is the highly acclaimed first novel by Susanna Clarke, published in 2004. The story shews, in historical fashion, the involvements of magicians and [[TheFairFolk fairies]] in [[AlternateHistory alternate]] [[GaslampFantasy Britain]] of the [[RegencyEngland Regency era]]. Being [[DoorStopper nearly 1000 pages long]], the book is well-known (and well-loved) for skillfully combining political intrigue, elaborate academic footnotes and [[GenreThrowback sweet charcoal illustrations]].

''Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell'' is the highly acclaimed first novel by Susanna Clarke, published in 2004. The story shews, in historical fashion, the involvements of magicians and [[TheFairFolk fairies]] in [[AlternateHistory alternate]] [[GaslampFantasy Britain]] of the [[RegencyEngland Regency era]]. Being [[DoorStopper nearly 1000 pages long]], the book is well-known (and well-loved) for skillfully combining political intrigue, elaborate academic footnotes and [[GenreThrowback sweet charcoal illustrations]].