An Ode to the Epigraphs in The Practical Guide to Evil
From the banal humour of evil to earnest striving for good
The Practical Guide to Evil, a web novel I've been reading since the summer of 2019, is about to end.
One of the features of the series is that every chapter starts with a quote from an in-universe character. As the series has drawn on, we'ge gotten a lot of these epigraphs, and they start to add a lot to the world-building.
One of the more humorous examples of this is Dread Emperor Traitorous. Traitorous is a recurring character in the epigraphs - and never appears in the main text - but the epigraphs about him illustrate the banality of Evil that has been common in the world that the series takes place in (and which the main character is rejecting);
The quotes mentioning him start out simple;
"Ha! And I bet you didn't even see it coming!""
- Dread Emperor Traitorous the First
(From Book 1, chapter 11)
But quickly devolve into comedy;
"I've been told one can only be betrayed by a friend, which is why I constantly surround myself with enemies"
- Dread Emperor Traitorous
(From Book 2, Interlude:Nemesis)"Gentlemen, there is no need to worry: our plan is flawless. The Emperor wlil never see it coming"
- Grandmaster Ouroboros of the Order of Unholy Obsidian, later revealed to have been Dread Emperor Traitorous all along
(From Book 3, chapter 9)
and one more example, cause I think you're getting the gist of it by now
"At which point Lord Bujune and Lady Rania both accused the other of being the Emperor in disguise, and the meeting devolved into protracted argument until the final quarter hour had passed.”
- Extract from the minutes of the fourth meeting of the Red Fox Conspiracy, as taken by the stenographer Shamna Mehere (later revealed to have been Dread Emperor Traitorous all along
(From Book 5, Interlude:Reverberation)
But there are very good epigraphs that don’t involve Traitorous, like references to man-eating tapirs;
“When using tigers you don’t have enough time to gloat, when using rats you risk awkwardly running out of gloat before the end: true equilibrium is found in a pit of humble man-eating tapirs, beasts that have never once failed me.”
- Dread Empress Atrocious, later devoured by man-eating tapirs
(From Book 6, Chapter 27)
a sentient tiger army;
“In conclusion, the court recognizes the desertion of the sentient tiger army raised by Dread Emperor Sorcerous as sufficient precedent to rule that tapirs can, in fact, commit treason but that lack of sentience bars them from laying claim to the Tower by right of usurpation.”
- Official transcript from the Trial of Unexpected Teeth, which resulted in the execution of the man-eating tapirs that devoured Dread Empress Atrocious
(From Book 4, Chapter 2)
and another recurring character, Dread Emperor Irritant, the Oddly Successful;
“Ah, but being defeated was always part of my plan! Yet another glorious victory for the Empire.”
- Dread Emperor Irritant, the Oddly Successful
(From Book 3, Chapter 7)
but none of those were the impetus behind me writing this post today. I'm getting to that now. One of the other collections of epigraphs are the "Two Hundred Heroic Axioms";
"Thirty-three: It doesn’t matter how good the sword is, if it talks put it back where you found it. Yes, even if it lets you beat your nemesis. They probably thought their talking sword was a good idea too and look where that got them."
- "Two Hundred Heroic Axioms", author unknown
(From Book 7, Chapter 51)
The Two Hundred Heroic Axioms are, as the name suggests, a collection of axioms for heroes. They're usually humorous, and mimicking what we would see as common tropes in heroic stories (stuff that might happen in a DnD game or 90s fantasy).
"Forty-one: should personalities among your band be clashing overmuch, consider leading the band into grave peril. Either friendship or a corpse will ensue, which remedies the issue either way"
- "Two Hundred Heroic Axioms", author unknown
(From Extra Chapter, Winter I)
Up until now, that's pretty much all they've been. Pithy, humorous, but more earnest than the Evil epigraphs. That changed with the entries that were revealed in the most recent interludes. First, we got the last, and yesterday, we got the first;
"One hundred ninety-nine: this list began with the simplest of axioms, the first. In the years since others like you have added to or taken away from it, a chain that goes back further than any of us know, changing and twisting as it grows. In time no two list will be the same, save always in this one regard: there is no two hundredth axiom. That place remains empty, so that once you learn something worth passing down you may fill it yourself. Look forward, as we once did, and let those who come after you learn from our mistakes. What greater gift can there be?"
- "Two Hundred Heroic Axioms", Author unknown
(From Book 7, Interlude:Legends IV),
"One: first, do good"
- "Two Hundred Heroic Axioms", Author unknown
(From Book 7, Interlude:Legends V)
These two, the first and final axioms, capture something different than the 197 between them. The 199th one is trying to tell these in-universe heroes that they are contributing to the global project of "good". And the first one is emphasising that this project is not to do "Good", but to do "good". Not to fight for your cause, but to ensure that goodness exists.
This difference between ‘Good’ and ‘good’ is explored in the series, where the main character is a proponent of the titular "Practical Evil" but still does "good" - in lifting people out of poverty/slavery/discrimination - and condemns many of those who do "Good" - e.g. hanging on to outdated morals that hurt more than they help.
It’s hard to relate in only these 1000 words how much reading these two epigraphs affected me. The Practical Guide is a tear-jerker1 at many points - I can’t help but feel for these characters, who just want, so much, to do good, but seldom am I tearing up at the first line of a chapter.
Characters (and epigraphs) that try to speak on moral issues can often become moralising instead - as if the author is just using it as a mouthpiece to espouse a moral point of view that the story was crafted specifically to present. It is a point in favour of any author when their characters can give a moral speech, and not come across in this way. Brandon Sanderson does this well in his Stormlight Archives series, and so does the Practical Guide.
The characters in the Practical Guide, which are now reaching an end to their stories, and who, in the climax of the book, are struggling to overcome personal, interpersonal, and external "Big Bad Evil Guy" problems, still do good. There's something in that.
Perhaps surprising to some, given its name. But I love the Practical Guide so much because it is an exemplar of the very genre it is satirising. That genre is defined partly by the bonds made by bands of Heroes (and squads of Villains, and those inbetween), and “the friends we made along the way”. The Practical Guide expertly weaves touching character moments in-between massive set piece battles and the exposition of magic and other powers, to great effect.