The Last Unicorn

The Last Unicorn

Hardcover - USA - 1st edition.

Author Peter S. Beagle Published 1968-03-?? Type Fiction Genre Adventure, Fantasy Themes Adventure, Fantasy Age Group Children

The Last Unicorn is a fantasy novel by Peter S. Beagle published in March 1968. While Beagle had no intention of ever writing a sequel, he did write multiple related stories including Two Hearts, The Green-Eyed Boy, Schmendrick Alone, and others.

In the story, a unicorn discovers an absence of other unicorns, so she leaves her forest to go searching for them, only to realize they've all disappeared. She tries to find out where they have all gone to, but having spent so many years safe in her secluded forest, she is unaware of just how hostile the world have become toward her kind.

Personal

Own?	No.
Read?	Audiobook read by Peter S. Beagle.
Finished	2025-01-26.

I remember renting and watching this movie with my high school girlfriend in 1998. We were both surprised to see one of the characters voiced by Jeff Bridges and the score composed by the band America. I remember generally enjoying it, but thinking it had a lot of flaws. In 2025, my friend Kelly wanted to read this together like a book club to hear each other's opinions, so we both read it and chatted about it later. Upon completion, I found it to be rather enjoyable, if a little juvenile.

Review

Overall:

Good

• I like how Beagle incorporates a lot of existing concepts from mythology and fairy tales, particularly about unicorns. He follow traditional tropes of heroes, damsels in distress, and the like, and almost breaks the fourth wall by having his characters be aware of the tropes, but in a way that fits within the story's mythos.
• I like the different concepts for the illusions placed on the animals of the traveling carnival. How the the manticore and dragon are complete illusions, the harpy is real, but the spider is both real and fake because it truly believes its own illusions.
• The song sung by the bluejay mother is a cute way of poking fun at how human nursery rhymes are so messed-up.
• The scene where Molly chastises the unicorn for no showing up to her until she's old and cynical, but ultimately forgives her, is quite moving.
• King Haggard was a very interesting villain. He wasn't cartoonishly evil, just selfish, and that made him far more realistic.
• I like how Prince Lír is incapable of wooing the unicorn because he only thinks of being heroic in fairy tale ways, which the unicorn has no use for.
• I appreciated how, after Hagsgate was destroyed because the citizens made no effort to save the unicorns, they felt it wasn't fair because they couldn't have stood up to King Haggard and the Red Bull, but they were informed how one word of resistance could have made all the difference. This is an important message to teach children about anti-authoritarianism.

Bad

• The flighty singing butterfly starts out funny, but the anachronism about needing to catch an A-train is a bit too silly and hurts immersion. Similarly, "Schmendrick," although a fitting name for an inept magician, doesn't fit with the book's high fantasy setting. The whole section with Captain Cully was dull, and the inclusion of Robin Hood and his Merry Men also hurt immersion. It makes the book feel less like the creation of the author and more like a fairy tale compilation.
• II wish there was some closure on the cat. I assumed it was a shape-shifted Mabruk, but it appears to just be a talking cat.

Ugly

• Nothing.

Media

Covers

• 

  Hardcover - USA - 1st edition. Very dull cover.

• 

  Mass market - USA - 1976 - Ballantine. A fittingly old style.

• 

  Paperback - USA - 1991 - Ace. Attractive line art. At least the emphasis is on the unicorn.

• 

  Paperback - USA - 1991 - Roc. Nice colorful line art, but still lacking.

Representation

Strong female character?	Pass	Molly Grue is frequently the only voice of reason and competence. To some extent the unicorn, though she's turned into a damsel in distress later on.
Bechdel test?	Pass	Mommy Fortuna and Molly both talk to the unicorn for a while each.
Strong person of color character?	Fail	I don't think race is ever mentioned, but, considering the setting, it's safe to assume everyone is white.
Queer character?	Fail	There are no queer characters.

Quotes

• It's a rare man who is taken for what he truly is … There is much misjudgment in the world. … We are not always what we seem, and hardly ever what we dream.
• He was not lying, merely organizing events more sensibly.
• Spiders and sowbugs and beetles and crickets, Slugs from the roses and ticks from the thickets, Grasshoppers, snails, and a quail's egg or two— All to be regurgitated for you. Lullaby, lullaby, swindles and schemes, Flying's not near as much fun as it seems.
• "Where have you been?" she cried. "Damn you, where have you been?" She took a few steps toward Schmendrick, but she was looking beyond him, at the unicorn. When she tried to get by, the magician stood in her way. "You don't talk like that," he told her, still uncertain that Molly had recognized the unicorn. "Don't you know how to behave, woman? You don't curtsy, either."But Molly pushed him aside and went up to the unicorn, scolding her as though she were a strayed milk cow. "Where have you been?" Before the whiteness and the shining horn, Molly shrank to a shining beetle, but this time it was the unicorn's old dark eyes that looked down. "I am here now," she said at last. Molly laughed with her lips flat. "And what good is that to me that you're here now? Where were you twenty years ago, ten years ago? How dare you come to me now, when I am this?" ... The unicorn made no reply, and Schmendrick said, "She is the last. She is the last unicorn in the world." "She would be." Molly sniffed. "It would be the last unicorn in the world that comes to Molly Grue." She reached up then to lay her hand on the unicorn's cheek; but both of them flinched a little, and the touch came to rest on on the swift, shivering place under the jaw. Molly said, "It's all right. I forgive you."
• "Any woman can weep without tears," she answered over her shoulder, "and most can heal with her hands. It depends on the wound. She is a woman, Your Highness, and that's riddle enough."
• I am what I am. I would tell you what you want to know if I could, for you have been kind to me. But I am a cat, and no cat anywhere ever gave anyone a straight answer.

Adaptations

The book has been adapted into an animated movie in 1982, a stage play in 1988, a graphic novel in 2010, and various audiobook recordings.

Links