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* SinisterSchnoz: Pyat has a prominent nose. He laments that this makes people think he's a Jew, [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial even though he definitely isn't one.]]
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* SinisterSchnoz: Pyat has a prominent nose. He laments that [[SizableSemiticNose this makes people think he's a Jew, Jew,]] [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial even though he definitely isn't one.]]]]
* SizableSemiticNose: Again, Pyat's big nose is absolutely not in any way this trope.
* SizableSemiticNose: Again, Pyat's big nose is absolutely not in any way this trope.
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* AmbiguousDisorder: Pyat is prone to wild delusions, has an exaggerated sense of self-importance, and keeps having some kind of weird attacks where he comes close to passing out for no apparent reason. How much of that is inborn and how much is caused by some kind of post-traumatic stress disorder from living through a civil war at a young age is unclear.
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* AGodAmI: Al-Habashiya makes his slaves refer to him as "God" and wields absolute and sadistic power over them.
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* AGodAmI: Al-Habashiya makes his slaves refer to him as "God" and wields absolute and sadistic power over them.
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* AuthorFilibuster: Pyat frequently breaks off from the story to spend multiple pages ranting incoherently about various topics (personal, political, historical, scientific, artistic... or any confused mix of all the above), only to then pick up the scene right where he left off.
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* FairWeatherFriend: No matter how much Pyat claims to love and cherish someone, it is ''never'' wise for them to assume he won't immediately sell them out the moment remaining loyal becomes inconvenient.
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* ProtagonistCenteredMorality: Hooo boy yes. Pyat sees ''everything'' in terms of how it affects him, constantly wailing eloquently about how ill-used and unlucky he's been while dismissing the even worse fates of people he claims to have cared bout with mild regret at most. And usually plenty of UsefulNotes/VictimBlaming heaped on top of it, along with a great deal of SelfServingMemory in regards to the part he himself played in their downfall.
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* ProtagonistCenteredMorality: Hooo boy yes. Pyat sees ''everything'' in terms of how it affects him, constantly wailing eloquently about how ill-used and unlucky he's been while dismissing the even worse fates of other people he claims to have cared bout with mild regret at most. And usually plenty of UsefulNotes/VictimBlaming heaped on top of it, along with a great deal of SelfServingMemory in regards to the part he himself played in their downfall.
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* AffectionateParody: Of turn-of-the-century pulpy adventure stories, deconstructing the bigotry and CulturalPosturing sauturating them, and showing how conceited and out of touch with reality someone would have to be to believe he really was a ScienceHero MasterOfAll. At the same time, it's also a rollicking tale of adventure and danger in exotic locations, even if the [[NominalHero "hero"]] gets out of sticky situations less by manly prowess and brilliant thinking and more by [[DeusExMachina sheer dumb luck.]]
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* AGodAmI: Al-Habashiya makes his slaves refer to him as "God" and wields absolute and sadistic power over them.
* CreepyCrossdresser: Al-Habashiya, the Egyptian mob boss to whom Pyat is enslaved for a time. His habit of wearing dresses and pretending to be a woman is really the least creepy thing about him.
* ProtagonistCenteredMorality: Hooo boy yes. Pyat sees ''everything'' in terms of how it affects him, constantly wailing eloquently about how ill-used and unlucky he's been while dismissing the even worse fates of people he claims to have cared bout with mild regret at most. And usually plenty of UsefulNotes/VictimBlaming heaped on top of it, along with a great deal of SelfServingMemory in regards to the part he himself played in their downfall.
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* ThoseWackyNazis: Pyat was involved with the German Nazy Party in the thirties and still thinks that they have the right ideas, and it's just a shame that that unfortunate "Holocaust" thing got blown out of all proportion.
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* ThoseWackyNazis: Pyat was involved with the German Nazy Party in the thirties and still thinks that they have had the right ideas, and it's just a shame that that unfortunate "Holocaust" thing got blown out of all proportion.
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* DirectLineToTheAuthor: The premise is that Pyat enlisted Michael Moorcock to edit his memoirs for him.
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* LiteraryAgentHypothesis: InUniverse. The premise is that Pyat enlisted Michael Moorcock to edit his memoirs for him.
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* ConsummateLiar: Pyat is ''extremely'' good at saying what people want to hear and presenting himself as someone they should want to help and support. It helps that he's just as good at lying to himself, so half the time he fully believes that he's telling the truth, or at least [[FromACertainPointOfView the important parts of it.]]
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* BoomerangBigot: Pyat hates Jews and blames them for everything that's wrong with the world. He's also ''strongly'' implied to be Jewish himself. [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial The way he constantly feels the need to assure the reader of his non-Jewishness does not to lessen those implications.]]
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* BoomerangBigot: Pyat hates Jews and blames them for everything that's wrong with the world. He's also ''strongly'' implied to be Jewish himself. [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial The way he constantly feels the need to assure the reader of his non-Jewishness does not nothing to lessen those implications.]]
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* ForegoneConclusion: No matter what vainglorious scheme Pyat is up to at the moment, we know it's eventually going to come crashing down around his ears and that he'll eventually live out his old age in poverty and obscurity.
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* HurricaneOfExcuses: Pyat tends to launch into one whenever he feels like events might make him seem somewhat less than sympathetic. [[NeverMyFault It wasn't his fault!]] [[DeliberateValuesDissonance It was the custom of the time!]] [[CultureJustifiesAnything You're just not worldly enough to understand different practices!]] [[TheParanoiac People are always slandering him!]] [[AtLeastIAdmitIt He never said he was perfect!]] When even that isn't enough, he tends to proceed into completele incoherent rants before picking up the story again like nothing happened.
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* ThoseWackyNazis: Pyat was involved with the German Nazy Party in the thirties and still thinks that they have the right ideas, and it's just a shame that that unfortunate "Holocaust" thing got blown out of all proportion.
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* BestialityIsDepraved: When Pyat describes traveling alone through the desert in ''Jerusalem Commands,'' he starts talking about his female camel, [[GenderBlenderName Uncle Tom]], in oddly glowing and romantic terms. Nothing is ever made explicit, but given [[ExtremeLibido who we're dealing with here...]]
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* SinisterSchnoz: Pyat has a prominent nose. He laments that this makes people think he's a Jew, [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial even though he definitely isn't one.]]
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* OrderVersusChaos: As in many of Moorcock's books this is a strong theme, but with a twist - Pyat ''[[UnreliableNarrator thinks]]'' he's a champion of Order, but it's obvious to the reader that he's a creature of Chaos through and through.
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* OrderVersusChaos: As in many of Moorcock's books this is a strong theme, but with a twist - Pyat ''[[UnreliableNarrator thinks]]'' he's a [[TheFettered champion of Order, Order]], but it's obvious to the reader that he's a [[TheUnfettered creature of Chaos Chaos]] through and through.
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* OrderVersusChaos: As in many of Moorcock's books this is a strong theme, but with a twist - Pyat ''[[UnreliableNarrator thinks]]'' he's a champion of Order, but it's obvious to the reader that he's a creature of Chaos through and through.
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* ViewersAreGeniuses: A lot of the humour relies on the reader knowing all about the historical events and people Pyat encounters, since that's necessary for understanding how he's completely misinterpreting them.
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* ViewersAreGeniuses: A lot of the humour relies on the reader knowing all about the historical events and people Pyat encounters, since that's necessary for understanding how he's completely misinterpreting EntertaininglyWrong about them.
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* WrongGenreSavvy: Pyat seems to think that he's starring in the sort of pulpy Victorian science fiction story he grew up reading, about a [[TheAce hyper-competetent]] [[ScienceHero gentleman scientist]] [[MightyWhitey who embodies the romanticised values of Western civilisation]] and constantly has to battle ill-bred criminals and foreign savages. He's in fact living out a fairly cynical and gritty historical novel set in a CrapsackWorld where everyone, regardless of ethnicity or class, is either a huckster, a fanatic or a moron.
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* BilingualBonus: The text is peppered with expressions in different languages which are not translated. Pyat also tends to start switching from language to language when he goes into an especially incoherent rant.
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* SelectiveObliviousness: Pyat is ''really'' good at ignoring things that contradict his preferred narrative, though sometimes you can see the cracks. For example, at one point he actively admits that "Esmé" is just a teenage prostitute that he picked up and projected all his yearnings for his innocent youth onto, but that it's absolutely necessary to his mental well-being that he doesn't let himself get reminded of that fact.
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* CondescendingCompassion: Pyat's attitude to women and any ethnicity other than his own. He can be very fond of them, but only as long as they seem to know their place.
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* OddFriendship: Pyat and Mrs. Cornelius. She's a hard-nosed, down-to-earth cynic and he's a neurotic dreamer with delusions of grandeur. However, he has only good things to say about her, and she seems to regard him with some fondness even while recognising all his faults.
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* StealthInsult: People frequently says things to Pyat that he chooses to interpret as glowing praise but that sound to a perceptive reader more like thinly veiled insults.
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* BeenThereShapedHistory: Generally averted; for all his delusions of grandeur, Pyat rarely makes an impact on the world. However, there are exceptions. For one thing, while he [[NoodleIncident won't give any details]] he's strongly implied to have been responsible for the mysterious death of [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_H._Ince Thomas Ince]].
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* ViewersAreGeniuses: A lot of the humour relies on the reader knowing all about the historical events and people Pyat encounters, since that's necessary for understanding how he's completely misinterpreting them.
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* IfItsYouItsOkay: Pyat will sleep with just about any woman, but with a man only if he thinks that man is truly exceptional.
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* BiTheWay: Bordering on IfItsYouItsOkay. Pyat has sex with both men and women throughout the story, but women are his more frequent lovers. He states at one point that he'll go for any moderately attractive woman, but a man must be almost completely perfect for him to be interested.
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* ScienceMarchesOn: InUnvierse. Pyat refuses to believe that anything he learned in his youth is false. In particular, cocaine is a marvelous cure for all that ails you, and the only reason people are now taught otherwise is because the powers that be prefer it that people remain stupid and sickly.
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* ScienceMarchesOn: InUnvierse.InUniverse. Pyat refuses to believe that anything he learned in his youth is false. In particular, cocaine is a marvelous cure for all that ails you, and the only reason people are now taught otherwise is because the powers that be prefer it that people remain stupid and sickly.
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* LiteraryAgentHypothesis: The premise is that Pyat enlisted Michael Moorcock to edit his memoirs for him.
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* LiteraryAgentHypothesis: InUniverse. The premise is that Pyat enlisted Michael Moorcock to edit his memoirs for him.
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* TheParanoiac: Pyat blames everything that goes wrong in the world and in his own life as the work of the sinister Jewish-Muslim-Communist conspiracy against the West.
* ScienceMarchesOn: InUnvierse. Pyat refuses to believe that anything he learned in his youth is false. In particular, cocaine is a marvelous cure for all that ails you, and the only reason people are now taught otherwise is because the powers that be prefer it that people remain stupid and sickly.
* ScienceMarchesOn: InUnvierse. Pyat refuses to believe that anything he learned in his youth is false. In particular, cocaine is a marvelous cure for all that ails you, and the only reason people are now taught otherwise is because the powers that be prefer it that people remain stupid and sickly.
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* BiTheWay: Bordering on IfItsYouItsOkay. Pyat has sex with both men and women throughout the story, but women are his more frequent lovers. He states at one point that he'll go for any moderately attractive woman, but a man must be almost completely perfect for him to be interested.
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* HypocriticalHumor: Pyat rants at length about the moral decay of society as evidenced by rampant sex and drug use, while snorting coke like it's going out of fashion and trying to screw everything in a skirt. But of course, when ''he'' does it it's a gentlemanly indulgence in refined pleasures!
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* BoomerangBigot: Pyat hates Jews and blames them for everything that's wrong with the world. He's also ''strongly'' implied to be Jewish himself. [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial The way he constantly feels the need to assure the reader of his non-Jewishness does not to lesson those implications.]]
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* BoomerangBigot: Pyat hates Jews and blames them for everything that's wrong with the world. He's also ''strongly'' implied to be Jewish himself. [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial The way he constantly feels the need to assure the reader of his non-Jewishness does not to lesson lessen those implications.]]
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* HeroOfAnotherStory: Mrs. Cornelius, who weaves in and out of the story in the course of her own eventful life. Pyat initially meant for the story to be mostly about his experiences with her.
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* HeroOfAnotherStory: Mrs. Cornelius, who weaves in and out of the story in the course of her own eventful life. Pyat initially meant for the story to be mostly about his experiences ''her'' life, with her.himself only as the observer.
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Meet Maxim Arturovitch Pyatnitski, also known as Pyat. Tsarist rebel, Nazi thug, continental conman and reactionary counterspy: the dark and dangerous antihero of [[Creator/MichaelMoorcock Michael Moorcock's]] most controversial work. Published in 1981 to great critical acclaim—then condemned to the shadows and unavailable in the United States for 30 years — ''Byzantium Endures'', the first of the Pyat quartet, is not a book for the faint-hearted. It is the story of a cocaine addict, sexual adventurer, and obsessive anti-Semite whose epic journey from Leningrad to London connects him with scoundrels and heroes from Trotsky to Makhno and whose career echoes that of the 20th century's descent into fascism and total war. This is Moorcock at his audacious, iconoclastic best: a grand sweeping overview of the events of the last century, as revealed in the secret journals of modern literature's most proudly unredeemable outlaw. This authoritative edition presents the author's final cut, restoring previously forbidden passages and deleted scenes.
The series consists of four parts:
* ''Byzantium Endures''
* ''The Laughter of Carthage''
* ''Jerusalem Commands''
* ''The Vengeance of Rome''
!! This series contains examples of:
----
* AmbiguousDisorder: Pyat is prone to wild delusions, has an exaggerated sense of self-importance, and keeps having some kind of weird attacks where he comes close to passing out for no apparent reason. How much of that is inborn and how much is caused by some kind of post-traumatic stress disorder from living through a civil war at a young age is unclear.
* BoomerangBigot: Pyat hates Jews and blames them for everything that's wrong with the world. He's also ''strongly'' implied to be Jewish himself. [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial The way he constantly feels the need to assure the reader of his non-Jewishness does not to lesson those implications.]]
* BunglingInventor: Pyat has a lot of weird inventions. They rarely work as intended.
* HeroOfAnotherStory: Mrs. Cornelius, who weaves in and out of the story in the course of her own eventful life. Pyat initially meant for the story to be mostly about his experiences with her.
* HorribleJudgeOfCharacter: Pyat consistently sees the people trying to stab him in the back as the finest people imaginable, and the people with his best interests at heart as treacherous backstabbers.
* TheKlan: Pyat gets involved with the Klu Klux Klan in the second book, and gushes over how they were true champions of civilisation... until they turned on him, at least.
* LiteraryAgentHypothesis: The premise is that Pyat enlisted Michael Moorcock to edit his memoirs for him.
* MasterOfNone: Pyat considers himself an omnidisciplinary genius, but it seems more like he knows just enough of a lot of different fields to ''fake'' actual competence in them.
* OmniGlot: Pyat speaks a lot of different languages, though he's described as "speaking every language a bit inexpertedly, including his own." The manuscript is said to have originally been written in a wild variety of different languages, randomly switching from one to another for no apparent reason.
* SmallNameBigEgo: Pyat is painfully aware of how small his name is, but he blames that on how he's been betrayed and exploited by evil people and robbed of his just fame and fortune. Interestingly, he seems to project his delusions of grandeur on people he likes, too - Moorcock mentions that Pyat seems to think that Mrs. Cornelius is world-famous, when in fact she's a charismatic local figure but nothing more.
* SuspiciouslySpecificDenial: When Pyat spends entire pages furiously asserting his innocence about something, it's probably safe to assume that he's actually guilty.
* UnreliableNarrator: It's pretty clear that a lot of things did ''not'' happen the way that Pyat describes them. For one thing, he keeps contradicting himself. It's often unclear whether he's consciously lying or is suffering from SelfServingMemory, though.
* VillainProtagonist: Pyat is a thoroughly foul human being, but he's still the main character.
----
The series consists of four parts:
* ''Byzantium Endures''
* ''The Laughter of Carthage''
* ''Jerusalem Commands''
* ''The Vengeance of Rome''
!! This series contains examples of:
----
* AmbiguousDisorder: Pyat is prone to wild delusions, has an exaggerated sense of self-importance, and keeps having some kind of weird attacks where he comes close to passing out for no apparent reason. How much of that is inborn and how much is caused by some kind of post-traumatic stress disorder from living through a civil war at a young age is unclear.
* BoomerangBigot: Pyat hates Jews and blames them for everything that's wrong with the world. He's also ''strongly'' implied to be Jewish himself. [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial The way he constantly feels the need to assure the reader of his non-Jewishness does not to lesson those implications.]]
* BunglingInventor: Pyat has a lot of weird inventions. They rarely work as intended.
* HeroOfAnotherStory: Mrs. Cornelius, who weaves in and out of the story in the course of her own eventful life. Pyat initially meant for the story to be mostly about his experiences with her.
* HorribleJudgeOfCharacter: Pyat consistently sees the people trying to stab him in the back as the finest people imaginable, and the people with his best interests at heart as treacherous backstabbers.
* TheKlan: Pyat gets involved with the Klu Klux Klan in the second book, and gushes over how they were true champions of civilisation... until they turned on him, at least.
* LiteraryAgentHypothesis: The premise is that Pyat enlisted Michael Moorcock to edit his memoirs for him.
* MasterOfNone: Pyat considers himself an omnidisciplinary genius, but it seems more like he knows just enough of a lot of different fields to ''fake'' actual competence in them.
* OmniGlot: Pyat speaks a lot of different languages, though he's described as "speaking every language a bit inexpertedly, including his own." The manuscript is said to have originally been written in a wild variety of different languages, randomly switching from one to another for no apparent reason.
* SmallNameBigEgo: Pyat is painfully aware of how small his name is, but he blames that on how he's been betrayed and exploited by evil people and robbed of his just fame and fortune. Interestingly, he seems to project his delusions of grandeur on people he likes, too - Moorcock mentions that Pyat seems to think that Mrs. Cornelius is world-famous, when in fact she's a charismatic local figure but nothing more.
* SuspiciouslySpecificDenial: When Pyat spends entire pages furiously asserting his innocence about something, it's probably safe to assume that he's actually guilty.
* UnreliableNarrator: It's pretty clear that a lot of things did ''not'' happen the way that Pyat describes them. For one thing, he keeps contradicting himself. It's often unclear whether he's consciously lying or is suffering from SelfServingMemory, though.
* VillainProtagonist: Pyat is a thoroughly foul human being, but he's still the main character.
----
