The Neverending Story
The Neverending Story (German: Die unendliche Geschichte) is a fantasy novel by German writer Michael Ende, published in 1979. The first English translation, by Ralph Manheim, was published in 1983. The novel was later adapted into several films.
The book centres on a boy, Bastian Balthazar Bux, an overweight and strange child who is neglected by his father after the death of Bastian’s mother. While escaping from some bullies, Bastian bursts into the antiquarian book store of Carl Conrad Coreander, where he finds his interest held by a book called The Neverending Story. Unable to resist, he steals the book and hides in his school’s attic, where he begins to read.
The story Bastian reads is set in the magical land of Fantastica, a place of wonder ruled by the benevolent and mysterious Childlike Empress. A great delegation has come to the Empress to seek her help against a formless entity called “The Nothing”. The delegates are shocked when the Empress’s physician, a centaur named Cairon, informs them that the Empress is ill, and has chosen a boy warrior named Atreyu to find a cure. Upon finding Atreyu, Cairon gives him AURYN: a powerful medallion that protects him from all harm. At the advice of the giant turtle Morla the Aged One, Atreyu sets off in search of an invisible oracle known as Uyulala, who may know the Empress’s cure. In reaching her, he is aided by a luckdragon named Falkor, whom he rescues from the creature Ygramul the Many. By Uyulala, he is told the only thing that can save the Empress is a new name given to her by a human, who can only be found beyond Fantastica’s borders.
As Falkor and Atreyu search for the borders of Fantastica, Atreyu is flung from Falkor’s back in a confrontation with the four Wind Giants and loses Auryn in the sea. Atreyu lands in the ruins of Spook City, the home of various creatures of darkness. Wandering the dangerous city, Atreyu finds the wolf Gmork, chained and near death, who tells him that all the residents of the city have leapt voluntarily into The Nothing.
There, thanks to the irresistible pull of the destructive phenomenon, the Fantasticans are becoming lies in the human world. The wolf also reveals that he is a servant of the force behind The Nothing and was sent to prevent the Empress’s chosen hero from saving her. Gmork then reveals that when the princess of the city discovered his treachery against the Empress, she imprisoned him and left him to starve to death. When Atreyu announces that he is the hero Gmork has sought, the wolf laughs and succumbs to death. However, upon being approached, Gmork’s body instinctively seizes Atreyu’s leg in his jaws, preventing him from being dragged by the Nothing. Meanwhile, Falkor retrieves Auryn from the sea and arrives in time to save Atreyu from the rapid approach of The Nothing.
