The Grey King is a contemporary fantasy novel by Susan Cooper, published almost simultaneously by Chatto & Windus and Atheneum in 1975. It is the fourth of five books in her Arthurian fantasy series The Dark is Rising. The Grey King won the inaugural Tir na n-Og Award from the Welsh Books Council as the year's best English-language children's book with an "authentic Welsh background". It is set in Wales and incorporates Welsh folklore as well as Arthurian material, especially that of the Brenin Llwyd. It also won the annual Newbery Medal recognizing the year's "most distinguished contribution to American children's literature".

Characters

Geography

The geography described in the book is based very closely on the real geography in and around the Dysynni Valley in Gwynedd in north-west Wales. References include the town of Tywyn, Cader Idris and Bird Rock (Craig yr Aderyn).

Critical reception

At the time of the book's publication, Kirkus Reviews said, "Cooper is clearly building towards a thumping conclusion in the fifth and next volume and even those of us who have doubts about the significance of all this thunderous moral absolutism will want to get in on the action." In a retrospective essay about the Newbery Medal-winning books from 1976 to 1985, literary critic Zena Sutherland wrote, "While The Grey King can be read profitably on its own, it gains stature when read in sequence, and it is masterful in the meshing of the fantastic elements and their realistic matrix... It has the classic form of the quest, and its intricate yet cohesive plot is developed with a high sense of drama—and even a bit of the inevitability of a Greek tragedy. It is no small thing to make a character believable both as a mortal child and as an immortal and a powerful magician." Karen Patricia Smith has written, "Will is assisted in his quest for a golden harp by several people, including Bran, son of King Arthur, brought forward in time. Cooper continues her exploration of the many guises of evil and reiterates the theme that the Dark is a wily foe, capable of taking many forms." Mary Corran said that "in The Grey King, it is human emotions which are the danger—jealousy, anger and hate, which open mortal minds to the invasion of the Dark. The fourth book is strongly Arthurian in content ... Cooper deals with the innate antagonism between mortals and immortals impressively, and in The Grey King reaches great heights as she mingles the worlds and peoples of legend and the present day."