John the Pupil
Page 20
page 182
They find my explanations of things too long
There seems to be something John is not saying here, or many things (and it makes us reconsider what we noted earlier about his candour): what is his business in Bullicame? He implies that he is a guest here, and appears to have the run of the place to wander through; but along with his disapproval there seems to be a resentment. He notes that if Bernard were there with him, he would perform feats of strengths. If Andrew were there he would be singing. John himself implies that he bores his audience with his speeches, so it is not too big a jump to assume that John was there only as a kind of performer, and not a popular one at that. He also seems to have a knowledge of the ‘common women’ (i.e., prostitutes), so it is possible that it is with them he had been billeted. His scornful remarks about the disputes run for entertainment at Bullicame might suggest his failure at competing in them.
John was longer at Bullicame than this fragment would indicate: in 1267, the Feast Day of the Transfiguration of Our Lord fell on 6 of August; his next entry, Saint Laurence’s Day, would have been written for the 10th; but Bullicame is only a day’s walk from his next stop, Lake Bolsena.
At the beginning of his chronicle, John had seemed to be aiming at an inclusivity of consideration. His perceptions were constrained by his inexperience and piety, so, in the early sections for example, he hardly bothers with physical description (which would be in keeping with the typical clerical attitude of contemptus mundi, that is, a contempt for the base fallen matter of physical reality) but he doesn’t seem to be holding anything back. By now though, he has matured as a writer, even if his artifice, or self-editing, can be guilelessly clumsy.
page 184
Building works …
From my one encounter with the original manuscript (and, in our gratitude to the benefactor, we must pardon his jealous ownership), I have seen that the visit to the Pope is on one unfragmented quire of parchment, which suggests that it was written later.
We can easily imagine that, after the events, John might have been looking through his rough chronicle and making changes, keeping to the manner of an account by a witness when, in fact, he was recollecting the entire expedition from a farther vantage point. I have to confess now that I have wondered if the first-person narrator is a kind of fiction, that the whole thing was composed by the lonely magus Roger Bacon in his prison seclude, deprived of his books and his instruments but driven, as ever, to lecture and elucidate, but this time casting his theories in a more immediate mode than his customary discourses of philosophy and theology could afford; and, further, if this theory is allowed any credence, that it was also a kind of ruthless mea culpa, an accusation to the self that he had cast his cherished pupil on to turbulent tides for, really, the purpose of his own fame and preferment. In all Bacon’s recovered writings, it is only in reference to John – ‘a virgin, not knowing mortal sin … full of sweetness, goodness and discretion … and an excellent keeper of secrets’ – that he allows himself to express, or maybe even to feel, any fondness or tenderness for another human being.
About the Author
David Flusfeder is the author of six novels, including Like Plastic, which won the Encore Award, and The Gift.
Also by David Flusfeder
A Film by Spencer Ludwig
The Pagan House
The Gift
Morocco
Like Plastic
Man Kills Woman
Copyright
Fourth Estate
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
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First published in Great Britain by Fourth Estate in 2014
Copyright © David Flusfeder 2014
Cover and inside illustration by Jonathan Pelham
David Flusfeder asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
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Ebook Edition © July 2014 ISBN: 9780007561193
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