A nest of priests
Francis King
THE ABBE TIGRANE by Ferdinand Fabre, translated by Robert Liddell
Peter Owen, £10.95
Although enthusiastically admired first by Walter Pater and then by Edmund Gosse, each of whom wrote an essay on his work, the French regional novelist Ferdi- nand Fabre (1827-98), described by Sainte- Beuve as 'the strongest of the disciples of Balzac', is now very little known and very seldom read in this country. Even in his native France, this 'Hardy of the Cev- ennes' enjoys none of Hardy's continuing popularity. The first English translation, by Robert Liddell, of what is generally regarded as the best of his novels, L'Abbe Tigrane, Candidat a la Papaute, comes therefore as a welcome reminder of a powerful, if narrow, talent.
Fabre's own early life clearly dictated his subsequent themes. After the bankruptcy of his father, a previously successful architect, the young Ferdinand was, in effect, adopted by an uncle who was priest of a neighbouring parish. Long after his death, the Abbe Fulcran Fabre continued to exert a profound influence on his nephew, who himself also studied for the priesthood at the Great Seminary at Mont- pellier. After what he believed to have been a divine vision had commanded him not to take holy orders, Fabre became in turn an articled clerk in a lawyer's office, a journalist, a poet, a novelist, and curator of the Mazarin Library.
Gosse rightly saw in Fabre an example of the kind of writer who, having produced a series of 'pleasant, characteristic and not- able books', none of which is a master- piece, then by some fluke or miracle transcends his own limitations to become `almost first-class'. It was with Tigrane, first published in 1873, that he achieved this.
How can one most succinctly convey the nature of this novel to someone unfamiliar with it? In his excellent introduction, Lid- dell invokes the names of both Trollope and George Eliot, but then goes on to point out two essential differences: Fabre's priests are not country gentlemen, and no important character is a layman. Although this may sound perverse, the nearest En- glish parallel to Tigrane strikes me as being C.P. Snow's The Masters. In Snow's novel one is presented with a similar closed society, and overheated ambition similarly provides the internal combustion to propel the narrative forward with an irresistible force.
The real name of the 'Abbe Tigrane' is the Abbe Rufin Capdepont. Born of poor parents on the Spanish frontier, he arrives, a pale, angular hobbledehoy, at the Great Seminary of a town which one suspects to be Montpellier, even if it is here called Lormieres, in the year 1835. His fellow students seize on the nickname `Tigrane' for him when, in answer to a question from one of the professors, he gives the answer `Tigranes, King of Armenia.' There is nothing either kinglike or Armenian about Capdepont, but he is certainly a tiger in the ferocity with which he sets about acquiring first intellectual distinction and then eccle- siastical power.
The book begins with the venomous feud conducted by Tigrane and his allies at the Great Seminary, of which he is now Superior, against the man, the Marquis of Roquebrun, whom he believes to have usurped the bishopric rightly his own. As both priest and man, Roquebrun is Tig- rane's antithesis, being aristocratic, cour- teous and charitable. He also has the advantage of having powerful friends in government, to counterbalance his ultra- montane sympathies (Tigrane's are Galli- can). Having been repeatedly defied by Tigrane, the ailing Roquebrun does every- thing in his power to ensure that he is eventually succeeded not by this enemy but by his unworldly private secretary. In the end, however, it is evil which triumphs. Tigrane becomes bishop and, in the last chapter, is already plotting to succeed Pius IX.
One summation of these events can be found in the exclamation of one of Tig- rane's allies in a rare moment of disgust with both himself and with Tigrane: '0 Holy Catholic Church! There must be something divine in you, as your priests have not succeeded in destroying you!' Another summation can be found in the passage, near the close, in which a cold- hearted, wily cardinal, confidant of the Pope, differentiates between the Church and the government of the Church. The Church remains what it has always been: `divine, infallible, above human chances and changes'. But the government of the Church has demanded 'chiefs more firm than pious, more energetic than prudent, and to all appearances more animated by the spirit of the world than by that of Heaven.' (There is a piquant topicality here.) Many of Fabre's priests are immoral. In England, where immorality is so often identified with sexual impropriety, this may be taken to imply that they keep mistresses, frequent brothels or have affairs with each other. But not only does this novel contain virtually no layman, it also contains no women. Certainly at moments of stress, the priests have a tendency to fall into each other's arms and embrace each other. But the only fluids then mingled are the tears which they shed so frequently and so copiously.
Tigrane himself — exemplar of Seneca's dictum 'There is in man a god and a beast tied together' — is a splendid creation. Creations hardly less splendid are Roque- brun, saintly in the philanthropy which has devoured all his fortune, and the various trimmers, hypocrites and cowards of whom Fabre comments drily: 'Those who have lived among priests know that they are timid in general, and have little resistance in catastrophes that threaten their material position.'
There is a lack of realism in the lengthy speeches, not unlike the tirades of French classical drama, in which the characters attack each other or justify themselves. But, admirably translated by Robert Lid- dell, these passages are often thrilling. It is in the briefer exchanges — with characters saying things like 'Let us agree, my friend, and not take fire like gun-powder' — that a stiltedness becomes oppressive.
Fabre writes: 'It is easy to protest at the abasement of a priest when one does not know to what absolute power he is en- slaved. The limitless power of the bishops has produced the servility of the whole body of clergy.' On that text he here wrote a riveting sermon.
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