John the Pupil
A Novel
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3.7 • 14 Ratings
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- $6.99
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- $6.99
Publisher Description
“A superbly written and intellectually stimulating novel.”—The Independent (London)
Since he was a young boy, John has studied at the Franciscan monastery outside Oxford, under the tutelage of friar and magus Roger Bacon, an inventor, scientist, and polymath. In 1267 Bacon arranges for his young pupil to embark on a journey of penitence to Italy. But the pilgrimage is a guise to deliver scientific instruments and Bacon’s great opus to His Holiness, Pope Clement IV. Two companions will accompany John, both Franciscan novices: the handsome, sweet-tempered Brother Andrew; and the brutish Brother Bernard.
John the Pupil is a road movie, recounting the journey taken from Oxford to Viterbo by John and his two companions. Modeling themselves after Saint Francis, the men trek by foot through Europe, preaching the gospel and begging for sustenance. In addition to fighting off ambushes from thieves hungry for the thing of power they are carrying, the holy trio is tried and tempted by all sorts of sins: ambition, pride, lust—and by the sheer hell and heaven of medieval life.
“Astonishing.”—Booklist (starred review)
“Strikingly original . . . a hugely enjoyable read.”—The Times (London)
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this multilayered, intellectually challenging historical novel, Flusfeder (The Gift) considers medieval science, religion, and education through a young scholar's journey from Oxford, England, to Viterbo, Italy. In 1267, real-life freethinker Roger Bacon sends off John, his fictional favorite pupil, accompanied by strong, silent Brother Bernard and sweet-tempered Brother Andrew, on the pretense of a pilgrimage, to deliver a copy of Bacon's Opus Majus and samples of his inventions to the Pope. At Canterbury, they meet Simeon the Palmer, a pilgrim-for-hire who supplements his income by robbing other pilgrims. In France, John finds contentment tending a garden in a monastery. At Cavalcante de' Cavalcanti's Italian palace, John's companions find temptation. By the time John reaches the Pope, he has experienced friendship and conflict, witnessed sin and martyrdom, suffered loss and doubt. The core of the novel is John's first-person chronicle of the adventures, interspersed with fables and legends of saints, capturing the violence, superstition, and spirituality characteristic of the Middle Ages. Academic endnotes amplify selected references: Cavalcanti, for example, appears in Dante's Inferno, waiting for his son, the Florentine poet Guido Cavalcanti. The footnotes' excruciating erudition belie the fact that they are essential reading: they provide place names along the pilgrims' progress, they both support and undermine the faux chronicle's credibility, and they include the author's passionate rant against historical fiction; this is, after all, an antihistorical historical novel.
