William Golding's 'The Spire' 1964

 

Faber and Faber first edition - 1964

Reading Golding's novel brought home to me why I was right to choose History rather than English to study for my university degree. Whilst I feel I am a competent enough researcher, analyst and non-fiction writer, I think the creativity and literary imagination needed to appreciate such works as Golding's is simply not there, or hardly there. By and large, I like straightforward narrative, not unduly encumbered with nuance, irony or philosophy. To be blunt, I struggled with The Spire - I found Dean Jocelin, the central (almost only character of any weight) simply boring. Towards the end of the book, Brother Anselm complains to Jocelin that You've lain on us like a blight. Empathy oozed from me.

I am not keen on stream-of-consciousness writing (I hated Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse at 'A' Level), and the novel reeks of this. The story is a simple one: Dean Jocelin, directs the construction of a 404-foot-high spire (slightly based on Salisbury), funded by his aunt Lady Alison, a wealthy mistress of the late king (it is not clear which century it is set in - there is mention of a steel girdle to go around the lower reaches of the spire). The cathedral has insufficient foundations to support such a spire and Jocelin is regularly warned not to proceed by not only other clergy but by the master builder, Roger Mason. The latter is forced to continue with the project because Jocelin has made it impossible for him to work elsewhere (Malmesbury Abbey is mentioned). Jocelin's obsession deepens with the progression of the novel. But so does a pain in his spine (he regards this as an angel alternately comforting or punishing him). His obsession means that he neglects his duties as Dean, fails to pray and ignores those who most need him. Meanwhile, the four main tower pillars begin  to 'sing'. Shades of John Meade Falkner's Minster in his The Nebuly Coat, where 'the arch never sleeps'.

Jocelin also lusts after Goody Pangall, the wife of the crippled and impotent cathedral servant, Pangall. He is distrought when he realises Goody is having an affair with Roger Mason. Pangall disappears (a pagan sacrifice buried in the base earth of the tower?) Goody dies in childbirth (Roger's); Roger descends into alcoholism. Jocelin dies of consumption, only after being told by his aunt that he was appointed, not through his merits, but by her sexual influence. One paragraph in the novel stood out for me as a sign of fine writing. It comes from the sick Jocelin being visited by his aunt:

He opened his eyes in the perfume while she was still busy about him. He examined her face from only a few inches away; and now he saw how carefully preserved and tended it was. The smooth skin was netted down by lines too fine to be seen from further off. It was a compromise between too much fat and too little, as could be seen by the deeper lines defended from becoming wrinkles at the corner of each eye and in the bland forehead. It was a face that must defend itself by dancing from expression to expression, let it should be still, and sag. Only the eyes, the little mouth, the nose, held out - bastions so strong they need not be defended.... 

I suppose I find another person's obsession of little interest. Jocelin's destroyed others' lives. He expired. Did the spire fall? Probably, but we will never know. AND I never want to see the word crossways again - I lost count in the novel!

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As an after thought, I looked at a few Reviews on Amazon UK.

One, headed simply A Dud, had this to say:

The irony of the book is the result of its enquiry into obsession. Those of others are at best inexplicable but more usually just plain boring. The Spire, I'm afraid to say as a Golding fan, is a bore.