Book review: Human nature through an ancient lens

Imagine a seven-year-old boy being taken away from his family and brought to a monastery where a life of austerity awaits with endless praying and punishment, including whipping for misdemeanours? 

It’s a bleak prospect for a mere child but back in the seventh century, when life was often brutal and short, childhood wasn’t indulged. 

The child in question is the fictional Wilfrid, who witnesses the life of St Cuthbert of Lindisfarne.

Wilfrid is a troubled child, seemingly tormented by demons, who feels a dark presence taking on the guise of a wolf.

Cuthbert, the prior of Lindisfarne Monastery, is kind towards the boy, until Wilfrid’s behaviour gets out of hand. 

When Cuthbert avenges Wilfrid, it is the worst possible punishment. Wilfrid is to be Brother Dunstan’s servant and guide, “without thanks”. Dunstan, a nasty piece of work, happens to be Wilfrid’s nemesis.

When Wilfrid first meets Cuthbert, he is “more bone than skin. His robe hung from him like a rag draped over a stick”. 

This strong visual image is typical of the author’s talent for evoking asceticism, in this case displayed by Cuthbert, with a deft brushstroke. 

The writing is strong. So too is the evocation of the bewildered youngster who feels that his parents don’t love him. 

Not to mention that everywhere the boy goes, he seems to bring bad luck with him. 

Wilfrid blames himself for Brother Fergus’s drowning in the North Sea because he was unable to properly man the boat from which Fergus fell to his death.

Clearly, there is a lot going on with Wilfrid. It manifests itself in self-harm, when he often reaches for his knife to slice into his arm. It gives him “relief” to bleed. 

When one of his cohorts notices what Wilfrid is doing, he dismisses it by saying that it’s just “self-mortification”.

The world of the monks may be ancient and arcane but human nature doesn’t change. 

Cutting may seem to be a modern affliction, a neurosis of someone who is full of self-loathing. Here, it seems entirely possible that a boy, even from the seventh century, would develop a habit that might be discussed in the contemporary psychotherapist’s rooms.

Indeed, there is an attempt at analysis when Meredith, a young abbess, witnesses Wilfrid who is about to cut himself.

“Does that bring you close to Him?” she asks, referring to the Lord. She wonders if piercing the skin is akin to carving it “with Christ’s wounds”.

Wilfrid may be haunted and miserable but he is not without sexual urges, the subject of which is Meredith. 

She too seems drawn to Wilfrid and while nothing much happens between them, there is chemistry there, evoked fleetingly and with the lightest of physical touches.

The backdrop to Wilfrid’s coming of age is political and religious turmoil. Northumbria is at war with the Picts, there are religious schisms, and the queen of the land is so desperate to conceive an heir that she takes extreme measures to compensate for the fact her husband no longer finds her attractive.

Wilfrid, who pays an unwelcome visit home to his mother (his father is off fighting), pieces together his family’s history.

This is a world of demonic possession which, in today’s parlance, might be described as mental health issues. There is trauma and guilt here, in spades.

Despite the absence of any levity, this debut novel is thoroughly engaging. It drives home our common humanity, regardless of the era in question.