This one is a dazzling story and the setting is Rome during the German occupation – with the crucial difference that Vatican City,the domain of the Pope,is neutral space. It’s from here at Christmas,1943,that an Irish priest,Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty,organises the escape of numerous people sought by the Nazis with the help of a group who make up his “choir”,including a titled British ambassador,his Cockney minder,a dynamic Italian man of the streets,a contessa,an Irish woman,a gay female journalist,and a professional British army officer,offhand and debonair.
Joseph O’Connor has fictionalised the real story of Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty.Urszula Soltys
They’re a brilliant,intensely likeable crew,and they’re brave beyond belief. Each of them presents some section of the narrative via an interview or written statement from the early ’60s,and it’s remarkable how O’Connor sustains a consistent narrative while also doing justice to the individual quality of these recollections.
At the centre of the whole thing is the monsignor,a man of mercy and as tough as nails,the kind of Irishman who will fight until he drops but is also a religious man who believes as an article of faith in the forgiveness of a loving God.
This is a kind of historical thriller that is rich in its coloration and with a tendency towards melodrama that is not in control but is hard not to be swept up by. There is a not quite sinister meeting with Pope Pius XII done with a deliberate magnificence and there is a ghastly scoundrel who is head of the SS and has a cruelty that is not separate from his hysteria.
“In my father’s house there are many mansions,” Jesus said. Or rooms as O’Connor has it for purposes of clarity. He wants to conjure every last detail:the cat with yellow haughty eyes someone calls Cleopatra,the smell of burned dust,the rats bloated like monsters of the animal kingdom,the stew made of lungs,the extraordinary courage and the bestial gratuitous sadism of humankind.
My Father’s House is an exhilarating story of dark and crooked staircases that rot and creak and lead to terrible falls and nightmare visions. It is all overdone and at the same time done with a tremendous and irresistible vigour. O’Connor,brother of Sinead,is a maestro of every kind of excess:he lays everything on too thick,but it’s impossible to distinguish the artistry from the rollicking hackwork because the mixture is so absolutely blended.
He belongs with lords of language such as Stevenson,Chesterton and Chandler,who are also tellers of tales. He takes a bath in an eloquence that he is a master of but that is also in constant danger of overmastering him.
I readMy Father’s House without looking at any background information and was amazed to discover that the whole story (or at least its outline) was true. There was a brave Monsignor Hugh O’Flaherty,he did help a great many people escape from the Nazis,he did have these brave collaborators and base enemies,but O’Connor emphasises that the intonation and the inflection are his own. Still,the fact that the outline of this story should be “true” makes the head reel.
My Father’s House does not come across as a docudrama but nor do historical novels generally and that’s how we have to view this mesmerising story of valour and deep human kindness.
You don’t really expect a story – from Ireland of all places – to be about a saintly priest who was also in the most dynamic and dashing sense a man of action. That much seems to be true however much O’Connor has surrendered to the power and glory of language. To be fair,it’s something over which he has dominion even though he goes over the top.
My Father’s House is sure to keep people reading longer into the night than they should.
My Father’s House byJoseph O’Connor is published byHarvill Secker,$32.99.
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