The Monk
Encyclopedia
The Monk: A Romance is a Gothic novel
by Matthew Gregory Lewis
, published in 1796. It was written before the author turned 20, in the space of 10 weeks.
Ambrosio is an extremely devout monk about 30 years old. He was found left at the Abbey doorstep when he was too young to tell his tale. The monks consider him a present from the Virgin and they educate him at the monastery. According to Don Lorenzo, he has “never been known to transgress a single rule of his order.” The progress of the novel chronicles Ambrosio's fall from innocence and virtue to complete evil.
Antonia is a timid and innocent girl of 15. She was brought up in an old castle in Murcia with only her mother Elvira and is therefore very sheltered. She is the object of Don Lorenzo's attentions. She is eventually buried alive, raped and murdered by Ambrosio, who turns out to be her older brother. In The Monk, the evil characters are better written than the virtuous ones, and Antonia's character is so virtuous that some have found her “deadly dull”.
Baptiste is a robber living outside of Strausbourg. He lets travelers stay in his house so that he may rob and murder them. His two sons by a previous wife, Jacques and Robert, assist him to this end. He then forced Marguerite to marry him. Marguerite, however, is disgusted by his life of crime.
Cunegonda An old nun who is held by Don Raymond to prevent her telling of his attempted elopement with Agnes.
Elvira is the mother of Antonia and Ambrosio. She married a young nobleman in secret. His family does not approve of her and because of this she and her husband escape to the Indies, leaving her 2 year old son behind. After 13 years, when Antonia is very young, her husband dies and she returns to Murcia where she lives on an allowance given to her by her father in law.
She is extremely protective of her daughter. Because her husband's family did not approve of her, she is very cautious of Lorenzo's attentions to Antonia. Elvira tells him that should he get his family's approval, she will agree to the match but she does not believe this will actually happen. She also gives Antonia an edited version of the bible so as to protect her innocence. Because of this implication that the bible is inappropriate for a young lady, Coleridge
later called Lewis blasphemous.
Leonella is Elvira's sister and Antonia's spinster aunt. She takes an immediate disliking to Ambrosio after hearing his sermon. She believes Don Christoval's polite attentions are more significant than they actually are and is hurt when he fails to call at her house. She eventually marries a younger man and lives in Cordova.
Don Lorenzo de Medina is Agnes' older brother and friend of Don Raymond and Don Christoval. Immediately intrigued by Antonia after meeting her at Ambrosio's sermon, Don Lorenzo resolves to marry her.
Matilda is first known as Rosario, the young boy who looks up to Ambrosio “with a respect approaching idolatry
”. Rosario is brought to the Monastery by a well dressed rich stranger but not much more is known of his past. He always hides under his cowl and later reveals that he is actually Matilda, a beautiful young lady who loves Ambrosio. Matilda was also the model for the Madonna
painting that hangs in Ambrosio's room. She seduces Ambrosio and aids in his destruction of Antonia with magic.
The character of Matilda was highly praised by Coleridge
as Lewis' masterpiece, and is said to be “exquisitely imagined” and “superior in wickedness to the most wicked of men." Though she is considered by some critics to be the most intelligent, articulate, and interesting, she is difficult to characterize. The plot of the novel relies on her being a supernatural force with magical powers, but she begins as a human. She tells Ambrosio she loves him when she thinks he is asleep, and cries “involuntary” tears when she realizes he no longer cares for her. These passages, together with the haste in which the novel was written, “that Lewis changed his mind in the course of the narrative”.
Mariana, Alix, Violante are nuns who vote to punish Agnes and are aware that she is being kept in the sepulcher. They fall victim to the outraged crowd at the processional.
Marguerite is first introduced as a short and unwilling hostess and wife of Baptiste. Her first husband dies after receiving wounds from an English traveler. The group of banditti do not trust Marguerite to keep their secret and she becomes the property of Baptiste. She has two sons, Theodore and a younger unnamed boy. She saves Don Raymond's life by revealing Baptiste's true intentions through mysterious bloody sheets and significant glances. She stabs and kills Baptiste as Don Raymond tries to strangle him, allowing them both to escape.
The Prioress, also known as Mother St. Agatha, is given Don Raymond's letter to Agnes by Ambrosio. She punishes Agnes severely to uphold the honor of the convent of St. Clare. “Viciously cruel in the name of virtue”, she keeps Agnes prisoner in the dungeons beneath the convent with only enough bread and water to sustain her but not nourish her. The prioress circulates the story of Agnes' death to everyone, including Agnes' own relations. She is torn to pieces by the crowd that gathers to honor St. Clare when they realize she is responsible for Agnes' supposed death. She is also the inspiration for the Abbess of San Stephano in Radcliffe
's The Italian
.
Don Raymond, Marquis de las Cisternas is also known as Alphonso d'Alvarada. He takes the name Alphonso when his friend, the Duke of Villa Hermosa, advises him that taking a new name will allow him to be known for his merits rather than his rank.
He travels to Paris
, but finds the Parisians “frivolous, unfeeling and insincere” and sets out for Germany
. Near Strausbourg he is forced to seek accommodations in a cottage after his chaise supposedly breaks down. He is the target of the robber Baptiste but with help from Marguerite, he is able to save himself and the Baroness Lindenberg. Grateful, the Baroness invites Don Raymond to stay with her and her husband at their castle in Bavaria
.
It is at the Castle of Lindenberg that he first meets Agnes.
Donna Rodolpha, Baroness of Lindenburg meets Don Raymond while traveling to Strausbourg. She is in love with Don Raymond and becomes jealous when she finds out Don Raymond is in love with her niece, Agnes. She asks him to leave the Castle of Lindenberg and later speaks poorly of his character.
Don Christoval, the Condé d'Ossorio, is Lorenzo's friend. He attracts Leonella's desires but does not return them.
Mother St. Ursula assists in Agnes' rescue. She is a witness to the Prioress' crimes and without her, Don Lorenzo would not be able to accuse the Prioress.
Theodore is Marguerite's son who becomes Don Raymond's page. He enjoys writing poetry and authors the poems “Love and Age” and “The Water King”. After reading “Love and Age”, Don Raymond points out the flaws in the piece, which may be flaws Lewis noticed in his own work. Far from being the unwaiveringly faithful servant stock character, Theodore plays a key role in moving the plot forward by helping with Don Raymond's plans to escape with Agnes. Theodore's character also provides foreshadowing through his poems. His poems parallel the action of the story. For instance, in his poem “The Water King”, the lovely maid's fate foreshadows Antonia's. In addition, Theodore also bears a striking resemblance to other characters in other of Lewis' works, including Leolyn in One O'clock (1811) and Eugene in “Mistrust” from Romantic Tales (1808).
Virginia de Villa Franca is introduced late in the story. She is a beautiful, virtuous young relation of the Prioress who represents St. Clare in the Procession. Virginia nurses the ill Agnes back to health and thus wins Lorenzo's affections. Like Isabella in The Castle of Otranto
, she is introduced as an acceptable marriage partner for Lorenzo but plays an unessential part in the plot.
in Spain - and his violent downfall. He is undone by carnal lust for his pupil, a woman disguised as a monk (Matilda), who tempts him to transgress, and, once satisfied by her, is overcome with desire for the innocent Antonia. Using magic spells, Matilda aids him in seducing Antonia, whom he later rapes and kills. Matilda is eventually revealed as an instrument of Satan in female form, who has orchestrated Ambrosio's downfall from the start. In the middle of telling this story, Lewis frequently makes further digressions, which serve to heighten the Gothic atmosphere of the tale while doing little to move along the main plot. A lengthy story about a "Bleeding Nun" is told, and many incidental verses are introduced. A second romance, between Lorenzo and Antonia, also gives way to a tale of Lorenzo's sister being tortured by hypocritical nuns (as a result of a third romantic plot). Eventually, the story catches back up with Ambrosio, and in several pages of impassioned prose, Ambrosio is delivered into the hands of the Inquisition
; he escapes by selling his soul to the devil
for his deliverance from the death sentence which awaits him. The story ends with the devil preventing Ambrosio's attempted final repentance, and the sinful monk's prolonged torturous death. Ambrosio finds out by the devil that the woman that he had raped and killed, Antonia, was indeed his sister.
.
The fourth edition of the novel was published in 1798, and, according to Peck, “contains nothing which could endanger the most fragile virtue... He expunged every remotely offensive word in his three volumes, with meticulous attention to lust. Ambrosio, formerly a ravisher, becomes an intruder or betrayer; his incontinence changes to weakness or infamy, his lust to desire, his desires to emotions. Having indulged in excesses for three editions, he committed an error in the fourth.” Lewis wrote an apology for The Monk in the preface of another work; as recorded by Peck:
“Without entering into the discussion, whether the principles inculcated in “The Monk” are right or wrong, or whether the means by which the story is conducted is likely to do more mischief than the tendency is likely to produce good, I solemnly declare, that when I published the work I had no idea that its publication could be prejudicial; if I was wrong, the error proceeded from my judgment, not from my intention. Without entering into the merits of the advice which it proposes to convey, or attempting to defend (what I now condemn myself) the language and manner in which that advice was delivered, I solemnly declare, that in writing the passage which regards the Bible (consisting of a single page, and the only passage which I ever wrote on the subject) I had not the most distant intention to bring the sacred Writings into contempt, and that, had I suspected it of producing such an effect, I should not have written the paragraph.”
wrote a piece in The Critical Review
, an important literary magazine of the day, in which he both praises and criticizes the novel harshly. He acknowledges that it is “the offspring of no common genius,” that the “underplot... is skilfully and closely connected with the main story, and is subservient to its development,” that the story Lewis weaves in about the bleeding nun is “truly terrific” and that he cannot recall a “bolder or more happy conception than that of the burning cross on the forehead of the wandering Jew.” Coleridge gives his highest praise to the character of Matilda, whom he believes is “the author’s master-piece. It is, indeed, exquisitely imagined, and as exquisitely supported. The whole work is distinguished by the variety and impressiveness of its incidents; and the author everywhere discovers an imagination rich, powerful, and fervid. Such are the excellencies” (7). Coleridge continues by saying that “the errors and defects are more numerous, and (we are sorry to add) of greater importance.” Because “the order of nature may be changed whenever the authors purposes demand it” there are no surprises in the work. Moral truth cannot be gleaned because Ambrosio was destroyed by spiritual beings, and no earthly being can sufficiently oppose the “power and cunning of supernatural beings.” Scenes of grotesquery and horror abound, which are a proof of “a low and vulgar taste.” The character of Ambrosio is “impossible... contrary to nature.” Coleridge argues that the most “grievous fault... for which no literary excellence can atone” is that “our author has contrived to make [tales of enchantments and witchcraft] ‘ ‘pernicious’ ‘, by blending, with an irreverent negligence, all that is most awfully true in religion with all that is most ridiculously absurd in superstition,” commenting with the immortal line that “the Monk is a romance, which if a parent saw in the hands of a son or daughter, he might reasonably turn pale.” Coleridge finishes the piece by explaining that he was “induced to pay particular attention to this work, from the unusual success which it has experienced” and that “the author is a man of rank and fortune. Yes! the author of the Monk signs himself a LEGISLATOR! We stare and tremble.”
Thomas James Mathias
followed Coleridge’s lead in The Pursuits of Literature, a poem in the 18th-Century satiric tradition, but takes a step farther than Coleridge by claiming that a specific passage made the novel indictable under law. The passage, found in Chapter Seven Volume II, discusses an interpretation of the Bible as too lewd for youth to read.
These two major pieces lead the way for a multitude of other attacks on the novel, from such sources as the Monthly Review, the Monthly Magazine, and the Scots Magazine; the last of these attacked the novel six years after its publication. It was a general trend amongst those who criticized, however, to offer praise of some aspect of the novel. “It looked,” writes Parreaux, “as if every reviewer or critic of the book, no matter how hostile he was, felt compelled to at least pay lip-service to Lewis’s genius.”
The criticism of his novel, extending even into criticism of his person, never truly left Lewis, and an attack on his character was published by the Courier posthumously, calling itself a “just estimate of his character.” As recorded by MacDonald: “He had devoted the first fruits of his mind to the propagation of evil, and the whole long harvest was burnt up ... There is a moral in the life of this man ... He was a reckless defiler of the public mind; a profligate, he cared not how many were to be undone when he drew back the curtain of his profligacy; he had infected his reason with the insolent belief that the power to corrupt made the right, and that conscience might be laughed, so long as he could evade law. The Monk was an eloquent evil; but the man who compounded it knew in his soul that he was compounding poison for the multitude, and in that knowledge he sent it into the world.”
There were those who defended The Monk as well. Joseph Bell, publisher of the novel, spent half of his essay Impartial Structures on the Poem Called “The Pursuits of Literature” and Particularly a Vindication of the Romance of “The Monk” defending Lewis; Thomas Dutton, in his Literary Census: A Satirical Poem, retaliated against Mathias and praised Lewis; Henry Francis Robert Soame compared Lewis to Dante in his The Epistle in Rhyme to M. G. Lewis, Esq. M. P.
“Assurances that The Monk was not as dangerous as its enemies maintained failed to dampen its success with the reading public,” writes Peck. “They had been told that the book was horrible, blasphemous, and lewd, and they rushed to put their morality to the test.” Indeed, the novel’s popularity continued to rise and by 1800 there were five London and two Dublin editions.
In its essence, The Monk’s plot is not completely unpredictable or revolutionary. Ambrosio displays traces of hubris and lust very early in the novel. It is explained that “he [Ambrosio] dismissed them [the monks] with an air of conscious superiority, in which humility’s semblance combated with the reality of pride.” Similarly, “he fixed his eyes on the Virgin…Gracious God, should I then resist the temptation? Should I not barter for a single embrace the reward of my sufferings for thirty years?” Both passages explicitly show the conflicting forces, that is, the moral choices that rage within Ambrosio. His nature instructs him to exult himself above others and lust for the Virgin Mary, while his religious inclinations, or at least his awareness of his position within the church, command him to humility and chastity. Ambrosio begins to deviate from his holy conduct when he encounters Matilda, a character revealed at the end of the novel to be an emissary of Satan
. All of these circumstances are consistent with the classic model of the morality tale, and, true to form, once Ambrosio is tempted into sin he enters into a tailspin of increasing desire, which leads him to transgression and culminates in the loss of his eternal salvation and his grisly murder at the hands of the devil.
This pattern of wicked actions leading to ill consequences is exactly what is expected in a morality tale and is reflected in other Gothic novels. For example, Lewis’ work is often discussed in conjunction with that of Ann Radcliffe
’s. Robert Miles
writes that “Ann Radcliffe
and Matthew Lewis were the two most significant Gothic
novelists of the 1790s, an estimate of their importance shared by their contemporaries.”. Indeed, the repercussions of malevolent and self-serving actions are represented extraordinarily well in Radcliffe’s The Romance of the Forest. The Marquis in the story was driven to murder for “the title of his brother…and riches which would enable him to indulge his voluptuous inclinations.”. Similar to Ambrosio, the Marquis was tempted and succumbed to sin, which sets him on a wicked path leading to his public shame and suicide.
However, despite its outcome, The Monk does have some very marked discrepancies from the normal morality tale setup used in gothic novels. In most morality tales, both vice and virtue are represented equally, but in Lewis’ work, the powers of evil are disproportionately represented. Technically speaking, Ambrosio is surrounded by virtue in the sense that he is always conscious that what he is doing is wrong and, until the end of the novel, never believes that he cannot repent. In fact, he tells Matilda that “the consequences [of witchcraft] are too horrible: I…am not so blinded by lust as to sacrifice for her enjoyment my existence both in this world and the next.” However, this general sense of right and wrong is a feeble, inefficacious defense for Ambrosio when he is confronted by the physical presence and influence of demons. There are no corresponding angels who appear before Ambrosio to counter the influence of the devil and try to dissuade him from his path of destruction. As a result, his depravity is accelerated and magnified from the minor character foibles that are congenital to him to the egregious evils that possess him by the end of the novel. The only apparition that is potentially heaven-sent is that of Elvira’s ghost. She comes back from the grave to caution her daughter, Antonia that “yet three days, and we shall meet again!” While the apparition may seem to be trying to warn Antonia of her impending death, the ghost’s appearance causes Jacintha to fetch Ambrosio to dispel the spirit, allowing him to drug Antonia and take her under his power, a chain of events ultimately leading to the demise of Antonia, which the ghost foretold. As a result of the ghost’s intrusion, Antonia is put directly into harm’s way, an action much more apropos for a demonic presence rather than a heavenly one.
This lack of divinity is, however, not unique to The Monk. John Moore’s Zeluco focuses on the nefarious plots of a single man who cannot control his passions. Like Ambrosio, Zeluco’s disposition is shown very early in the novel to be disagreeable. In his youth Zeluco “seized it [his pet sparrow] with his hand, and while it struggled to get free, with a curse he squeezed the little animal to death.” Zeluco continually gratifies his vices much to his discredit and dishonor, and, as in The Monk, his sins compound upon themselves culminating in the infanticide of his only son. Unlike Ambrosio, however, Zeluco has no physical demons spurring him onwards, but rather his insatiable appetite for sin.
Lewis also deviates from what is typically expected from morality tales when he includes the sacrifice of innocent people in the latter chapters of the novel. As a result of Ambrosio’s personal vices, both Elvira and Antonia are slain. Elvira finds Ambrosio, “the man whom Madrid esteems a saint…at this late hour near the couch of my unhappy child)” on the verge of committing rape, and Ambrosio murders her to prevent her from revealing his crimes. Elvira was guilty of no crime and throughout the novel was committed to the welfare of her family, and her daughter in particular. Likewise, Antonia is murdered to prevent her from alerting Officers of the Inquisition
of Ambrosio’s crimes. Antonia is also undeserving of her fate as she was always a loyal daughter and honest woman throughout the novel.
Another gothic novel in which one individual’s quest for a gratification of the senses leads to the ruin of others is Vathek. In the novel, Vathek attempts to sacrifice fifty children to a demon in order to gain his favor. Without mercy he “pushed the poor innocent into the gulph [open to hell].” Similarly, in The Necromancer, an entire village is sacrificed to a troop of banditti who are angered at their hideout being revealed. The leader of group explaining that “the villagers are not yet punished …for having assisted them, but they shall not escape their doom.” Admittedly, Vathek can be more readily identified as a morality tale, but The Necromancer warns against the pernicious effects of a legal system that is bereft of mercy. A criminal declares during his confession that his life “will afford a useful lesson to judges, and teach the guardians of the people to be careful how they inflict punishments if they will not make a complete rogue of many a hapless wretch… .” In this way, The Necromancer references the same type of ethics extant in morality tales. Similar to The Monk, these two novels showcase morality tales in which the sinful choices of characters lead to the suffering of innocent people.
Throughout The Monk, Lewis incorporates traditional aspects of the morality tale while including elements that are unconventional and display similarities to other Gothic novels. Specifically, the sacrifice of innocent people and the lack of divine intercession in The Monk separate it from the traditional morality tale narrative. In doing so, Lewis keeps the ethics and conventions of his predecessors, while using his own innovations and techniques to throw the debasement of Ambrosio into greater relief and to show his downfall in a more appalling, and, ultimately, a more realistic way.
Women are in sensational environments, and while they are trying to create better lives for themselves, they only end up with worse lives. This is portrayed in the subplot of Agnes. She is trying to create a better life for herself by escaping from the Castle of Lindenberg. She even comes up with a unique plan that she explains to Raymond, “I shall quit my chamber… drest in the same apparel as the Ghost is supposed to wear. Whoever meets me will be too much terrified to oppose my escape'. However, in anti-feminist fashion (of not letting the woman succeed in a plan to make her life better), a real ghost (the Bleeding Nun) appears to foil her plan. “By staging this episode, Lewis emphasizes how Agnes’s noncompliance – her insistence on her own pleasure, and her defiant questioning of the destiny that others have mapped out for her – nevertheless fails to found the mythical new society”. Therefore by trying to escape her current prison, she only ends up in a different kind of prison, hence, not making a better life for herself.
An example of brutality of treatment is seen in Agnes as well. First Agnes, a pregnant woman, is imprisoned for a single sexual infraction. Then her whereabouts are concealed from her relatives, and the Pope’s order to release her is disregarded. Finally, her newborn child and she are both left to starve to death. Another example is the Bleeding Nun who had her bones lie unburied near the Lindenburg Castle. “Know then, that my bones lie still unburied: They rot in the obscurity of Lindenberg Hole. None but this Youth has the right of consigning them to the Grave." After being horribly murdered, she does not even receive the dignity of a burial. Thirdly, is the rape and murder of Antonia by her brother Ambrosio. A final example is the Prioress being trampled and violated by an incensed mob. The rioters dragged the Prioress “through the Streets, spurning her, trampling her, and treating her with every species of cruelty which hate or vindictive fury could invent”. The Prioress became a “wretched woman” in this scene. Most importantly throughout these examples is the fact that each woman’s story is linked to their femininity. “Agnes is a mother who holds the decomposed body of her infant; the Bleeding Nun is the licentious wide of a Baron; Antonia is the innocent virgin; and, finally, the Prioress is the feminine head of the Convent of St. Clare.”
Furthermore, women are seen to cause the downfall of other women. “Antonia’s mother Elvira could hardly have chosen a worse companion for her daughter than her sister Leonella, for Leonella’s indiscretion and absurdity contribute directly to the misfortunes that later befall Antonia.
Finally, while The Monk ends with weddings, this does not mean happy endings for the women. The marriage of Raymond and Agnes leaves Agnes vowing to be a devoted wife. “The more culpable have been the errors of your Mistress, the more exemplary shall be the conduct of your wife”. Instead of finally reaching a happy environment and living situation in the end of the novel, this marriage still portrays anti-feminist qualities by leaving Agnes as completely devoted to her husband, without having a life of her own. The second marriage is of Lorenzo is to Virginia de Villa- Franca, who is,” The Idol of her Parents, the admiration of Madrid, endowed by nature and education with every perfection of person and mind”. Once again a marriage is, “calculated to make him happy”. Instead of being married for the traditional value of love, both of these marriages are made only to create the most happiness for the men without taking the enjoyment of the women into consideration.
In addition to the blurred lines between genders in Rosario/ Matilda, there are obvious gender role reversals. Men are portrayed in a very feminine sense, not just women. For a bit of this novel Ambrosio is the weak main character that is normally seen in the female character in earlier Gothic novels, such as Matilda from The Castle of Wolfenbach. Ambrosio is seen from a “feminine” position at the start of this novel. Like a young girl who is protected to keep her virtue and innocence, Ambrosio is similarly protected and ignorant of the world and temptations due to being raised in a monastery.
Both Antonia and Ambrosio do not seem to distinguish the opposite sex, once again blurring the gender roles. Antonia does not seem to comprehend, “that there is such a thing as a Man in the world” and she “imagine(s) every body to be of the same sex with (herself)”. Because she is innocent in regard to understanding men are different from herself, this, “links the same feminine brother and sister together”.
Similar to Antonia, Ambrosio seems to forget that Matilda is a woman. This is most likely due to Matilda befriending Ambrosio as a man (Rosario) along with Ambrosio’s innocence. “It is Ambrosio’s sexual ignorance and hence ‘innocence’ that makes him vulnerable to Matilda’s seduction”. Ambrosio expressed this after seeing Matilda’s breasts by saying. “May I not safely credit her assertions? Will it not be easy for me to forget her sex and still consider her as my Friends and my disciple [?] … She strove to keep me in ignorance of her sex … She has made no attempts to rouse my slumbering passions, not has She ever conversed with me till this night on the subject of Love”. Excuses aside, Ambrosio continues to blur the lines between female and male.
In addition to Ambrosio being feminized, Raymond is feminized a bit. When Raymond is with the Bleeding Nun, whom he thinks is his lover Agnes, “he sexually surrenders and sinks upon Matilda’s bosom, alerting the reader that another role reversal is forthcoming”. Furthermore, the Bleeding Nun takes the male role. She accomplishes this by lifting the ironic “wedding” veil, kissing the bride (by grabbing and kissing his hand), and reciting the wedding incantation, “Raymond! Raymond! Thou art mine! Raymond! Raymond! I am thine! In thy veins while blood shall roll, I am thine! Thou art mine! Mine thy body! Mine thy soul!" Finally, Raymond has “frequent fainting fits,” which is normally seen in weak female characters in Gothic novels, not male characters.
" of Gothic novels. It is also the first book to feature a priest as the villain. In this respect it would serve as a model for such future works of literature as The Hunchback of Notre Dame
.
This novel shares a number of traits with Ann Radcliffe's
gothic novels The Italian
and The Mysteries of Udolpho
.
Featuring demon
ic pacts, rape
, incest
, and such props as the Wandering Jew
, ruined castle
s, and the Spanish Inquisition, The Monk serves more or less as a compendium of Gothic taste. Ambrosio, the hypocrite foiled by his own lust, and his sexual misconduct inside the walls of convent
s and monasteries
, is a vividly portrayed villain
, as well as an embodiment of much of the traditional English
mistrust of Roman Catholicism, with its intrusive confessional
, its political and religious authoritarianism, and its cloistered lifestyles. The American
fictitious anti-Catholic libel, The Awful Disclosures of Maria Monk
, borrowed much from the plot of this novel. Despite the critics' comments on its crudeness and lack of depth, it proved to be one of the most popular novels of the Romantic Period.
It is among the many Gothic works referenced in the Jane Austen
novel Northanger Abbey
.
This novel was considered by the Marquis de Sade
as a reaction to the 1789 French Revolution
, with Lewis using the Gothic to express concerns circulating around England in the Romantic Period. Concerns such as social stability and the mis-use of power are some of the issues explored.
Robert Miles suggests that The Monk is about “veiling and disguise” and that it is possible to read into the novel a possible expression of the “open secret” of Lewis’s homosexuality through the characters of Ambrosio, Rosario/Matilda, and Lucifer. “In the end, Ambrosio’s desires are insatiable... But Ambrosio’s desire may be insatiable because it is denied its true object. The closest the text gets to disclosing what this object might be is an elaborately staged event which obfuscates as it reveals. In the centre of the text, in quick succession, Matilda performs two acts of conjuration. In the first, Antonia’s coy, modest, naked body is displayed before Ambrosio in Matilda’s magic mirror. In the second, in labyrinthine caverns beneath the monastery, Matilda invokes an androgynous, decidedly camp ‘Daemon’: ‘a Youth seemingly scarce eighteen, the perfection of whose form and face was unrivalled’. The ‘beautiful’ figure, ‘perfectly naked’, with ‘silken locks’ and surrounded by ‘clouds of rose-coloured lights’ (277), appears as the key to Ambrosio’s possession of Antonia. The figure, at Matilda’s strident behest finally relinquishes the ‘myrtle’ which will enable Antonia’s seduction. The parallelism of the stagin raises the question of causation: is the Daemon the key to the sexual possession of Antonia, or is Antonia’s image a screen for Ambrosio’s true object of desire, the epicene devil?”
is a man doomed to walk the earth until the second coming of Jesus
. There are several interpretations of why he is punished this way. One legend says that Jesus wished to take a drink from a horse trough and the Jew refused, instead pointing to a hoofprint filled with water on the ground and “observed that it was good enough for such an enemy of Moses” Another legend says that when Christ sat to rest on a man’s doorstep, a man from Jerusalem drove him away, yelling, “‘Walk faster!’ And Christ replied, ‘I go, but you will walk until I come again!’” Both these legends show that the Jew’s rude behavior to Christ is the reason for his punishment of endless wandering.
The Wandering Jew appears in the subplot of Raymond and Agnes’ story in The Monk and foreshadows Ambrosio’s encounters with supernatural devilish spirits. The Wandering Jew is first referenced to as a “Great Mogul,” but he displays several characteristics associated with the legend of the Wandering Jew that allow us to figure out his true identity before it is directly revealed. He tells Raymond:
This speech reveals that this Great Mogul must constantly move from place to place, has no friends, and can never die. All of these signs point to the legend of the Wandering Jew. On top of this, the Great Mogul reveals, “God has set his seal upon me, and all his creatures respect this fatal mark”. This refers to the burning cross on his forehead, a mark of God that gives the Great Mogul his power to destroy evil spirits, such as the Bleeding Nun. This burning mark is a characteristic of the Wandering Jew specifically found in Spanish variants of the legend. The Monk is primarily set in Spain
and its main characters, like Raymond, are mostly Spanish. Therefore, the Wandering Jew fulfills the aspects of the legend most commonly found in Spain. Another characteristic of the Wandering Jew found in Spain is that although he is miserable and cursed, he spends his time praying, doing good works, and helping others. Theodore tells Raymond that “he did much good in the town,” and he helps Raymond get rid of the Bleeding Nun. The Great Mogul’s identity as the Wandering Jew is eventually revealed:
The Cardinal-Duke’s confirmation and belief in the existence of the Wandering Jew gives credit to Raymond’s story.
The Bleeding Nun also appears in the subplot of Raymond and Agnes and epitomizes the sin of erotic desires. Raymond mistakes her for his lover, Agnes, because she is veiled and he cannot see her face. The veil “conceals and inhibits sexuality comes by the same gesture to represent it.” Both Antonia and Matilda are veiled to protect their virginity and innocence and it is expected that Agnes also covers her face for this reason when she meets Raymond. However, the removal of the veil reveals the Bleeding Nun, dead and punished because of her sins. While she was alive, she was a prostitute and a murderer before she was murdered by her lover. Her story is the first we receive of how giving in to sexual desires leads to death and eternal unrest. Raymond expects to find Agnes’ beautiful, virgin face beneath the veil, but instead finds death. Her unveiling connects the loss of virginity and the giving in to sexual desires with death and punishment. Both the Bleeding Nun and Ambrosio begin pious but then fall prey to their sexual desires. Ambrosio has already given into his desire for Matilda and the story of the Bleeding Nun told in the subplot foreshadows his further downfall with Antonia and his eternal punishment in the hands of the devil.
The Bleeding Nun also introduces the world of the supernatural
into The Monk. The supernatural something “that is above nature or belonging to a higher realm or system than that of nature” This introduction brings another Gothic element into the book. Up until this point, the plot has relied on natural elements of the sublime to invoke the terror expected of a Gothic novel. The entrance of the Bleeding Nun transforms this natural world into a world where the supernatural is possible. When she gets into Raymond’s carriage, “Immediately thick clouds obscured the sky: The winds howled around us, the lightning flashed, and the Thunder roared tremendously.” Nature is acknowledging the presence of a supernatural force.
When Agnes tells Raymond the story of how the Bleeding Nun’s ghost haunts the Castle of Lindenberg, Raymond asks her wh ether she believes the story, and she replies “How can you ask such a question? No, no, Alphonso! I have too much reason to lament superstition’s influence to be its Victim myself.” It is not until the Bleeding Nun appears to Raymond at night that the idea of the existence of the supernatural begins to be a reality. The Wandering Jew’s appearance coincides with this first instance of the supernatural. He can see the Bleeding Nun, proving that she is not a figment of Raymond’s imagination. His supernatural abilities give access to the Bleeding Nun’s story and provide plausibility to the existence of the supernatural. He also has the power to free Raymond from her presence. The later confirmation of Raymond’s uncle to the existence of the Wandering Jew allows the whole story to be taken for fact. This establishes the reality of the supernatural and lays the groundwork for Matilda’s later use of magic and her and Ambrosio’s interaction with evil spirits.
used the work as the basis for his 1855 opera Raymond and Agnes
.
The French writer Antonin Artaud
's only full-length novel of the same name is a reworking of Lewis's plot. Artaud discarded some of the original's subplots and added others of his own, wanting his version to be even more shocking and subversive than the original.
Luis Buñuel
and Jean-Claude Carrière
attempted to film a version of The Monk in the 1960s, but the project was halted due to lack of funds. Buñuel's friend, the Greek director Ado Kyrou
, used this script as the basis for his 1972 film version. Le Moine (English
The Monk) boasted an international cast with Franco Nero
in the title role. The film also starred Nathalie Delon, Eliana de Santis, Nadja Tiller
and Nicol Williamson
.
In 1990 The Monk was produced by Celtic Films. It starred Paul McGann
as the title character, and was written and directed by Francisco Lara Polop.
A stage adaptation by Christopher Renstrom was produced off-off-Broadway by Bad Neighbors Theater Co. in 1992.
A new stage adaptation of The Monk written by Nirmala Nataraj premiered Oct. 9, 2008 at the Exit Theatre in San Francisco.
A brand new musical parodying the novel is in development. A workshop of the first act (of at least three) was presented at Carnegie Mellon University in March 2010, and the second act in October 2010.
Grant Morrison
and Klaus Janson
's 1990 DC graphic novel Batman: Gothic
relies heavily and overtly upon the Monk, combined with elements of Don Giovanni
, as the inspiration for the plot.
A new film adaption, The Monk
, is done by French-German director Dominik Moll in 2011, it is shot in Madrid
and stars Vincent Cassel
, Déborah François
, Geraldine Chaplin
and Sergi López i Ayats. The shoot begins in mid April and is set for 12 weeks.
Gothic fiction
Gothic fiction, sometimes referred to as Gothic horror, is a genre or mode of literature that combines elements of both horror and romance. Gothicism's origin is attributed to English author Horace Walpole, with his 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto, subtitled "A Gothic Story"...
by Matthew Gregory Lewis
Matthew Gregory Lewis
Matthew Gregory Lewis was an English novelist and dramatist, often referred to as "Monk" Lewis, because of the success of his classic Gothic novel, The Monk.-Family:...
, published in 1796. It was written before the author turned 20, in the space of 10 weeks.
Characters
Agnes is Don Lorenzo's younger sister and Don Raymond's lover. Her mother fell ill while pregnant with Agnes and promised to send Agnes to the convent if she delivered her safely. She is a virtuous young lady who intends to marry Don Raymond but her parents want her to become a nun, so she decides to run away with him. Their plans are foiled and, thinking Don Raymond has abandoned her forever, she enters the convent. However, Don Raymond discovers her location and disguises himself as a gardener to get in and see her. In a moment of heated passion, she breaks her vow of chastity, and later discovers she is carrying his child. When the Prioress discovers her secret, she locks Agnes in the sepulcher. There, Agnes delivers her baby boy, who dies shortly after. Agnes slowly wastes away but is rescued, and sent to recover under the care of Virginia, a friend. She and Don Raymond finally marry. Agnes is grateful for Virginia's careful attention and wants Virginia and her brother to marry.Ambrosio is an extremely devout monk about 30 years old. He was found left at the Abbey doorstep when he was too young to tell his tale. The monks consider him a present from the Virgin and they educate him at the monastery. According to Don Lorenzo, he has “never been known to transgress a single rule of his order.” The progress of the novel chronicles Ambrosio's fall from innocence and virtue to complete evil.
Antonia is a timid and innocent girl of 15. She was brought up in an old castle in Murcia with only her mother Elvira and is therefore very sheltered. She is the object of Don Lorenzo's attentions. She is eventually buried alive, raped and murdered by Ambrosio, who turns out to be her older brother. In The Monk, the evil characters are better written than the virtuous ones, and Antonia's character is so virtuous that some have found her “deadly dull”.
Baptiste is a robber living outside of Strausbourg. He lets travelers stay in his house so that he may rob and murder them. His two sons by a previous wife, Jacques and Robert, assist him to this end. He then forced Marguerite to marry him. Marguerite, however, is disgusted by his life of crime.
Cunegonda An old nun who is held by Don Raymond to prevent her telling of his attempted elopement with Agnes.
Elvira is the mother of Antonia and Ambrosio. She married a young nobleman in secret. His family does not approve of her and because of this she and her husband escape to the Indies, leaving her 2 year old son behind. After 13 years, when Antonia is very young, her husband dies and she returns to Murcia where she lives on an allowance given to her by her father in law.
She is extremely protective of her daughter. Because her husband's family did not approve of her, she is very cautious of Lorenzo's attentions to Antonia. Elvira tells him that should he get his family's approval, she will agree to the match but she does not believe this will actually happen. She also gives Antonia an edited version of the bible so as to protect her innocence. Because of this implication that the bible is inappropriate for a young lady, Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet, Romantic, literary critic and philosopher who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla...
later called Lewis blasphemous.
Leonella is Elvira's sister and Antonia's spinster aunt. She takes an immediate disliking to Ambrosio after hearing his sermon. She believes Don Christoval's polite attentions are more significant than they actually are and is hurt when he fails to call at her house. She eventually marries a younger man and lives in Cordova.
Don Lorenzo de Medina is Agnes' older brother and friend of Don Raymond and Don Christoval. Immediately intrigued by Antonia after meeting her at Ambrosio's sermon, Don Lorenzo resolves to marry her.
Matilda is first known as Rosario, the young boy who looks up to Ambrosio “with a respect approaching idolatry
Idolatry
Idolatry is a pejorative term for the worship of an idol, a physical object such as a cult image, as a god, or practices believed to verge on worship, such as giving undue honour and regard to created forms other than God. In all the Abrahamic religions idolatry is strongly forbidden, although...
”. Rosario is brought to the Monastery by a well dressed rich stranger but not much more is known of his past. He always hides under his cowl and later reveals that he is actually Matilda, a beautiful young lady who loves Ambrosio. Matilda was also the model for the Madonna
Madonna (art)
Images of the Madonna and the Madonna and Child or Virgin and Child are pictorial or sculptured representations of Mary, Mother of Jesus, either alone, or more frequently, with the infant Jesus. These images are central icons of Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodox Christianity where Mary remains...
painting that hangs in Ambrosio's room. She seduces Ambrosio and aids in his destruction of Antonia with magic.
The character of Matilda was highly praised by Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet, Romantic, literary critic and philosopher who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla...
as Lewis' masterpiece, and is said to be “exquisitely imagined” and “superior in wickedness to the most wicked of men." Though she is considered by some critics to be the most intelligent, articulate, and interesting, she is difficult to characterize. The plot of the novel relies on her being a supernatural force with magical powers, but she begins as a human. She tells Ambrosio she loves him when she thinks he is asleep, and cries “involuntary” tears when she realizes he no longer cares for her. These passages, together with the haste in which the novel was written, “that Lewis changed his mind in the course of the narrative”.
Mariana, Alix, Violante are nuns who vote to punish Agnes and are aware that she is being kept in the sepulcher. They fall victim to the outraged crowd at the processional.
Marguerite is first introduced as a short and unwilling hostess and wife of Baptiste. Her first husband dies after receiving wounds from an English traveler. The group of banditti do not trust Marguerite to keep their secret and she becomes the property of Baptiste. She has two sons, Theodore and a younger unnamed boy. She saves Don Raymond's life by revealing Baptiste's true intentions through mysterious bloody sheets and significant glances. She stabs and kills Baptiste as Don Raymond tries to strangle him, allowing them both to escape.
The Prioress, also known as Mother St. Agatha, is given Don Raymond's letter to Agnes by Ambrosio. She punishes Agnes severely to uphold the honor of the convent of St. Clare. “Viciously cruel in the name of virtue”, she keeps Agnes prisoner in the dungeons beneath the convent with only enough bread and water to sustain her but not nourish her. The prioress circulates the story of Agnes' death to everyone, including Agnes' own relations. She is torn to pieces by the crowd that gathers to honor St. Clare when they realize she is responsible for Agnes' supposed death. She is also the inspiration for the Abbess of San Stephano in Radcliffe
Ann Radcliffe
Anne Radcliffe was an English author, and considered the pioneer of the gothic novel . Her style is romantic in its vivid descriptions of landscapes, and long travel scenes, yet the Gothic element is obvious through her use of the supernatural...
's The Italian
The Italian (novel)
The Italian, or the Confessional of the Black Penitents is a Gothic novel written by the English author Ann Radcliffe. It is the last book Radcliffe published during her lifetime...
.
Don Raymond, Marquis de las Cisternas is also known as Alphonso d'Alvarada. He takes the name Alphonso when his friend, the Duke of Villa Hermosa, advises him that taking a new name will allow him to be known for his merits rather than his rank.
He travels to Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, but finds the Parisians “frivolous, unfeeling and insincere” and sets out for Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. Near Strausbourg he is forced to seek accommodations in a cottage after his chaise supposedly breaks down. He is the target of the robber Baptiste but with help from Marguerite, he is able to save himself and the Baroness Lindenberg. Grateful, the Baroness invites Don Raymond to stay with her and her husband at their castle in Bavaria
Bavaria
Bavaria, formally the Free State of Bavaria is a state of Germany, located in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the largest state by area, forming almost 20% of the total land area of Germany...
.
It is at the Castle of Lindenberg that he first meets Agnes.
Donna Rodolpha, Baroness of Lindenburg meets Don Raymond while traveling to Strausbourg. She is in love with Don Raymond and becomes jealous when she finds out Don Raymond is in love with her niece, Agnes. She asks him to leave the Castle of Lindenberg and later speaks poorly of his character.
Don Christoval, the Condé d'Ossorio, is Lorenzo's friend. He attracts Leonella's desires but does not return them.
Mother St. Ursula assists in Agnes' rescue. She is a witness to the Prioress' crimes and without her, Don Lorenzo would not be able to accuse the Prioress.
Theodore is Marguerite's son who becomes Don Raymond's page. He enjoys writing poetry and authors the poems “Love and Age” and “The Water King”. After reading “Love and Age”, Don Raymond points out the flaws in the piece, which may be flaws Lewis noticed in his own work. Far from being the unwaiveringly faithful servant stock character, Theodore plays a key role in moving the plot forward by helping with Don Raymond's plans to escape with Agnes. Theodore's character also provides foreshadowing through his poems. His poems parallel the action of the story. For instance, in his poem “The Water King”, the lovely maid's fate foreshadows Antonia's. In addition, Theodore also bears a striking resemblance to other characters in other of Lewis' works, including Leolyn in One O'clock (1811) and Eugene in “Mistrust” from Romantic Tales (1808).
Virginia de Villa Franca is introduced late in the story. She is a beautiful, virtuous young relation of the Prioress who represents St. Clare in the Procession. Virginia nurses the ill Agnes back to health and thus wins Lorenzo's affections. Like Isabella in The Castle of Otranto
The Castle of Otranto
The Castle of Otranto is a 1764 novel by Horace Walpole. It is generally regarded as the first gothic novel, initiating a literary genre which would become extremely popular in the later 18th century and early 19th century...
, she is introduced as an acceptable marriage partner for Lorenzo but plays an unessential part in the plot.
Plot summary
The story concerns Ambrosio - a pious, well-respected monkMonk
A monk is a person who practices religious asceticism, living either alone or with any number of monks, while always maintaining some degree of physical separation from those not sharing the same purpose...
in Spain - and his violent downfall. He is undone by carnal lust for his pupil, a woman disguised as a monk (Matilda), who tempts him to transgress, and, once satisfied by her, is overcome with desire for the innocent Antonia. Using magic spells, Matilda aids him in seducing Antonia, whom he later rapes and kills. Matilda is eventually revealed as an instrument of Satan in female form, who has orchestrated Ambrosio's downfall from the start. In the middle of telling this story, Lewis frequently makes further digressions, which serve to heighten the Gothic atmosphere of the tale while doing little to move along the main plot. A lengthy story about a "Bleeding Nun" is told, and many incidental verses are introduced. A second romance, between Lorenzo and Antonia, also gives way to a tale of Lorenzo's sister being tortured by hypocritical nuns (as a result of a third romantic plot). Eventually, the story catches back up with Ambrosio, and in several pages of impassioned prose, Ambrosio is delivered into the hands of the Inquisition
Inquisition
The Inquisition, Inquisitio Haereticae Pravitatis , was the "fight against heretics" by several institutions within the justice-system of the Roman Catholic Church. It started in the 12th century, with the introduction of torture in the persecution of heresy...
; he escapes by selling his soul to the devil
Devil
The Devil is believed in many religions and cultures to be a powerful, supernatural entity that is the personification of evil and the enemy of God and humankind. The nature of the role varies greatly...
for his deliverance from the death sentence which awaits him. The story ends with the devil preventing Ambrosio's attempted final repentance, and the sinful monk's prolonged torturous death. Ambrosio finds out by the devil that the woman that he had raped and killed, Antonia, was indeed his sister.
First edition
The first edition of The Monk was published sometime between 1795 and 1796. Older scholarship tended toward a 1795 publication year, but because no copies of the book so dated could be found, and because contemporary sources did not begin announcing or referencing the work until March 1796, the latter date began to be preferred. It was published anonymously, but for Lewis’s initials after the preface and was highly praised by reviewers in The Monthly Mirror of June 1796 as well as the Analytical ReviewAnalytical Review
The Analytical Review was a periodical established in London in 1788 by the publisher Joseph Johnson and the writer Thomas Christie. Part of the Republic of Letters, it was a gadfly publication, which offered readers summaries and analyses of the many new publications issued at the end of the...
.
Second edition
The first edition sold well, and a second edition was published in October of 1796. The good sales and reviews of the first had emboldened Lewis, and he signed the new edition with his full name, adding “M.P.” to reflect his newly acquired seat in the House of Commons. The book continued to rise in popularity, but in February 1797 review by a writer for the European Magazine, the novel was criticized for “plagiarism, immorality, and wild extravagance.”Fourth edition
Lewis wrote to his father on 23 February 1798, attempting to make reparations: the controversy caused by The Monk was a source of distress to his family. As recorded by Irwin: “twenty is not the age at which prudence is most to be expected. Inexperience prevented my distinguishing what should give offence; but as soon as I found that offence was given, I made the only reparation in my power: I carefully revised the work, and expunged every syllable on which could be grounded the slightest construction of immorality. This, indeed, was no difficult task, for the objection rested entirely on expressions too strong, and words carelessly chosen; not on the sentiments, characters, or general tendency of the work.”The fourth edition of the novel was published in 1798, and, according to Peck, “contains nothing which could endanger the most fragile virtue... He expunged every remotely offensive word in his three volumes, with meticulous attention to lust. Ambrosio, formerly a ravisher, becomes an intruder or betrayer; his incontinence changes to weakness or infamy, his lust to desire, his desires to emotions. Having indulged in excesses for three editions, he committed an error in the fourth.” Lewis wrote an apology for The Monk in the preface of another work; as recorded by Peck:
“Without entering into the discussion, whether the principles inculcated in “The Monk” are right or wrong, or whether the means by which the story is conducted is likely to do more mischief than the tendency is likely to produce good, I solemnly declare, that when I published the work I had no idea that its publication could be prejudicial; if I was wrong, the error proceeded from my judgment, not from my intention. Without entering into the merits of the advice which it proposes to convey, or attempting to defend (what I now condemn myself) the language and manner in which that advice was delivered, I solemnly declare, that in writing the passage which regards the Bible (consisting of a single page, and the only passage which I ever wrote on the subject) I had not the most distant intention to bring the sacred Writings into contempt, and that, had I suspected it of producing such an effect, I should not have written the paragraph.”
Reviews
In the same month as the second edition was published, Samuel Taylor ColeridgeSamuel Taylor Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet, Romantic, literary critic and philosopher who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla...
wrote a piece in The Critical Review
The Critical Review
The Critical Review was first edited by Tobias Smollett from 1756 to 1763, and was contributed to by Samuel Johnson, David Hume, John Hunter, and Oliver Goldsmith, until 1817....
, an important literary magazine of the day, in which he both praises and criticizes the novel harshly. He acknowledges that it is “the offspring of no common genius,” that the “underplot... is skilfully and closely connected with the main story, and is subservient to its development,” that the story Lewis weaves in about the bleeding nun is “truly terrific” and that he cannot recall a “bolder or more happy conception than that of the burning cross on the forehead of the wandering Jew.” Coleridge gives his highest praise to the character of Matilda, whom he believes is “the author’s master-piece. It is, indeed, exquisitely imagined, and as exquisitely supported. The whole work is distinguished by the variety and impressiveness of its incidents; and the author everywhere discovers an imagination rich, powerful, and fervid. Such are the excellencies” (7). Coleridge continues by saying that “the errors and defects are more numerous, and (we are sorry to add) of greater importance.” Because “the order of nature may be changed whenever the authors purposes demand it” there are no surprises in the work. Moral truth cannot be gleaned because Ambrosio was destroyed by spiritual beings, and no earthly being can sufficiently oppose the “power and cunning of supernatural beings.” Scenes of grotesquery and horror abound, which are a proof of “a low and vulgar taste.” The character of Ambrosio is “impossible... contrary to nature.” Coleridge argues that the most “grievous fault... for which no literary excellence can atone” is that “our author has contrived to make [tales of enchantments and witchcraft] ‘ ‘pernicious’ ‘, by blending, with an irreverent negligence, all that is most awfully true in religion with all that is most ridiculously absurd in superstition,” commenting with the immortal line that “the Monk is a romance, which if a parent saw in the hands of a son or daughter, he might reasonably turn pale.” Coleridge finishes the piece by explaining that he was “induced to pay particular attention to this work, from the unusual success which it has experienced” and that “the author is a man of rank and fortune. Yes! the author of the Monk signs himself a LEGISLATOR! We stare and tremble.”
Thomas James Mathias
Thomas James Mathias
Thomas James Mathias, FRS was a British satirist and scholar.Mathias was educated in Kingston upon Thames and Trinity College, Cambridge...
followed Coleridge’s lead in The Pursuits of Literature, a poem in the 18th-Century satiric tradition, but takes a step farther than Coleridge by claiming that a specific passage made the novel indictable under law. The passage, found in Chapter Seven Volume II, discusses an interpretation of the Bible as too lewd for youth to read.
These two major pieces lead the way for a multitude of other attacks on the novel, from such sources as the Monthly Review, the Monthly Magazine, and the Scots Magazine; the last of these attacked the novel six years after its publication. It was a general trend amongst those who criticized, however, to offer praise of some aspect of the novel. “It looked,” writes Parreaux, “as if every reviewer or critic of the book, no matter how hostile he was, felt compelled to at least pay lip-service to Lewis’s genius.”
The criticism of his novel, extending even into criticism of his person, never truly left Lewis, and an attack on his character was published by the Courier posthumously, calling itself a “just estimate of his character.” As recorded by MacDonald: “He had devoted the first fruits of his mind to the propagation of evil, and the whole long harvest was burnt up ... There is a moral in the life of this man ... He was a reckless defiler of the public mind; a profligate, he cared not how many were to be undone when he drew back the curtain of his profligacy; he had infected his reason with the insolent belief that the power to corrupt made the right, and that conscience might be laughed, so long as he could evade law. The Monk was an eloquent evil; but the man who compounded it knew in his soul that he was compounding poison for the multitude, and in that knowledge he sent it into the world.”
There were those who defended The Monk as well. Joseph Bell, publisher of the novel, spent half of his essay Impartial Structures on the Poem Called “The Pursuits of Literature” and Particularly a Vindication of the Romance of “The Monk” defending Lewis; Thomas Dutton, in his Literary Census: A Satirical Poem, retaliated against Mathias and praised Lewis; Henry Francis Robert Soame compared Lewis to Dante in his The Epistle in Rhyme to M. G. Lewis, Esq. M. P.
“Assurances that The Monk was not as dangerous as its enemies maintained failed to dampen its success with the reading public,” writes Peck. “They had been told that the book was horrible, blasphemous, and lewd, and they rushed to put their morality to the test.” Indeed, the novel’s popularity continued to rise and by 1800 there were five London and two Dublin editions.
Themes
A major theme prevalent in gothic novels contemporaneous to The Monk is that of the morality tale juxtaposed onto a horrific and often violent plot, laden with real or perceived supernaturalism. The morality tale is a work of literature designed to inculcate the reader with the author’s ethical precepts by outlining the experiences of the protagonist and showing how his or her virtuous decisions lead to favorable denouements, and, in contrast, their iniquitous actions contribute to their downfalls. Frequently, impious demons attempt to lead the hero into dissipation and vice, while sacrosanct angels try to secure the main character’s passage into heaven via the resistance of temptation. Lewis utilizes many of these conventions, but also modifies some of the common aspects and incorporates new elements of his own. Ultimately, Lewis’ thematic usage of the morality tale is conventional in that it shows the downfall of the depraved, yet also innovative because it has an overall lack of divine intercession and incorporates the unfortunate sacrifice of innocent characters in the course of its narrative. In doing so, The Monk displays similarities to gothic novels both antecedent and subsequent to its publication.In its essence, The Monk’s plot is not completely unpredictable or revolutionary. Ambrosio displays traces of hubris and lust very early in the novel. It is explained that “he [Ambrosio] dismissed them [the monks] with an air of conscious superiority, in which humility’s semblance combated with the reality of pride.” Similarly, “he fixed his eyes on the Virgin…Gracious God, should I then resist the temptation? Should I not barter for a single embrace the reward of my sufferings for thirty years?” Both passages explicitly show the conflicting forces, that is, the moral choices that rage within Ambrosio. His nature instructs him to exult himself above others and lust for the Virgin Mary, while his religious inclinations, or at least his awareness of his position within the church, command him to humility and chastity. Ambrosio begins to deviate from his holy conduct when he encounters Matilda, a character revealed at the end of the novel to be an emissary of Satan
Satan
Satan , "the opposer", is the title of various entities, both human and divine, who challenge the faith of humans in the Hebrew Bible...
. All of these circumstances are consistent with the classic model of the morality tale, and, true to form, once Ambrosio is tempted into sin he enters into a tailspin of increasing desire, which leads him to transgression and culminates in the loss of his eternal salvation and his grisly murder at the hands of the devil.
This pattern of wicked actions leading to ill consequences is exactly what is expected in a morality tale and is reflected in other Gothic novels. For example, Lewis’ work is often discussed in conjunction with that of Ann Radcliffe
Ann Radcliffe
Anne Radcliffe was an English author, and considered the pioneer of the gothic novel . Her style is romantic in its vivid descriptions of landscapes, and long travel scenes, yet the Gothic element is obvious through her use of the supernatural...
’s. Robert Miles
Robert Miles
Robert Miles is an Italian record producer, composer, musician and DJ in electronica and alternative music.-Biography:...
writes that “Ann Radcliffe
Ann Radcliffe
Anne Radcliffe was an English author, and considered the pioneer of the gothic novel . Her style is romantic in its vivid descriptions of landscapes, and long travel scenes, yet the Gothic element is obvious through her use of the supernatural...
and Matthew Lewis were the two most significant Gothic
Gothic fiction
Gothic fiction, sometimes referred to as Gothic horror, is a genre or mode of literature that combines elements of both horror and romance. Gothicism's origin is attributed to English author Horace Walpole, with his 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto, subtitled "A Gothic Story"...
novelists of the 1790s, an estimate of their importance shared by their contemporaries.”. Indeed, the repercussions of malevolent and self-serving actions are represented extraordinarily well in Radcliffe’s The Romance of the Forest. The Marquis in the story was driven to murder for “the title of his brother…and riches which would enable him to indulge his voluptuous inclinations.”. Similar to Ambrosio, the Marquis was tempted and succumbed to sin, which sets him on a wicked path leading to his public shame and suicide.
However, despite its outcome, The Monk does have some very marked discrepancies from the normal morality tale setup used in gothic novels. In most morality tales, both vice and virtue are represented equally, but in Lewis’ work, the powers of evil are disproportionately represented. Technically speaking, Ambrosio is surrounded by virtue in the sense that he is always conscious that what he is doing is wrong and, until the end of the novel, never believes that he cannot repent. In fact, he tells Matilda that “the consequences [of witchcraft] are too horrible: I…am not so blinded by lust as to sacrifice for her enjoyment my existence both in this world and the next.” However, this general sense of right and wrong is a feeble, inefficacious defense for Ambrosio when he is confronted by the physical presence and influence of demons. There are no corresponding angels who appear before Ambrosio to counter the influence of the devil and try to dissuade him from his path of destruction. As a result, his depravity is accelerated and magnified from the minor character foibles that are congenital to him to the egregious evils that possess him by the end of the novel. The only apparition that is potentially heaven-sent is that of Elvira’s ghost. She comes back from the grave to caution her daughter, Antonia that “yet three days, and we shall meet again!” While the apparition may seem to be trying to warn Antonia of her impending death, the ghost’s appearance causes Jacintha to fetch Ambrosio to dispel the spirit, allowing him to drug Antonia and take her under his power, a chain of events ultimately leading to the demise of Antonia, which the ghost foretold. As a result of the ghost’s intrusion, Antonia is put directly into harm’s way, an action much more apropos for a demonic presence rather than a heavenly one.
This lack of divinity is, however, not unique to The Monk. John Moore’s Zeluco focuses on the nefarious plots of a single man who cannot control his passions. Like Ambrosio, Zeluco’s disposition is shown very early in the novel to be disagreeable. In his youth Zeluco “seized it [his pet sparrow] with his hand, and while it struggled to get free, with a curse he squeezed the little animal to death.” Zeluco continually gratifies his vices much to his discredit and dishonor, and, as in The Monk, his sins compound upon themselves culminating in the infanticide of his only son. Unlike Ambrosio, however, Zeluco has no physical demons spurring him onwards, but rather his insatiable appetite for sin.
Lewis also deviates from what is typically expected from morality tales when he includes the sacrifice of innocent people in the latter chapters of the novel. As a result of Ambrosio’s personal vices, both Elvira and Antonia are slain. Elvira finds Ambrosio, “the man whom Madrid esteems a saint…at this late hour near the couch of my unhappy child)” on the verge of committing rape, and Ambrosio murders her to prevent her from revealing his crimes. Elvira was guilty of no crime and throughout the novel was committed to the welfare of her family, and her daughter in particular. Likewise, Antonia is murdered to prevent her from alerting Officers of the Inquisition
Inquisition
The Inquisition, Inquisitio Haereticae Pravitatis , was the "fight against heretics" by several institutions within the justice-system of the Roman Catholic Church. It started in the 12th century, with the introduction of torture in the persecution of heresy...
of Ambrosio’s crimes. Antonia is also undeserving of her fate as she was always a loyal daughter and honest woman throughout the novel.
Another gothic novel in which one individual’s quest for a gratification of the senses leads to the ruin of others is Vathek. In the novel, Vathek attempts to sacrifice fifty children to a demon in order to gain his favor. Without mercy he “pushed the poor innocent into the gulph [open to hell].” Similarly, in The Necromancer, an entire village is sacrificed to a troop of banditti who are angered at their hideout being revealed. The leader of group explaining that “the villagers are not yet punished …for having assisted them, but they shall not escape their doom.” Admittedly, Vathek can be more readily identified as a morality tale, but The Necromancer warns against the pernicious effects of a legal system that is bereft of mercy. A criminal declares during his confession that his life “will afford a useful lesson to judges, and teach the guardians of the people to be careful how they inflict punishments if they will not make a complete rogue of many a hapless wretch… .” In this way, The Necromancer references the same type of ethics extant in morality tales. Similar to The Monk, these two novels showcase morality tales in which the sinful choices of characters lead to the suffering of innocent people.
Throughout The Monk, Lewis incorporates traditional aspects of the morality tale while including elements that are unconventional and display similarities to other Gothic novels. Specifically, the sacrifice of innocent people and the lack of divine intercession in The Monk separate it from the traditional morality tale narrative. In doing so, Lewis keeps the ethics and conventions of his predecessors, while using his own innovations and techniques to throw the debasement of Ambrosio into greater relief and to show his downfall in a more appalling, and, ultimately, a more realistic way.
Anti-feminist qualities
The Monk manipulates the female as the main source of spectacle. Females are reduced to spectacles in The Monk through two primary means. One is sensational environments and the second is the brutality of their treatments.Women are in sensational environments, and while they are trying to create better lives for themselves, they only end up with worse lives. This is portrayed in the subplot of Agnes. She is trying to create a better life for herself by escaping from the Castle of Lindenberg. She even comes up with a unique plan that she explains to Raymond, “I shall quit my chamber… drest in the same apparel as the Ghost is supposed to wear. Whoever meets me will be too much terrified to oppose my escape'. However, in anti-feminist fashion (of not letting the woman succeed in a plan to make her life better), a real ghost (the Bleeding Nun) appears to foil her plan. “By staging this episode, Lewis emphasizes how Agnes’s noncompliance – her insistence on her own pleasure, and her defiant questioning of the destiny that others have mapped out for her – nevertheless fails to found the mythical new society”. Therefore by trying to escape her current prison, she only ends up in a different kind of prison, hence, not making a better life for herself.
An example of brutality of treatment is seen in Agnes as well. First Agnes, a pregnant woman, is imprisoned for a single sexual infraction. Then her whereabouts are concealed from her relatives, and the Pope’s order to release her is disregarded. Finally, her newborn child and she are both left to starve to death. Another example is the Bleeding Nun who had her bones lie unburied near the Lindenburg Castle. “Know then, that my bones lie still unburied: They rot in the obscurity of Lindenberg Hole. None but this Youth has the right of consigning them to the Grave." After being horribly murdered, she does not even receive the dignity of a burial. Thirdly, is the rape and murder of Antonia by her brother Ambrosio. A final example is the Prioress being trampled and violated by an incensed mob. The rioters dragged the Prioress “through the Streets, spurning her, trampling her, and treating her with every species of cruelty which hate or vindictive fury could invent”. The Prioress became a “wretched woman” in this scene. Most importantly throughout these examples is the fact that each woman’s story is linked to their femininity. “Agnes is a mother who holds the decomposed body of her infant; the Bleeding Nun is the licentious wide of a Baron; Antonia is the innocent virgin; and, finally, the Prioress is the feminine head of the Convent of St. Clare.”
Furthermore, women are seen to cause the downfall of other women. “Antonia’s mother Elvira could hardly have chosen a worse companion for her daughter than her sister Leonella, for Leonella’s indiscretion and absurdity contribute directly to the misfortunes that later befall Antonia.
Finally, while The Monk ends with weddings, this does not mean happy endings for the women. The marriage of Raymond and Agnes leaves Agnes vowing to be a devoted wife. “The more culpable have been the errors of your Mistress, the more exemplary shall be the conduct of your wife”. Instead of finally reaching a happy environment and living situation in the end of the novel, this marriage still portrays anti-feminist qualities by leaving Agnes as completely devoted to her husband, without having a life of her own. The second marriage is of Lorenzo is to Virginia de Villa- Franca, who is,” The Idol of her Parents, the admiration of Madrid, endowed by nature and education with every perfection of person and mind”. Once again a marriage is, “calculated to make him happy”. Instead of being married for the traditional value of love, both of these marriages are made only to create the most happiness for the men without taking the enjoyment of the women into consideration.
Blurred gender roles
Gender is blurred in the unreliable character of Rosario/ Matilda in The Monk. “As in The Monk, the supernatural body is a sexualized, ambiguous object (i.e., the shedevil Matilda)”. This character is introduced as a man without real clarification since, “no one had ever seen his face”. However, this is portraying a woman as an imposture since Rosario is really the female Matilda, “I am a Woman… I am Matilda; You are her Beloved!”.In addition to the blurred lines between genders in Rosario/ Matilda, there are obvious gender role reversals. Men are portrayed in a very feminine sense, not just women. For a bit of this novel Ambrosio is the weak main character that is normally seen in the female character in earlier Gothic novels, such as Matilda from The Castle of Wolfenbach. Ambrosio is seen from a “feminine” position at the start of this novel. Like a young girl who is protected to keep her virtue and innocence, Ambrosio is similarly protected and ignorant of the world and temptations due to being raised in a monastery.
Both Antonia and Ambrosio do not seem to distinguish the opposite sex, once again blurring the gender roles. Antonia does not seem to comprehend, “that there is such a thing as a Man in the world” and she “imagine(s) every body to be of the same sex with (herself)”. Because she is innocent in regard to understanding men are different from herself, this, “links the same feminine brother and sister together”.
Similar to Antonia, Ambrosio seems to forget that Matilda is a woman. This is most likely due to Matilda befriending Ambrosio as a man (Rosario) along with Ambrosio’s innocence. “It is Ambrosio’s sexual ignorance and hence ‘innocence’ that makes him vulnerable to Matilda’s seduction”. Ambrosio expressed this after seeing Matilda’s breasts by saying. “May I not safely credit her assertions? Will it not be easy for me to forget her sex and still consider her as my Friends and my disciple [?] … She strove to keep me in ignorance of her sex … She has made no attempts to rouse my slumbering passions, not has She ever conversed with me till this night on the subject of Love”. Excuses aside, Ambrosio continues to blur the lines between female and male.
In addition to Ambrosio being feminized, Raymond is feminized a bit. When Raymond is with the Bleeding Nun, whom he thinks is his lover Agnes, “he sexually surrenders and sinks upon Matilda’s bosom, alerting the reader that another role reversal is forthcoming”. Furthermore, the Bleeding Nun takes the male role. She accomplishes this by lifting the ironic “wedding” veil, kissing the bride (by grabbing and kissing his hand), and reciting the wedding incantation, “Raymond! Raymond! Thou art mine! Raymond! Raymond! I am thine! In thy veins while blood shall roll, I am thine! Thou art mine! Mine thy body! Mine thy soul!" Finally, Raymond has “frequent fainting fits,” which is normally seen in weak female characters in Gothic novels, not male characters.
Critique
The Monk is one of the more lurid and "transgressiveTransgressional fiction
Transgressive fiction is a genre of literature that focuses on characters who feel confined by the norms and expectations of society and who break free of those confines in unusual and/or illicit ways. Because they are rebelling against the basic norms of society, protagonists of transgressional...
" of Gothic novels. It is also the first book to feature a priest as the villain. In this respect it would serve as a model for such future works of literature as The Hunchback of Notre Dame
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
The Hunchback of Notre-Dame is a novel by Victor Hugo published in 1831. The French title refers to the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, on which the story is centered.-Background:...
.
This novel shares a number of traits with Ann Radcliffe's
Ann Radcliffe
Anne Radcliffe was an English author, and considered the pioneer of the gothic novel . Her style is romantic in its vivid descriptions of landscapes, and long travel scenes, yet the Gothic element is obvious through her use of the supernatural...
gothic novels The Italian
The Italian (novel)
The Italian, or the Confessional of the Black Penitents is a Gothic novel written by the English author Ann Radcliffe. It is the last book Radcliffe published during her lifetime...
and The Mysteries of Udolpho
The Mysteries of Udolpho
The Mysteries of Udolpho, by Ann Radcliffe, was published in four volumes on 8 May 1794 by G. G. and J. Robinson of London. The firm paid her £500 for the manuscript. The contract is housed at the University of Virginia Library. Her fourth and most popular novel, The Mysteries of Udolpho follows...
.
Featuring demon
Demon
call - 1347 531 7769 for more infoIn Ancient Near Eastern religions as well as in the Abrahamic traditions, including ancient and medieval Christian demonology, a demon is considered an "unclean spirit" which may cause demonic possession, to be addressed with an act of exorcism...
ic pacts, rape
Rape
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...
, incest
Incest
Incest is sexual intercourse between close relatives that is usually illegal in the jurisdiction where it takes place and/or is conventionally considered a taboo. The term may apply to sexual activities between: individuals of close "blood relationship"; members of the same household; step...
, and such props as the Wandering Jew
Wandering Jew
The Wandering Jew is a figure from medieval Christian folklore whose legend began to spread in Europe in the 13th century. The original legend concerns a Jew who taunted Jesus on the way to the Crucifixion and was then cursed to walk the earth until the Second Coming...
, ruined castle
Castle
A castle is a type of fortified structure built in Europe and the Middle East during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars debate the scope of the word castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble...
s, and the Spanish Inquisition, The Monk serves more or less as a compendium of Gothic taste. Ambrosio, the hypocrite foiled by his own lust, and his sexual misconduct inside the walls of convent
Convent
A convent is either a community of priests, religious brothers, religious sisters, or nuns, or the building used by the community, particularly in the Roman Catholic Church and in the Anglican Communion...
s and monasteries
Monastery
Monastery denotes the building, or complex of buildings, that houses a room reserved for prayer as well as the domestic quarters and workplace of monastics, whether monks or nuns, and whether living in community or alone .Monasteries may vary greatly in size – a small dwelling accommodating only...
, is a vividly portrayed villain
Villain
A villain is an "evil" character in a story, whether a historical narrative or, especially, a work of fiction. The villain usually is the antagonist, the character who tends to have a negative effect on other characters...
, as well as an embodiment of much of the traditional English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
mistrust of Roman Catholicism, with its intrusive confessional
Penance
Penance is repentance of sins as well as the proper name of the Roman Catholic, Orthodox Christian, and Anglican Sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation/Confession. It also plays a part in non-sacramental confession among Lutherans and other Protestants...
, its political and religious authoritarianism, and its cloistered lifestyles. The American
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
fictitious anti-Catholic libel, The Awful Disclosures of Maria Monk
Maria Monk
Maria Monk was a Canadian woman who claimed to have been a nun who had been sexually exploited in her convent...
, borrowed much from the plot of this novel. Despite the critics' comments on its crudeness and lack of depth, it proved to be one of the most popular novels of the Romantic Period.
It is among the many Gothic works referenced in the Jane Austen
Jane Austen
Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature, her realism and biting social commentary cementing her historical importance among scholars and critics.Austen lived...
novel Northanger Abbey
Northanger Abbey
Northanger Abbey was the first of Jane Austen's novels to be completed for publication, though she had previously made a start on Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice. According to Cassandra Austen's Memorandum, Susan was written approximately during 1798–99...
.
This novel was considered by the Marquis de Sade
Marquis de Sade
Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade was a French aristocrat, revolutionary politician, philosopher, and writer famous for his libertine sexuality and lifestyle...
as a reaction to the 1789 French Revolution
French Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
, with Lewis using the Gothic to express concerns circulating around England in the Romantic Period. Concerns such as social stability and the mis-use of power are some of the issues explored.
Robert Miles suggests that The Monk is about “veiling and disguise” and that it is possible to read into the novel a possible expression of the “open secret” of Lewis’s homosexuality through the characters of Ambrosio, Rosario/Matilda, and Lucifer. “In the end, Ambrosio’s desires are insatiable... But Ambrosio’s desire may be insatiable because it is denied its true object. The closest the text gets to disclosing what this object might be is an elaborately staged event which obfuscates as it reveals. In the centre of the text, in quick succession, Matilda performs two acts of conjuration. In the first, Antonia’s coy, modest, naked body is displayed before Ambrosio in Matilda’s magic mirror. In the second, in labyrinthine caverns beneath the monastery, Matilda invokes an androgynous, decidedly camp ‘Daemon’: ‘a Youth seemingly scarce eighteen, the perfection of whose form and face was unrivalled’. The ‘beautiful’ figure, ‘perfectly naked’, with ‘silken locks’ and surrounded by ‘clouds of rose-coloured lights’ (277), appears as the key to Ambrosio’s possession of Antonia. The figure, at Matilda’s strident behest finally relinquishes the ‘myrtle’ which will enable Antonia’s seduction. The parallelism of the stagin raises the question of causation: is the Daemon the key to the sexual possession of Antonia, or is Antonia’s image a screen for Ambrosio’s true object of desire, the epicene devil?”
The Wandering Jew and the Bleeding Nun
The Wandering JewWandering Jew
The Wandering Jew is a figure from medieval Christian folklore whose legend began to spread in Europe in the 13th century. The original legend concerns a Jew who taunted Jesus on the way to the Crucifixion and was then cursed to walk the earth until the Second Coming...
is a man doomed to walk the earth until the second coming of Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...
. There are several interpretations of why he is punished this way. One legend says that Jesus wished to take a drink from a horse trough and the Jew refused, instead pointing to a hoofprint filled with water on the ground and “observed that it was good enough for such an enemy of Moses” Another legend says that when Christ sat to rest on a man’s doorstep, a man from Jerusalem drove him away, yelling, “‘Walk faster!’ And Christ replied, ‘I go, but you will walk until I come again!’” Both these legends show that the Jew’s rude behavior to Christ is the reason for his punishment of endless wandering.
The Wandering Jew appears in the subplot of Raymond and Agnes’ story in The Monk and foreshadows Ambrosio’s encounters with supernatural devilish spirits. The Wandering Jew is first referenced to as a “Great Mogul,” but he displays several characteristics associated with the legend of the Wandering Jew that allow us to figure out his true identity before it is directly revealed. He tells Raymond:
- Fate obliges me to be constantly in movement; I am not permitted to pass more than a fortnight in the same place. I have no friend in the world, and, from the restlessness of my destiny, I never can acquire one. Fain would I lay down my miserable life, for I envy those who enjoy the quiet of the grave; but death eludes me, and flies from my embrace.
This speech reveals that this Great Mogul must constantly move from place to place, has no friends, and can never die. All of these signs point to the legend of the Wandering Jew. On top of this, the Great Mogul reveals, “God has set his seal upon me, and all his creatures respect this fatal mark”. This refers to the burning cross on his forehead, a mark of God that gives the Great Mogul his power to destroy evil spirits, such as the Bleeding Nun. This burning mark is a characteristic of the Wandering Jew specifically found in Spanish variants of the legend. The Monk is primarily set in Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
and its main characters, like Raymond, are mostly Spanish. Therefore, the Wandering Jew fulfills the aspects of the legend most commonly found in Spain. Another characteristic of the Wandering Jew found in Spain is that although he is miserable and cursed, he spends his time praying, doing good works, and helping others. Theodore tells Raymond that “he did much good in the town,” and he helps Raymond get rid of the Bleeding Nun. The Great Mogul’s identity as the Wandering Jew is eventually revealed:
- When I [Raymond] related my adventure to my Uncle, the Cardinal-Duke, He told me that He had no doubt of this singular Man’s being the celebrated Character known universally by the name of ‘the wandering Jew.’ His not being permitted to pass more than fourteen days on the same spot, the burning Cross impressed upon his fore-head, the effect which it produced upon the Beholders, and many other circumstances give this supposition the colour of truth.
The Cardinal-Duke’s confirmation and belief in the existence of the Wandering Jew gives credit to Raymond’s story.
The Bleeding Nun also appears in the subplot of Raymond and Agnes and epitomizes the sin of erotic desires. Raymond mistakes her for his lover, Agnes, because she is veiled and he cannot see her face. The veil “conceals and inhibits sexuality comes by the same gesture to represent it.” Both Antonia and Matilda are veiled to protect their virginity and innocence and it is expected that Agnes also covers her face for this reason when she meets Raymond. However, the removal of the veil reveals the Bleeding Nun, dead and punished because of her sins. While she was alive, she was a prostitute and a murderer before she was murdered by her lover. Her story is the first we receive of how giving in to sexual desires leads to death and eternal unrest. Raymond expects to find Agnes’ beautiful, virgin face beneath the veil, but instead finds death. Her unveiling connects the loss of virginity and the giving in to sexual desires with death and punishment. Both the Bleeding Nun and Ambrosio begin pious but then fall prey to their sexual desires. Ambrosio has already given into his desire for Matilda and the story of the Bleeding Nun told in the subplot foreshadows his further downfall with Antonia and his eternal punishment in the hands of the devil.
The Bleeding Nun also introduces the world of the supernatural
Supernatural
The supernatural or is that which is not subject to the laws of nature, or more figuratively, that which is said to exist above and beyond nature...
into The Monk. The supernatural something “that is above nature or belonging to a higher realm or system than that of nature” This introduction brings another Gothic element into the book. Up until this point, the plot has relied on natural elements of the sublime to invoke the terror expected of a Gothic novel. The entrance of the Bleeding Nun transforms this natural world into a world where the supernatural is possible. When she gets into Raymond’s carriage, “Immediately thick clouds obscured the sky: The winds howled around us, the lightning flashed, and the Thunder roared tremendously.” Nature is acknowledging the presence of a supernatural force.
When Agnes tells Raymond the story of how the Bleeding Nun’s ghost haunts the Castle of Lindenberg, Raymond asks her wh ether she believes the story, and she replies “How can you ask such a question? No, no, Alphonso! I have too much reason to lament superstition’s influence to be its Victim myself.” It is not until the Bleeding Nun appears to Raymond at night that the idea of the existence of the supernatural begins to be a reality. The Wandering Jew’s appearance coincides with this first instance of the supernatural. He can see the Bleeding Nun, proving that she is not a figment of Raymond’s imagination. His supernatural abilities give access to the Bleeding Nun’s story and provide plausibility to the existence of the supernatural. He also has the power to free Raymond from her presence. The later confirmation of Raymond’s uncle to the existence of the Wandering Jew allows the whole story to be taken for fact. This establishes the reality of the supernatural and lays the groundwork for Matilda’s later use of magic and her and Ambrosio’s interaction with evil spirits.
Adaptations
Edward LoderEdward Loder
Edward James Loder was an English composer and conductor. His best remembered work is the 1855 opera Raymond and Agnes.-Biography:...
used the work as the basis for his 1855 opera Raymond and Agnes
Raymond and Agnes
Raymond and Agnes is an opera in 4 acts by composer Edward Loder. The work's English language libretto by Edward Fitzball is based on Matthew Lewis's classic Gothic novel, The Monk. The opera premiered on 14 April 1855 at the Theatre Royal, Manchester....
.
The French writer Antonin Artaud
Antonin Artaud
Antoine Marie Joseph Artaud, more well-known as Antonin Artaud was a French playwright, poet, actor and theatre director...
's only full-length novel of the same name is a reworking of Lewis's plot. Artaud discarded some of the original's subplots and added others of his own, wanting his version to be even more shocking and subversive than the original.
Luis Buñuel
Luis Buñuel
Luis Buñuel Portolés was a Spanish-born filmmaker — later a naturalized citizen of Mexico — who worked in Spain, Mexico, France and the US..-Early years:...
and Jean-Claude Carrière
Jean-Claude Carrière
Jean-Claude Carrière is a screenwriter and actor. Alumnus of the École normale supérieure de Saint-Cloud, he was a frequent collaborator with Luis Buñuel...
attempted to film a version of The Monk in the 1960s, but the project was halted due to lack of funds. Buñuel's friend, the Greek director Ado Kyrou
Adonis Kyrou
Adonis Kyrou was a Greek filmmaker and writer.Residing in France, where he was a critic, filmmaker, and author of L'Âge d'or de la carte postale , Amour - érotisme & cinéma and Le surréalisme au cinéma , the last two published by Eric Losfeld's publishing house Le Terrain Vague.He was a...
, used this script as the basis for his 1972 film version. Le Moine (English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
The Monk) boasted an international cast with Franco Nero
Franco Nero
Franco Nero is an Italian actor.-Early life:Nero was born Francesco Sparanero in San Prospero Parmense , the son of a sergeant in the...
in the title role. The film also starred Nathalie Delon, Eliana de Santis, Nadja Tiller
Nadja Tiller
Nadja Tiller is an Austrian actress. She was one of the most popular German actresses of the 1950s and 1960s.She won the Miss Austria competition in 1949, a national beauty pageant for unmarried women in Austria. She had her major film debut in 1952 in 'Märchen vom Glück .In 1955, she acted...
and Nicol Williamson
Nicol Williamson
Nicol Williamson is a Scottish-born English actor who was described by English playwright John Osborne as "the greatest actor since Marlon Brando".-Early life:...
.
In 1990 The Monk was produced by Celtic Films. It starred Paul McGann
Paul McGann
Paul McGann is an English actor who made his name on the BBC serial The Monocled Mutineer, in which he played the lead role...
as the title character, and was written and directed by Francisco Lara Polop.
A stage adaptation by Christopher Renstrom was produced off-off-Broadway by Bad Neighbors Theater Co. in 1992.
A new stage adaptation of The Monk written by Nirmala Nataraj premiered Oct. 9, 2008 at the Exit Theatre in San Francisco.
A brand new musical parodying the novel is in development. A workshop of the first act (of at least three) was presented at Carnegie Mellon University in March 2010, and the second act in October 2010.
Grant Morrison
Grant Morrison
Grant Morrison is a Scottish comic book writer, playwright and occultist. He is known for his nonlinear narratives and counter-cultural leanings, as well as his successful runs on titles like Animal Man, Doom Patrol, JLA, The Invisibles, New X-Men, Fantastic Four, All-Star Superman, and...
and Klaus Janson
Klaus Janson
Klaus Janson is a German-born American comic book artist, working regularly for Marvel Comics and DC Comics and sporadically for independent companies...
's 1990 DC graphic novel Batman: Gothic
Batman: Gothic
Gothic is a 1990 Batman comic book storyline that ran through the Legends of the Dark Knight monthly series. It was written by Grant Morrison and illustrated by Klaus Janson.- Plot :...
relies heavily and overtly upon the Monk, combined with elements of Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni
Don Giovanni is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and with an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It was premiered by the Prague Italian opera at the Teatro di Praga on October 29, 1787...
, as the inspiration for the plot.
A new film adaption, The Monk
The Monk (2011 film)
The Monk is a 2011 French-Spanish thriller directed by Dominik Moll. It is an adaptation of Matthew Lewis' gothic novel of the same name. It chronicles the story of a Capucin Ambrosio , a well-respected monk in Spain and his downfall...
, is done by French-German director Dominik Moll in 2011, it is shot in Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
and stars Vincent Cassel
Vincent Cassel
Vincent Cassel is a Cesar award winning French actor probably best known to English-speaking audiences through his performances in the Ocean's Trilogy of films and Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan.-Personal life:...
, Déborah François
Déborah François
Déborah François is a Belgian actress. She starred in the Palme d'Or winning film L'Enfant playing the lead role of Sonya...
, Geraldine Chaplin
Geraldine Chaplin
Geraldine Leigh Chaplin is an English-American actress and the daughter of Charlie Chaplin.Chaplin first came to prominence for her Golden Globe-nominated role of Tonya in David Lean's Doctor Zhivago . She received her second Golden Globe nomination for Robert Altman's Nashville...
and Sergi López i Ayats. The shoot begins in mid April and is set for 12 weeks.
Works cited
- Anderson, George K. The Legend of the Wandering Jew. Hanover: Brown University Press, 1991. Print.
- Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. "Review of The Monk by Matthew Lewis". The Norton Anthology of English Literature. 8th ed. Vol. D. Ed. Stephen *Greenblatt and M. H. Abrams. New York: W.W. Norton, 2006. Print.
- Irwin, Joseph James. M.G. "Monk" Lewis. Boston: Twayne, 1976. Print.
- Lewis, Matthew. The Monk. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008. Print.
- Miles, Robert. "Ann Radcliffe and Matthew Lewis." A Companion to the Gothic. Ed. David Punter. Oxford: Blackwell, 2000. Print.
- Macdonald, David Lorne. Monk Lewis: a Critical Biography. Toronto: University of Toronto, 2000. Print.
- Peck, Louis F. A Life of Matthew G. Lewis. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1961. Print.
- Parreaux, André. The Publication of The Monk; a Literary Event, 1796-1798. Paris: M. Didier, 1960. Print.
- Railo, Eino. The Haunted Castle: A Study of the Elements of English Romanticism. London: Routledge & Sons, ltd, 1927. Print.
External links
- The Monk in a 1907 edition at Google Books