Background
The novel draws extensively on Gnosticism, and this system of belief recurs as a plot element throughout the Quintet. Durrell had an interest in Gnosticism from the early 1940s and had studied Gnostic texts. [1] According to critics James Gifford and Stephen Osadetz, for Monsieur, Durrell drew from Serge Hutin's Les Gnostiques, as he had marked numerous passages in his copy, as well as contemporary newspaper reports he held of a Slovenian suicide cult. These materials are held at the Bibliotheque Lawrence Durrell, Université Paris X, Nanterre. [2]
Gifford and Osadetz say that "most critics" incorrectly suggested that the author had based his discussion on Jacques Lacarrière's The Gnostics [2] because he had known the essayist and critic since 1971 and wrote the "Foreword" to the 1974 English translation of his book. [2] [3] In Monsieur, "Durrell's Gnostics enact their refusal of the cursed world, flawed in every way, through suicide via the active acceptance of death." [3] But Lacarrière had written that "suicide is the absolute antithesis of the Gnostic attitude." [4] The Gnostic suicide plot is an element that Durrell uses in his four late novels of the Avignon Quintet.
Durrell's 1974 novel was published prior to the publication in English of the Nag Hammadi Library (1978). This was greeted with great interest by the many interested in these unique materials. The annotated edition has translations of an extensive stash of ancient documents from the period of early Christianity when Gnosticism was a powerful movement. The documents were discovered in the 1940s and had been tightly controlled by a group of scholars. The English edition of the Nag Hammadi papers refers to Durrell in its introduction, but largely in relation to his earlier The Alexandria Quartet (1957 to 1960). [5]
Plot summary
Five characters in Monsieur (including Durrell, referred to as "D," of "Devil in the Details") claim to be the author of the book. [6]
In the first section, "Outremer" (outre-mer, meaning overseas in French, and used to officially refer to former colonies that are now departments and territories of the metropole), protagonist Bruce Drexel is introduced, who is the chief narrator of the novel. (He shares certain characteristics with Durrell, such as working as a diplomat and press attaché.) [6] He is returning to Provence after learning of the suicide of his lover, Piers de Nogaret; Drexel is married to Piers' sister Sylvie. Drexel's wife has been institutionalized for mental illness for some time. He revisits Avignon with his friend Toby, while attending to the necessary funeral arrangements. He reminisces about his life with Piers and Sylvie. He recalls rich winter scenes when the three were first in love, as well as a novel written about them by Robin Sutcliffe. Another character, Aubrey Blanford, is noted briefly as having recently published a novel and gained fame from it.
The second chapter, "Macabru," recounts Bruce, Piers, and Sylvie's journey into Egypt years earlier. There they meet Akkad, who initiates them into a Gnostic cult. Akkad takes them to Macabru, an oasis in the desert, to introduce them to the cult's rituals. They take an extended journey together on the Nile River in this section. (Durrell's second novel of the Quintet, Livia, has characters make a river journey on the Rhone.)
"Sutcliffe, or the Venetian Documents" presents a new narrator, Robin Sutcliffe, identified as a character in Blanford's novel. This appears to render the previous materials as fictional, unless this is another fiction. Sutcliffe has various misadventures in Venice and recalls his failed marriage to Pia, Bruce's sister.
"Life with Toby" returns to Bruce and Toby in Avignon, discussing a theory about the Knights Templar. This returns to the Gnostic theme. This section is interrupted by another text in "The Green Notebook," which returns to Sutcliffe. (Durrell initially wrote Monsieur in a green notebook. "The Green Notebook" in this novel consists largely of his unrevised notes from work that preceded this novel.) This section becomes highly fragmentary.
"Dinner at Quartilla's" is the last section of the novel. It reintroduces author Aubrey Blanford, who claims to have written the entire novel, [6] in which Sutcliffe is a character. He dines with his friend, the old Duchess Tu. But she is known to have been long dead.
The novel ends with an Envoi; it provides a list of who begat whom throughout the novel, but without a final resolution.
Gnosticism is a collection of religious ideas and systems that coalesced in the late 1st century AD among early Christian sects. These diverse groups emphasized personal spiritual knowledge (gnosis) above the proto-orthodox teachings, traditions, and authority of religious institutions. Gnostic cosmogony generally presents a distinction between a supreme, hidden God and a malevolent lesser divinity who is responsible for creating the material universe. Consequently, Gnostics considered material existence flawed or evil, and held the principal element of salvation to be direct knowledge of the hidden divinity, attained via mystical or esoteric insight. Many Gnostic texts deal not in concepts of sin and repentance, but with illusion and enlightenment.
Lawrence George Durrell was an expatriate British novelist, poet, dramatist, and travel writer. He was the eldest brother of naturalist and writer Gerald Durrell.
The Nag Hammadi library is a collection of early Christian and Gnostic texts discovered near the Upper Egyptian town of Nag Hammadi in 1945.
The Apocryphon of John, also called the Secret Book of John or the Secret Revelation of John, is a 2nd-century Sethian Gnostic Christian pseudepigraphical text attributed to John the Apostle. It is one of the texts addressed by Irenaeus in his Christian polemic Against Heresies, placing its composition before 180 AD. It is presented as describing Jesus appearing and giving secret knowledge (gnosis) to his disciple John. The author describes it as having occurred after Jesus had "gone back to the place from which he came".
The Letter of Peter to Philip is a Gnostic writing. It was initially discovered as the second tractate in Codex VIII of the Nag Hammadi library. The tractate is a Coptic translation of a Greek original. An additional copy of the text, also written in Coptic, was later found in Codex Tchacos. The author of the original Greek text is unknown, but it was probably written in the late 2nd or early 3rd century.
The Sethians were one of the main currents of Gnosticism during the 2nd and 3rd century AD, along with Valentinianism and Basilideanism. According to John D. Turner, it originated in the 2nd century AD as a fusion of two distinct Hellenistic Judaic philosophies and was influenced by Christianity and Middle Platonism. However, the exact origin of Sethianism is not properly understood.
The Three Steles of Seth is a Sethian Gnostic text. It is the fifth tractate in Codex VII of the Nag Hammadi library. The writing is in Coptic and takes up the last nine pages of the codex.
The Gnostic Apocalypse of Peter, also known as the Coptic Apocalypse of Peter and Revelation of Peter, is the third tractate in Codex VII of the Nag Hammadi library. The work is associated with Gnosticism, a sect of early Christianity, and is considered part of the New Testament apocrypha and a work of apocalyptic literature. It was likely originally written in the Koine Greek language and composed around 200 CE. The surviving manuscript from Nag Hammadi is a poor-quality translation of the Greek into Coptic, and likely dates from the 4th century.
The Gospel of the Truth is one of the Gnostic texts from the New Testament apocrypha found in the Nag Hammadi codices ("NHC"). It exists in two Coptic translations, a Subakhmimic rendition surviving almost in full in the first Nag Hammadi codex and a Sahidic in fragments in the twelfth codex.
Jacques Lacarrière was a French writer, born in Limoges. He studied moral philosophy, classical literature, and Hindu philosophy and literature. Professionally, he was known as a prominent critic, journalist, and essayist.
The Second Treatise of the Great Seth, also known as the Second Discourse of the Great Seth and Second Logos of the Great Seth, is a Gnostic text. It is the second tractate in Codex VII of the Nag Hammadi library. It was likely originally written in the Koine Greek language and composed around 200 CE. The surviving manuscript from Nag Hammadi is a translation of the Greek into Coptic. The work's author is unknown; he was perhaps writing in Alexandria, the literary center of Egyptian Christianity.
The Testimony of Truth is a Gnostic Christian text. It is the third of three treatises in Codex IX of the Nag Hammadi library texts, taking up pages 29–74 of the codex. The original title is unknown; the editor created the title based on expressions in the text, such as "the word of truth" and "true testimony." The text is a homily that argues for accepting spiritual truth and renouncing the material world. The author interprets the serpent that instructed Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden as Christ, who revealed knowledge of a malevolent Creator. Testimony of Truth is also the only Nag Hammadi text that identifies opposing Gnostic Christian groups by name.
The Hypostasis of the Archons, also called The Reality of the Rulers or The Nature of the Rulers, is a Gnostic writing. The only known surviving manuscript is in Coptic as the fourth tractate in Codex II of the Nag Hammadi library. It has some similarities with On the Origin of the World, which immediately follows it in the codex. The Coptic version is a translation of a Greek original, possibly written in Egypt in the third century AD. The text begins as an exegesis on Genesis 1–6 and concludes as a discourse explaining the nature of the world's evil authorities. It applies Christian Gnostic beliefs to the Jewish origin story, and translator Bentley Layton believes the intent is anti-Jewish.
The Avignon Quintet is a five-volume series of novels by British writer Lawrence Durrell, published between 1974 and 1985. The novels are metafictional. He uses developments in experimental fiction that followed his The Alexandria Quartet (1957-1960). The action of the novels is set before and during World War II, largely in France, Egypt, and Switzerland.
Sebastian, or Ruling Passions (1983), is the fourth volume in The Avignon Quintet series by British author Lawrence Durrell, which was published from 1974 to 1985. This novel is set mainly in Switzerland immediately after World War II. It continues the story of Constance and a Gnostic cult, which was introduced in the first novel of the quintet, Monsieur (1974).
Livia, or Buried Alive (1978), is the second volume in British author Lawrence Durrell's The Avignon Quintet, published from 1974 to 1985. Durrell has described the novels as "roped together like climbers on a rockface, but all independent. .. a series of books through which the same characters move for all the world as if to illustrate the notion of reincarnation." The description of this form for the quintet actually appears in Livia. The first novel of the quincunx, Monsieur, received the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in 1974.
Constance, or Solitary Practices is the central volume of the five novels of Lawrence Durrell's The Avignon Quintet, published from 1974 to 1985. It was nominated for the Booker Prize in 1982. Involving some of the characters from the preceding Livia, the novel also introduces new ones. It is set before and during World War II, in France, Egypt, Poland and Switzerland.
Quinx, or The Ripper's Tale is the 5th and final volume in Lawrence Durrell's "quincunx" of novels, The Avignon Quintet, published from 1974 to 1985. It explores the activities of Constance, Aubrey Blanford, Robin Sutcliffe, Lord Galen, and most of the other surviving characters as they return to Avignon and Provence in the immediate aftermath of World War II.
A pentalogy is a compound literary or narrative work that is explicitly divided into five parts. Although modern use of the word implies both that the parts are reasonably self-contained and that the structure was intended by the author, historically, neither was necessarily true: in fact, a pentalogia could be assembled by a later editor, just as Plotinus's Enneads were arranged in nines by Porphyry in order to create an overarching structure of six which would express the idea of perfection.
A Valentinian Exposition is the second tractate from Codex XI of the Nag Hammadi Library. Less than half of the text has been preserved. The text explores the relationship between God, the created world, and humanity. It states that the material world is a shadow of the spiritual world and that humanity is a mixture of spiritual and carnal elements. The Demiurge, a lower deity, is responsible for creating the physical world and humanity, and the Devil, who is one of the divine beings, expelled his root from the body of humanity and caused the world to fall into sin. It also explores themes such as salvation through knowledge and understanding of one's true identity.
