I was fortunate enough to 'meet' Elizabeth Bell at the virtual Historical Novel Society North American 2021 conference last month, and I was excited to read her novel set in antebellum Charleston. Here's what I thought:
The first installment of Elizabeth Bell’s Lazare Family Saga is a beautifully-written story for those who enjoy exploring the complexities of being human—the conflicting emotions and values, the anguish, and sometimes the sheer brutality. There is also joy and love and charm, and Ms. Bell does a wonderful job of capturing these emotions. I appreciated that this 19th-century Charlestonian tale began in Saint Domingue (later Haiti), as Charleston’s roots do extend back to the sugar plantations of Barbados and the West Indies. For all that I was born in Charleston and went to college there, that part of the area’s history has always seemed vague and elusive to me, but Ms. Bell brought it to stark, vivid life.
The main protagonist of the overall story is Joseph, who is drawn to the priesthood, but he doesn’t even enter the story for some time. This saga is very much about the Lazare Family’s several generations, even within this first novel.
Joseph is a devout young man who struggles to cope with overpowering feelings of lust. Following this journey for hundreds of pages should make anyone sympathetic to Catholic priests who have to adhere to the absolute requirement of chastity, of not being able to marry those that they fall in love with—and being human, this will happen from time to time, at least for many of them. The situation grows far worse and more ‘sinful’ in large part due to those very strictures—and the reader is so weary of his struggles by the end of the novel that it’s hard to really condemn him. I think that was exactly the author’s mission—to make us sympathetic to this particular plight of devout young men who must pledge to remain chaste forever in order to join the priesthood. I hope they don’t all struggle so much, but Ms. Bell quoted so much Catholic instruction on this very topic that one is left fairly convinced that Joseph is far from alone in his condition.
It’s my belief that one of the primary benefits to readers of reading fiction is to develop empathy, and Ms. Bell has created an entirely different situation for me to empathize with than I’ve ever encountered in any novel thus far—and she does it thoroughly, unstintingly. For that and the impeccable research and the beautifully-perfected prose, I applaud the author.
Again, however, much of the story is sad. I was overwhelmed at times by the sheer number of deaths, and I’ve never agreed with that prevalent practice of depicting life as generally brutal-and-short for all historical times up until nearly the present. For some people, sure. For some times, of course. Ms. Bell zones in on those people and those times, though she also shows the joy in their lives. Necessary Sins was eloquent and touching, but I felt trammelled by so many heartbreaking losses—and yet, I suppose perhaps that is part of how she wore us down to think, “Goodness, is it really THAT important for him to stay chaste?” In the midst of so much sadness, is carnal love really such a terrible sin? Isn’t there a beauty and a comfort in it, oftentimes? I didn’t leave the book with any firm answers as to their potential ‘sins’, but I do have more empathy now than I did for Catholic priests that way, if only because I’d never given it very much thought. Perhaps chastity could still be held sacred without making it an absolute requirement for them? Ms. Bell doesn’t really address this situation for monks and nuns, but one can’t help but extrapolate to them—maybe there could be a different order or cloister that they could transition to if they find the requirement too difficult, one for married monks and nuns? As Ms. Bell says in the author’s note about another matter, she was trying to depict historically-accurate situations, not ideal ones. She leaves the conclusions up to us.
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