There are two kinds of atheists. One branch obsesses over religions and their foibles, the other shuns any religiosity. I’m in the latter category and have avoided biblically slanted literature since Sunday school, so I only tackled Philip Pullman’s controversial The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ for a book club. Oddly enough, I found the experience to be an enriching one.
Commissioned to retell the Jesus Christ tale, Pullman has taken the opportunity to slam organized, rather than elemental, religion. His enabling device is to imagine two twins born to Mary: the charismatic prophet Jesus, convinced of the upcoming apocalypse and destined to die young as a raving cult leader; and the ordinary, wavering chronicler Christ, instrumental in launching a post-crucifixion church. Couched in plain language (nothing at all like his marvellous fantasy style) mixing a biblical tone with modern vernacular, Pullman’s storyline tracks that of the bible, except he transforms chunk after chunk to suit his purposes. One central oddity is the mysterious ‘stranger’ who guides Christ in his role – Pullman leaves the role of this manipulator as ambiguous as many strange, sometimes startling, novelistic changes.
The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ is no literary masterpiece. The plot, if one can call it that, is humdrum. The author explores the tremulous character of Christ quite deeply, but Joseph and the other characters gain little depth. There are no lyrical evocations of place and time. As a read, this one is short and none too riveting or rich. Nonetheless, I surprised myself by extracting quite some pleasure from my sojourn into our society’s most enduring fable. I was delighted by the author’s clever, imaginative recasting, I enjoyed the thematic attack on church versus faith, and my writerly mind has been brewing ever since over the elemental power of the crucifixion-and-rebirth myth.
Bold, clever, if flawed. 2½ stars.