This novel is all about Christian, specifically Catholic, sexual hysteria. Sex seems to determine everyone's motivation in the first volume. This makes sense when you consider that it was written by a nineteen year old for whom these obsessions were no doubt a daily occurence. Fortunately for us, he has managed to sublimate them into the form of a novel. (Which puts me in mind of E.M. Forster, who, when touched on the ass by an admirer at a tender age, promptly went home and wrote Maurice.) A duenna and her charge arrive in Madrid from provincial Mucia some time in the very late eighteenth century. For some reason no doubt to be made clear later, they arrive at a church where the much talked about Father Ambrosio is to speak. The father is a paragon of virtue. He has spent his thirty years entirely immersed in studies and prayer at the local Capuchin monastery. While waiting for the good father to arrive the duenna, Leonella, who is fifty-one, and her charge, Antonia, who is fifteen, are questioned by two young men and their tale of woe is gradually revealed. This is essentially a tale of Antonia's mother, seduced by a libertine, who runs away with her to the West Indies where thirteen years later he dies leaving her penniless so she must return to Spain with baby Antonia in tow to throw herself on the mercy of her outraged father. The wholly pure Ambrosio then spends the next sixty pages undergoing two events: the first is his heartless condemnation of a nun who has allowed herself to be seduced. She is with child but Ambrosio gives her into the hands of the prioress of her order for purposes of punishment; the second event is Ambrosio's seduction by a woman disguised as a young man, one Rosario, who has shamelessly broken the sanctity of the monastery. That at least is how Ambrosio sees it before he eventually gives way to godless and all too enjoyable rutting with the woman. These pages are tumescent with hot-blooded satanic sex. It is hard to believe they first saw the light of day in 1796. What an earth-shattering fireball this novel must have been then.One of the gentlemen entertaining the two new arrivals at the church is a nobleman, Lorenzo. It is his sister, Agnes, who has just been sacrificed by Father Ambrosio to the prioress. Now we enter into a long divagation narrated by the sister's nobleman lover, the Marquis de las Cisternas. First there is the interlude in the forest outside Strasborg in which the Marquis walks into a nest of banditti who wish him only ill. This is a vividly described section with lots of action and blood. At extraordinary length, the Marquis survives, as he must if we are to get the story of how Agnes becomes trapped into entering a convent by a guardian jealous of her relationship with the Marquis. This section involves some decisions on the part of the Marquis that no adult man with any romantic experience would make. In other words, the crudeness here really smacks of a nineteen year old writing his first novel. Yet the vivacity of the writing somehow continues to hold the reader despite these howlers.Later, we move on to Ambrosio's repeated sexcapades with Matilda (Rosario). The prioress's lie to brother Lorenzo that his sister Agnes has died in childbirth. Father Ambrosio as he overhears the prioress's evil plans for punishing Agnes on his way to an assignation with Matilda. Father Ambrosio's attempted seduction of a the young Antonia, innocent of carnal knowledge, and his deal with the devil to gain access to her lily-white body. The satisfying denouement I will not describe. Suffice it to say that Lewis's writing becomes more assured as he proceeds. By chapter 7, more than half way through, his writing becomes, as John Berryman discusses in his introduction, "passionate and astonishing."
Ambrosio,the abbot, is the perfect monk.Head of an abbey in Madrid.He is the idol of the city.A young,handsome,charismatic man.With a spellbinding voice. That thrills the audience at his church.All the people flock to it.To hear his sermons.Five minutes after the bells ring.The church is overflowing.The noble families are there.Silently the assembly listens.A living saint,they witness.The proud people are ecstatic.In this modern age(the 1700's),God has sent them Ambrosio!The Capuchin(Franciscan),is not what he appears to be.Everything is a mirage.The orphan, found at the door of the abbey.As an infant.Raised in the monastery.Never leaving its grounds.Nobody knows where the child came from.Now evil thoughts permeates his mind.Lust and debauchery.After thirty years.The Monk wants to have some fun.The deadly boredom must end. He will risk his reputation.If only the monk had a chance...Ambrosio is close to a novice by the name of Rosario.His only friend.Who mysteriously arrived at the abbey.This young gentleman, always covers his face.Keeps to himself,except for the abbot.Their discussions are what the monk looks forward to, during the bleak daily ennui.But finally in the garden of the abbey.Rosario reveals to Ambrosio,he's a woman called Matilda!Of course ,after a short hesitation.Canal knowledge commences.That "She" looks like the Madonna, doesn't hurt.But the abbot soon shows lack of interest.A new conquest is needed.The very accommodating Rosario/Matilda .Through witchcraft,helps him, try to violate another innocent woman...Midnight,at the cemetery,he hears the owls shrieks.Opens the gate.Into the vast,dark,underground vaults of the abbey's graveyard.Jointly used by the nearby convent. Ambrosio slowly descends the stairs.His heart is pounding.A lamp to shows the many decaying bodies.Unknown vermin creeping around the horrific scene.While the monks and nuns above,hold a sacred procession.Viewed by the citizens of Madrid.But he goes on, until he reaches the tomb of the supposedly dead, Antonia .But the drugged girl,is still alive. And waking up just now.She see him and thinks all will be safe.The Monk moves closer.......Later he hears the sound of footsteps approaching him.Fiend, friend or enemy?The uneasy monk awaits in the gloom.Is his destiny, death or life?Condemned when first published.In England,in 1796, and thus a bestseller. Considered now.The Gothic classic novel.Even though the twenty -year- old British author. Uses Italian names in Spain!Murder,incest,parricide,lascivious men and women(including an old maid).Religious bigotry,Black Magic, and some strange, creepy,and weird . Supernatural atmosphere too.Graveyards,ghosts,demons,secret identities.And a hidden prisoner,held by nuns? Everything that a reader, comes to expect and dread.Hate and love.It's all there.Not for everyone...Matthew Gregory Lewis, was an English M.P. During hopefully,the bright daylight.
What do You think about The Monk (1999)?
When I was younger, I avoided this book because the literary snob in me--a much more insistent voice back then than now--had decided, on the basis of ”informed opinion,” that “The Monk” was merely an exercise in sensationalism, a device for producing horrific thrills through the deliberate, exploitative use of cheap effects and anti-Catholic stereotypes. Now that I have read it, I see that the literary snob in me had a point. “The Monk” is all of these things. But it is also more.I think the young Matthew Lewis liked Walpole and loved Radcliff, but believed that they both fell short of his own darker, revolutionary vision, particularly in regard to the supernatural, providence, and fate. For Lewis, the supernatural is neither an obvious intrusion of the symbolic into the actual, a providential and prophetic sign (Walpole) nor a mere objective correlative for the heroine's emotional state which--once it has served its sentimental purpose--can be explained away and summarily discarded (Radcliff). No, the supernatural for Lewis is an elusive, complex phenomenon, a dangerous disruption of the ordinary, which may be mocked by the rationalist or embraced by the gullible, which may at times be a mere legend (or a stratagem exploiting a legend), but could just as easily turn out to be real. And if real, it will be something horribly real--relentless and insistent at best, malevolent and destructive at worst, and only tangentially connected to providence.It is in his radical criticism of providence itself that Lewis differs most markedly from his influences. For Mrs. Radcliff (and Walpole, to a lesser extent) Providence is a benevolent but mischievous uncle who enjoys scaring the children before he rewards them with treats. But for Lewis, Providence is a capricious, unreliable overseer, capable of allowing the spotless innocent to be ravished and destroyed by the wicked. The fact that the wicked one later meets with a terrifying supernatural destruction never quite makes up for the great horror or the grave injustice of the initial violation.In addition, Lewis brings the dark side of Shakespeare plus the spirit of early German Romanticism and the recent French Revolution into the already familiar world of sentimental dialogue, medieval abbeys and Salvator Rosa landscapes, giving the gothic world a wider breadth and a greater force.(A final note: all lovers of Poe should read this novel. Just as "The Fall of the House of Usher" was inspired by "Otranto," so "The Pit and the Pendulum" was inspired by "The Monk." In both cases Poe surpasses his influences, but the comparisons are extremely interesting.)
—Bill Kerwin
Stephen King highly praises this Gothic writer, so in beginning the novel I braced myself for some horrific scenes. The Monk is about the downfall and demise of Ambrosia who is put on a pedestal for his spiritual godliness. He starts out as a highly respected friar and sells his soul to Lucifer in the end.A mild sin at first, lusting after an image of the Madonna, manifests itself when a a young novitiate, a woman in disguise, seduces him. I won't spoil the book with too many details, but be prepared for scenes of torture, rape, incest, and satanic worship. At the same time Ambrosia's spiraling ruin takes place another romantic story with a gallant hero is developing. It is an unexpected tale of love, deceit, good and evil. With the 18th century dialect and coinage it was slow reading at first, but it didn't take long for me to soon be absorbed in the plot, anxious and worried for the victims while shocked by the behavior of the villains. This book will have readers glued to the pages and losing track of time.
—Suzanne Moore
This is such a great fun book to read. It's really not like anything else at all, it's so extreme in every way. It was written in the era of the great classics, but this one is never going to be taught in schools.The book out-Gothics all the Gothic novels you ever read, Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey isn't even related to the raw perversion and criminality of this madcap horror ride through the forbidden where taboos fall one by one as the The Monk, unable to live up to his vows gives in to every deviant temptation. In him, every tenet of pure, celibate monastic existence becomes corrupted and evil.The Monk has everything - a cross-dressing seductive heroine, get thee to a nunnery oh you virgin (but not for long), sex, incest, rape, madness, torture, death, crypts, poison, magic, ghosts, bandits, vermin, the devil and the total moral and social degradation of all concerned. The author, who was only 20 at the time, let his fevered imagination run as wild as it wanted and then whipped it on a bit further. The most perverted and extreme taboos were just eccentricities to be worked into the characters and plot. What makes the book so outstanding, and why it has never been out of print in the over 200 years since it was first published, is that it is written with great intelligence and insight into people's psyches by an extremely talented author. And, unlike some classics, it isn't in the least bit boring.But seriously, no one is ever going to be asked to write a book report in school for it. I might have though. If I'd know about the book I would have done it as 'summer reading'. Those reports had to be read out to the class. That would have enlivened things a bit.It's free here. It says it's a romance. I wouldn't really call it that!Edited for some egregious typos, bad grammar and triple-redundant words, mostly 'mad'.
—Petra X
