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A review by book_concierge
Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather
2.0
Okay … Intellectually I can appreciate Cather’s writing. The last chapter, in particular, is very fine. I love the way she is able to convey a sense of time and place … and she speaks of a landscape that is dear to me.
Now, I know this book was written in 1927, and I know that the setting is in the New Mexico territory from about mid 1850s to 1888, but I just cannot stomach the superior European attitude of this book and its main characters.
The educated are all French Jesuits, Spaniards or the occasional Anglo (Kit Carson). The Native Indian are described as noble, loyal, superstitious but deeply spiritual.
But, the Mexicans? Oh my God. It just gives me a stomach ache. The Mexican priests are slovenly, avaricious, gluttonous, vain, greedy, prideful, barely short of evil. Fathers Lucero and Martinez have robbed their parishioners for years – Lucero amasses several hundred THOUSAND dollars. All this money goes to the church “to say masses for the repose” of the priests’ souls. While the parishioners are left to their poverty and hard scrabbled lives, the church is enriched. Wouldn’t it have been better for the Bishop to still say the masses but give the riches back to those from whom it had been wrested?
The Mexican people, we are told, are like children who need guidance. At one point (p 226) LaTour is described as being less quick to learn Spanish than Valliant. But that’s okay for LaTour “To communicate with peons, he was quite willing to speak like a peon.” Only the Mexican women seem to have any virtues at all … but mostly as faithful housekeepers, and willing to sacrifice what little they have to glorify the Church. (They even do so to help Valliant build his Denver church when his own parishioners won’t give anything.) But I guess this is how the Catholic Church has always operated – the poorest give the most.
So, this book just makes me sick. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone.
I give the book 2.5*.
Now, I know this book was written in 1927, and I know that the setting is in the New Mexico territory from about mid 1850s to 1888, but I just cannot stomach the superior European attitude of this book and its main characters.
The educated are all French Jesuits, Spaniards or the occasional Anglo (Kit Carson). The Native Indian are described as noble, loyal, superstitious but deeply spiritual.
But, the Mexicans? Oh my God. It just gives me a stomach ache. The Mexican priests are slovenly, avaricious, gluttonous, vain, greedy, prideful, barely short of evil. Fathers Lucero and Martinez have robbed their parishioners for years – Lucero amasses several hundred THOUSAND dollars. All this money goes to the church “to say masses for the repose” of the priests’ souls. While the parishioners are left to their poverty and hard scrabbled lives, the church is enriched. Wouldn’t it have been better for the Bishop to still say the masses but give the riches back to those from whom it had been wrested?
The Mexican people, we are told, are like children who need guidance. At one point (p 226) LaTour is described as being less quick to learn Spanish than Valliant. But that’s okay for LaTour “To communicate with peons, he was quite willing to speak like a peon.” Only the Mexican women seem to have any virtues at all … but mostly as faithful housekeepers, and willing to sacrifice what little they have to glorify the Church. (They even do so to help Valliant build his Denver church when his own parishioners won’t give anything.) But I guess this is how the Catholic Church has always operated – the poorest give the most.
So, this book just makes me sick. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone.
I give the book 2.5*.