Vie de Jude, frère de Jésus par Françoise Chandernagor (review)

experience, as though to impress on readers what action films do not represent. True to the novel’s requirement to address reality, however tangentially, Beast gestures to our contemporary world. We catch references to Sarkozy’s trophy wife, Obama’s armored limo,security people with unrevealed powers,and staged political events that confound popular criticism. If the novelist asks us to visualize and internalize the unimaginable, she may also be suggesting that what we do not see before our very eyes may yet have truths worth examining. Lawrence University (WI) Eilene Hoft-March Chandernagor, Françoise. Vie de Jude, frère de Jésus. Paris: Albin Michel, 2015. ISBN 978-2-226-25994-3. Pp. 395. 23 a. Jude, the youngest of Marie’s seven children, wonders: “À quoi suis-je bon, moi, le dernier de la lignée?” (193). The answer is for him to become a scribe, and record the events he will have witnessed in the Palestine of the Roman occupation of the first century. It is a miserable Palestinian society, humiliated by the Romans, divided by internal religious strife and above all civil disorder. Written in the first person and in biblical style, Jude’s document belongs to history rather than theology. Furthermore, it portrays well the human condition, and Jude’s sincerity and doubts touch the reader poignantly. As recounted in the avant-propos, the text was discovered in 1950 in the Abydos region of Egypt. Written on deteriorated papyrus with missing pages, it contains five books relating the life of Jude. Not only is the recovered document translated, it is also well documented throughout with historical and explanatory annotations. Furthermore, there is a forty-page atelier de l’auteur (349–89) in which Chandernagor verifies the existence of Jesus’s siblings as an historical truth.She attempts to validate historical data and retraces the author’s sources of inspiration. This postscript also gives the author an opportunity to “peindre l’évolution politique de la Palestine et celle du christianisme primitif après la mort de Jésus” (384). Jesus was nineteen years old when Jude was born, his two sisters had already been married. Joseph, the father, had just died. Jude describes his brother Jacques and the diverse personalities of the rebellious attitude of José and his influence over Simon. Jude’s story will also bring personal perspectives on a number of important events in the life of Jesus, either through personal observations or as recounted by others. One of the novel’s most touching scenes is the passing away of Marie four years after the crucifixion. Jude is there to comfort her in her momentary doubt: “Pourquoi ne se montre-t-il pas à moi comme il s’est montré aux autres?” (202). As the reader will discover, it will become difficult to forget that it is just a novel (as the cover stipulates clearly). The constant annotations, explanations, references to various religious texts, explicatory remarks, corrections in translations, and cultural elucidations, however, will constantly keep the reader believing that this authentic text is truly written by 258 FRENCH REVIEW 89.4 Reviews 259 Jude and correctly translated and edited by the celebrated author of historical novels. One might ask,is this novel a remarkable work of well-documented apocryphal writing? Is this a literary work attempting to validate the existence of siblings and demystify the perpetual virgin concept initiated in the fourth century? Is the author seeking the historical Jesus and not the one of faith? These are few questions which render this novel an intriguing literary coup de force. Jude might trouble the impassioned believers but it is bound to please the curious. Metropolitan State University of Denver, emeritus Alain Ranwez Delrue, Arnaud. Un été en famille. Paris: Seuil, 2014. ISBN 978-2-02-115526-6. Pp. 159. 16 a. The innocuous title of this first novel gives no warning of the twisted human relationships and behaviors hidden within the pages of this short work, many aspects of which call to mind L’étranger. The opening sentence “Notre sœur était morte depuis une semaine” (13) is but one example. The tone is set. Short, brutal phrases in the passé composé resemble those...