The Devils of Loudun
Not if my life depended on it could I tell you how I found out about Aldous Huxley's 1953 classic, The Devils of Loudun. And I should say at once that, fifteen years after publication, it did seem to wear the appellation "classic" very well. Maybe it was an "underground classic." It was certainly not studied; it appeared on no curricula. (This was before the appearance of Women's Studies, which I gather has blown fresh wind into the story, if not into Huxley's reputation.) I read the book twice, once in college and once shortly afterward.
And now I've read it three times. Something pricked me during the spring. It was the story of the Rumanian nun who was crucified by her abbey's priest. Truly horrific! But what happened at Loudun, France, in Richelieu's palmiest days, was also truly horrific. I couldn't quite remember just what it was that did happen. Somebody got burned at the stake, I was pretty sure. I decided that I'd better look into Huxley's book once again. But where was it?
Soon I was ordering a copy from Alibris, and when the book arrived, I thought I had better read the whole thing. Books are never the same twice, but they can change a very great deal in thirty years. The book itself doesn't change at all, of course, but your recollection of it changes, and so does whatever use you have made of it. You're certainly different. It is to be hoped that you know rather more than you did thirty years ago, that you have become better at weighing, sifting, and measuring your thought. The ways in which The Devils of Loudun have and haven't changed strike me as providing a useful measure of what's valuable about the book, and what's not.
Undoubtedly, The Devils of Loudun owed something of its réclame to its "interdisciplinary" construction. It is a history book that can't be bothered with dates. It is a work of completely undocumented sociology, backed up by Huxley's credit alone. It is a non-fiction novel that also expounds metaphysical philosophies. If I neglect to mention demonic possession, that's only because the author doesn't believe that it actually occurred. He doesn't to believe that there was ever any good reason to believe that it occurred. It's the fact that the case for possession was able to proceed without solid evidence that interests him. I believe that the book is going to be reissued this fall, but only in England. I wonder what sort of an impression it will make, if any.
In the summer of 1634, Urbain Grandier, a Jesuit-trained parish priest, was burned in the town of Loudun for having arranged the demonic possession of a convent of Ursuline nuns.
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