Glittering Images

Vicar Charles Ashworth agrees to become an archiepiscopal spy. What could be juicier? He has been tasked by the Archbishop of Canterbury with reading Bishop Jardine's private journal and search for illicit love letters to make sure nothing untoward is happening in the household. Rumors abound. Ashworth's cover story is that he is going to Starbridge Cathedral because he wants his students to learn more about Saint Anselm and Starbridge just happens to hold the only early manuscripts. As if orchestrated in advance, a dinner party discusses the subject of divorce as it relates to the Marriage Bill and the Bible. This is perfect cover for Charles' investigation, but it reveals deep, dark, and dirty secrets of his own. True to his past and show more unable to help himself, Charles falls in love with a member of the bishop's household; the very person causing the Archbishop's concern. From there, everything unravels at a rapid pace. Glittering Images becomes laden with psychobabble theology and therapy doubletalk. When Charles suffers from an emotional angst far heavier than he can handle, he seeks the counsel of Jon Darrow, a monk from the Fordite monastery. Thanks to Darrow's investigative interviews, sound consultation, and the subsequent wailing torment of Charles, the two discover Charles is of two distinct personalities. One maintains the glittering image of perfection while the other is a whiskey gulping, fornicating fool wracked with guilt. Is the man he has called 'father' to blame or is it the man who actually sired him? Uncovering layers of insecurity and irrational jealousy leads to a self-fulfilling prophesy. The more insecure Charles behaves, the less inclined people are to convince him of his worth. The fear of abandonment is not exclusive to Charles. Many other characters suffer the same terror of inadequacy. show less

I've seen Susan Howatch's ecclesiastical novels facetiously described as “surplice-rippers” - which is unfair, of course, but you can see why. There’s a late-Victorian earnestness about the way she deals with religious faith and a rather mid-twentieth-century lack of irony in her approach to sex and psycho-analysis. At one point in this book (the first in her Starbridge series), she seems to become aware of the difficulty and has two of her characters discuss whether they are caught up in a cross between Barchester Towers and Lady Chatterley’s lover. They decide that they aren't, of course. Perhaps a more apt comparison would have been with Zola’s Abbé Mouret’s sin, though, and as we worked towards the solution of the show more psychological mystery there was a kind of neat closure going on that seemed to come straight out of Agatha Christie (possibly deliberate - Roger Ackroyd is mentioned conspicuously early in the story). And the resolution does turn out to be the psychological equivalent of “the butler did it”.

Which is all to say that this isn't the sort of thing I usually enjoy. But in all fairness I have to say that Howatch does it extremely well. Despite the high-flown emotions, her characters are never altogether implausible, and she manages to stay convincingly in period (1937, before she was born) without much apparent effort. She’s obviously done her research and got a feel for the way clergymen spoke in the thirties. And I'm fairly confident that, if I knew more about theology and psycho-analysis, that would all turn out to be correct for the period too. show less

Long before Dan Brown discovered that religious institutions could be just as fruitful as law firms and airports for telling a compelling story, best-selling author of family sagas and historical novels Susan Howatch redirected her literary career with a series of novels about the upper echelons of the Anglican church. Mysteries and human failings abound, although nothing as sensational as secret codes revealing the descendants of Jesus and Mary Magdalene.
In Howatch’s case, her change of subject matter coincided with a personal spiritual quest that resulted in her commitment to high Anglicanism. Unlike many converts, who in their enthusiasm are blind to the human dimension of their new home, Howatch is too keen a student of life to show more paint an idealized picture. Some of her characters are saintly, but they remain human. Her commitment is best evidenced by her portrayal of most as genuine about their faith. The problem is, most have a public face (the glittering image) and a tormented inner life.
This inner turmoil is particularly true of the narrator/protagonist, Charles Ashworth. He is well-named since he is convinced he is unworthy, much like ashes. But in Christian tradition, ashes are the sign of penance in the hope of regeneration through the death and resurrection of Christ.
The torments of all main characters revolve around difficult marriages. It is no coincidence that the inciting incident of the book comes soon after a House of Lords debate in 1937 of a bill introduced to liberalize divorce. I won’t reveal more about the plot except to say that Howatch has created an interesting story, with enough melodramatic twists and turns to keep it a page-turner. In the end, it all seemed too pat, but the way there held my interest.
This even though much of the plot is recounted in dialogue, rather than in narrated action. While it was interesting to read Howatch’s depiction of the work of an insightful spiritual director, both strict and compassionate, not only this spiritual director, Jonathan Darrow, but several other characters display an uncanny ability to analyze in a way that neatly sums up the psychological traumas of the several characters.
Howatch has done her homework. The requisite theological authors, ancient and modern, are name-checked. Characters are also prone to use the titles of novels—Jane Eyre, Barchester Towers, Lady Chatterley's Lover—to describe their situations.
The title phrase, “Glittering Images,” appears early and recurs often throughout the book, but not in a univocal way. Among the theological discussions is one about the quest for the historical Jesus, the one behind the glittering image of the Gospel accounts. Since salvation for Charles, Lyle, and others involves stripping away the image and coming to grips with the person hidden behind, it’s surprising that Howatch makes nothing of what this might mean in the case of Christ.
At one point, when the Bishop of Starbridge is verbally fencing with Ashworth, who is intent on digging out a lurid secret he suspects the bishop of hiding, the bishop refers to an Agatha Christie crime story, then generalizes: “I always find the more I read that story the more intrigued I become by the narrator’s omissions and evasions.” This unreliability, it turns out, is relevant when applied to the Bishop, but since the protagonist narrates Glittering Images, I kept wondering when we would discover that this dictum applies to him as well. In the end, it seems that he has been all-too-truthful; there is no hint that he is an unreliable narrator. This seemed careless on the author’s part.
I also felt that the crisis leading to a resolution unfolds inconsistently. When the mystery Ashworth had pursued becomes revealed, it is clear that three women were complicit in imposing a situation on the bishop; yet before long, Darrow seemed to hold the bishop alone accountable.
Despite all the flaws, I enjoyed reading this book immensely, and will probably pick up others in the series when I’m in the need of some light entertainment, such as on an airplane flight. show less

First in the 'Starbridge' series about the Church of England.

I love this book! It's an incredibly powerful novel, based in the early part of the 20th century. Charles, a young Anglican minister, is sent to see if a Bishop is committing 'indiscretions'. He gets caught up in the strange household he discovers, and various crises unravel from his own past and personality.

While the book is somewhat rambling in places, with a great deal of conversation, I found, even reading it for the fourth time in fifteen years, that it was remarkably difficult to put down. I could remember the broad outline of the plot, of course, and the eventual resolution - but much of the detail intrigued me all over again.

Perhaps Charles’ problems are show more caricatured and exaggerated. Perhaps the psychological investigation that follows is a bit too neat and tidy. But it makes exciting reading, and Charles’ advisor - the mystical monk Jon Darrow - is a most intriguing character.

The writing is powerful, often quite terse and dramatic, with clever plotting. The book has been criticised as suggesting that Anglican ministers are as described in the book, but I don’t think that’s fair: Charles and the Bishop of Starbridge are contrasted with the majority of morally sound vicars around the country. My one reservation at recommending it widely is that there’s one somewhat explicit - and shocking - scene, and quite a lot of frank discussion about intimacies throughout the book. This is low-key compared to the majority of modern novels, but still I would hesitate to recommend this to anyone under the age of about 16. show less

I very much enjoyed reading this book but it never seemed entirely real or entirely believable. I wanted to find out about the characters and was intrigued by the level of psychological depth the author was able to enter into but somehow it all seemed a bit contrived. The latter part of the book is the endless, lengthy unburdening of everyone's soul but they all do it with such readiness which whilst convenient for the reader seems so remote from reality.

Sometimes it also feels very dated. Although the book is set in the 1930s it often betrays its 1980s heritage and it feels like someone trying to reflect 1980s sexual obsessions into a bygone age. It is never clear whether the sexual morality is that of the 1930s or the battle to fit show more Christianity into the morals of the 1980s. Nevertheless it is a jolly good story. show less

This book rode my book shelf for several years. I picked it up, and others of the Starbridge series from a used book sale at a theological library. A friend suggested it telling me that the characters in this series were based on theologians and churchmen in the Church of England. I love church history and was interested. My wife read a later book in the series and didn't enjoy it, so it kind of killed my excitement in starting in on these. But as I have been downsizing my library I thought I'd give it a go.

Absolutely brilliant. The plot centers on Charles Ashworth in 1937, a canon who is commissioned by Archbishop Cosmo Gordon Lang to investigate the sexual impropriety of a rival bishop, the fictional bishop of Starbridge, Alex show more Jardine. Ashworth starts out sleuthing around the Bishop's palace but his identification with Jardine reveals some cracks in his own character. This leads to a full-blown break down for Ashworth. Ashworth is led back to spiritual (and psychological) health through his counsel with his spiritual director, a world-wise ex-Navy Chaplain and Fordite Monk, John Darrow. Darrow helps Ashworth confront his 'glittering image' which gives him compassion for others with their glittering images.

This book is part mystery, part love story, part sorrid sexual tale, part mystical treatise. I enjoyed this book a lot and am interested in reading others in the series.

One small point of critique is that the female characters are not as fleshed out as the male character are in this novel. It may Just be that Howatch's protagonist here is a clergyman in the 1930s. show less

This book just hit too close to home for me, but like all her books, holds out the hope for healing. Can we ever get past the "glittering Images" which trap us?