Credo [Paperback]

Melvyn Bragg (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 7, 1996

Set in the 7th century, this novel recounts the story of Bega, an Irish princess. An epic encompassing religious, territorial and ideological conflicts, it depicts life during the little-known Dark Ages.

Editorial Reviews

Review

'A gripping saga of great passion ... sustained, impassioned and uplifting' -- The Times 'An absorbing epic ... as splendid a ripping yarn as any of the best classics' -- Daily Telegraph 'A gripping, deeply accomplished work' -- Evening Standard 'I loved it ... Bragg's stately, seething, passionate epic is several cuts above modern attempts at historical fiction' -- Literary Review 'A beguiling entry into a society strange, neglected, important, tragic in many of its triumphs' -- Spectator 'Wonderfully evocative, passionate and erudite ... No summary could do justice to a book of this erudition, romance and scope' -- Glasgow Herald --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Melvyn Bragg's first novel, For Want of a Nail, was published in 1965 and since then his novels have included The Hired Man, for which he won the Time/Life Silver Pen Award, Without a City Wall, winner of the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize, Credo, The Maid of Buttermere and The Soldier's Return, which was published to huge critical acclaim in 1999 and won the WHSmith Literary Award. He has also written several works of non-fiction including Speak for England, an oral history of the twentieth century, Rich, a biography of Richard Burton and On Giants' Shoulders, a history of science based on his BBC radio series. He was born in 1939 and educated at Wigton's Nelson Tomlinson Shool and at Oxford where he read history. He is controller of Arts at LWT and President of the National Campaign for the Arts, and in 1998 he was made a life peer. He lives in London and Cumbria. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 757 pages
• Publisher: Sceptre (November 7, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0340666188
• ISBN-13: 978-0340666180
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #7,021,516 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars 7th century Britain's way of life is under attack..., July 11, 1999

By 

[e-mail] (London, England) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Credo Hb (Hardcover)

Melvyn Bragg's Credo is astonishing. It is so well researched and so well written that the characters live in your head long after you have closed the pages for the last time.

It's a classical battle; between the Pagans and the Christians, and between the Christian Celts and the Christian Catholics, set in a violent and turbulent period of history.

What makes this book is such memorable characters: Bega, the devout christian, destined to become a saint; the pagan woman whom Bega so despises, yet who is so human, Bega's "man", who's love she is prepared to forgo to persue her love affair with God.

Read this book. It will change your outlook on life, love and religion. It is wonderful. This book has been reprinted as "The Sword and The Miracle", but is also available as "Credo" from Amazon.co.uk

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Incredibly Touching Story of the Celtic Church in the Dark Ages, January 10, 2006

By 

Michael M. Gollaher (Boise, Idaho, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Credo Hb (Hardcover)

Armed with careful scholarship and a deep insight into the personalities, tragedies and triumphs of his characters, Melvyn Bragg weaves an engrossing and remarkably authentic tale of the struggle to save Christianity in its original purity as it barely clings to life during the dark ages of the British Isles. This is an historic tale of true triumph through great tragedy of real people and the communities they served - or cruelly dominated - deftly mirroring the eternal struggle we all face between our dual natures of godliness and devilry.

The background and locale of the story is historical, as well as most of the characters Bragg summons from the dead pages of history. The protagonist herself is a mysterious and only partially mythical figure known as St. Bega. Her intense inner conflict between her most deserving earthly desires and her ideally pure devotion to God serves as a personal parallel for the historic struggle between Christianity and pagan ritual which had hitherto served, yet chained mankind to a barely sustainable earthly existence.

As in true life there are no pure heroes, only men and women doing the best they know how to do in the circumstances they find themselves. In the face-off between Bega, servant of the new "one God," and the priestess of the old gods of stone and sky, druids and druidesses are portrayed - quite accurately - as largely benevolent and wise stewards of an ancient magic, and whose advice the sometime fanatical Christian monks and abbesses would have been better off to accept on occasion. The Celtic Church, though clearly superior in true devotion and spirituality, cannot match the necessary pragmatism of the falsely pious and worldy Roman church, whose demands that the Celtic church accede to the authority of Rome have much more to do with a raw lust for power than they do with saving souls. Indeed, the religious enemy is clearly not the pagan druids and priestesses, but the enmity between professed followers of Christ.

Finally, this is a story of sacrifice. True and noble sacrifice born of faith and love for one's fellow man no matter how undeserving they may be. This is not your Sunday School version of sacrifice where, in the end, God rewards the valiant with all the glory and worldy riches they had denied themselves in His service, but the true, Christly sacrifice where one gives up his or her most cherished dreams to bring about a better world for others. Then, finally perishing in the struggle, as they realize those dreams will be left forever wanting, the only reward they are left is a knowledge that such a sacrifice has been acceptable to God and has, indeed, brought a measure of divinity into a world which so desperately, though ignorantly, needs it.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A vivid taste of the Dark Ages, May 4, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Credo Hb (Hardcover)

Bragg has done very well to recreate the atmosphere of Dark Age Britain when Christendom was still an infant in the isles. Although the plot itself isn't riveting, Bragg has welded his words together strongly enough to keep you interested. He is very articulate and creative, a veritable word-monger. The reader is subsumed into this strange world of miracles, superstition, and barbarism on the edge of the post-Roman world. The characters are very real and face curious conflicts which may seem very foreign to the modern reader, but the sheer atmosphere which Bragg infuses into his work is what really captures. After reading it, one feels like they have actually journeyed to Dark Age Cumbria and breathed the dank air which the Arthur of history (not of legend) breathed. And no, the book is not about Arthur - it is about Bega the Irish princess who would be a saint.