Amazon.com Review
This intriguing novel about the classic 12th-century love affair between Eloise and Abelard adds to the growing body of young adult novels with medieval themes. The story is told through the eyes of Aran, the mute servant of the charismatic philosopher-intellectual Abelard. As a teenager, tongue-tied Aran had been sold to a dealer in human oddities, who welded the boy into a metal vest so that he would grow into a "spider" with disproportionately long arms and legs. Abelard needs a servant who won't gossip about his passionate trysts with his beautiful and brilliant student Eloise. He rescues Aran by bringing him into his service, and thus the boy becomes a go-between and an observer of the famous romance. Idyllic love scenes contrast with episodes of bloody violence as the doomed affair plays itself out with Abelard's eventual castration by Eloise's guardian. When Aran gains his voice in a pseudo-miracle and grows in self-assurance, his hero worship of the selfish and insensitive Abelard begins to fade, but Eloise remains to him the symbol of an overwhelming passion he can never experience. A closing author's note zooms teens into the 21st century, noting the address of a Web site where they can read the actual love letters of this famous couple. (Ages 12 to 15)
--Patty Campbell
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
The scandalous history of the doomed 12th-century lovers Abelard and Heloise forms the dramatic frame for a coming-of-age story that is also a meditation on servitude, the fragility of the human body and the power of language. Aran, the peasant boy who narrates, cannot speak because of a deformity that has bound his tongue to the bottom of his mouth. His abusive brother sells him in Paris, where his new owners sear his flesh into a metal carapace; his limbs will grow, but not his torso, making him a human "spider." He is rescued by the arrogant, brilliant teacher Abelard, who promptly has the carapace removed, but Abelard has an ulterior motive for his kindness: he needs a silent servant to watch over his liaisons with the beautiful Eloise (as she is here called), "the most learned woman in all of Europe." Scholars, however, cannot marry, and Abelard and Eloise hurtle toward separate fates. Abelard gets castrated by his enemies and in his fury cuts loose Aran's tongue, and as the boy gains speech, Abelard becomes a monk and Eloise a nun. Skurzynski (Virtual War) doesn't flinch from her often distressing subject matter, and her characterizations are complex, doing justice to the courage and passion of her protagonists. Ages 12-up.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
