An Instance of the Fingerpost: A Novel (Paperback)

This is a mystery, much in the tradition of "The Name of the Rose," but with a deep bow to "Roshamon." For the story to work, each of the narrators has to come across as a genuine character of the 17th century. Pears accomplishes this by skillfully blending the style and syntax of the era with contemporaneous prejudices and ignorance. Every once in a while you can hear the style relapse to modern-speak for a bit, but Pears gets so much right that it's hard to quibble. The characters profess belief in magic and archaic medical theory with casual conviction. They are mired in-to modern ears-an appallingly oppressive attitude toward women and "common" people. At the same time, these are the leading scientists and philosophers of their time; hearing them you get the strong sense that their society is beginning to break free and move toward genuine science and egalitarian politics. It is a remarkable achievement for a novel-all the more so because it is also a gripping thriller.

What the memoirs are trying to explain are the events surrounding the death by poisoning of an Oxford don, Robert Grove and the subsequent execution of a young serving woman, Sarah Blundy, who is convicted of the murder. The first narrator identifies himself as Marco da Cola, a Venetian student of medicine who gets stuck in Oxford due to complications with his family's business. Although da Cola becomes convinced of Sarah's guilt, the reader develops great sympathy for her. Pears draws Sarah as a combination of a Christian mystic and a proto-feminist. This works for the plot and to make her an appealing character. But the combination of religious fervor and sexual freedom she proclaims is one note that does seem a bit too modern-perhaps one grows to love her because of this very whiff of modernity. Each narrator that follows retells the story with differing interpretations of the facts and with addition of separate layers of motivation. Be warned that the next two narrators espouse attitudes that are very hard to stomach-despite their great self-satisfaction. Contradictions and complexities accumulate until the mystery seems utterly insoluble. Then at the end, by some alchemy of literary skill, Pears manages to explain everything in the last few pages. A word of advice: even though this is a long read, do not succumb to the temptation of skipping ahead.

One minor frustration-the significance of the very odd title is embedded in the front-pages to one of the sections (the fourth, I think) and is easily missed. Turns out, it's a quote from Bacon describing a piece of compelling evidence that trumps all prejudices. Fingerpost indeed is what it takes to sort the whole thing out.

The parallels with Ecco's "The Name of the Rose" are very striking. A cloistered male setting (academic rather than ecclesiastic), a poisoning, an innocent female brutally prosecuted, a preoccupation with texts-including a purloined book that is the key to a cipher that is a major key to the plot, etc. There are surely more-including some that can not be revealed without spoiling the suspense. To me, Fingerpost compares quite favorably with Rose. I liked Rose very much, but ultimately it seemed that Ecco was more concerned with philosophy and semionics-whatever that is-than with character and story. The chase through the library maze and the cataclysmic fire at the end of Rose pushed the whole book over the edge of melodrama, in my opinion. Pears is more restrained in burdening his story with symbolism-though there is an obvious touch of semionics in the experiment with the dove in the vacuum chamber-watch for it early in da Cola's narrative.

By staying focused on the fully imagined people of the day, their authentic history, and in the mechanisms of a wonderfully realized plot, Pears writes a very satisfying and moving book. He solves the mystery of the Fingerpost, but he leaves you to ponder more profound and lasting mysteries. Somehow, the course of history has moved from the deep ignorance, tragedies, and injustice of that long-ago time to a perhaps more enlightened era. But just as certainly, many of the beliefs and practices we take for granted today will seem primitive and cruel 300 years hence. Just which beliefs are they?

That being said, it is one of the most rewarding mysteries you are likely to read. Pears's incredibly detailed depiction of Oxford in the late seventeenth century bristles with life, lust, and treachery. First through the eyes of a wandering Italian Marco da Cola, and then through the eyes of other major figures like John Wallis and Anthony Wood, we are introduced to the strange events surrounding an even stranger person: Sarah Blundy. The history of science and medicine is very accurate and very well-treated (not always the same thing!), especially in the sections on Wallis and Wood. The pace of the book does pick up the deeper we get into the twisting paths of Oxford life and legend, but I don't think that makes the first two accounts any less riveting. Instead, it brings home how different people see the same events, and makes us evaluate more critically every "fact" we think we know.

This would be a great book to take on a one-week vacation, since it will probably get you through the whole thing without having to take 6 books with you. If you like historical mysteries or historical fiction, or even the history of medicine, I highly recommend this book to you.

PS. The ending knocks you off your feet. Totally unexpected!

The book is complex, and I must thank Mr. Pears for including the Dramatis Personae section at the end. Besides helping the reader sort through the host of characters, it also sets the record straight on which ones are real, fictional, or some combination. Among the historical celebrities who people the novel are Robert Boyle, John Locke, and Christopher Wren, making this book a great lesson in the history of scientific thought and politics in the middle ages.

The crowning glory of the novel is the apparent ease with which Mr. Pears allows us to see the world through the eyes of the four narrators. (In this respect I found myself thinking of Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury.) Not only are we shown different perspectives on the events, but the "facts" of the events themselves become as fluid as the writer's prose.