Not only is this the most beautifully bound book of poetry I
think I've ever seen, but Thom Satterlee, assistant professor of English at
Taylor University, and advisor to the student-run magazine Parnassus, is
obviously a master at his craft.
His research into his subject, his empathetic exploration of a time very
different from our own, as well as his mastery of technique makes his a
stand-out book among this year's many prize winners.
Burning Wyclif is a novelized-biography of John Wyclif, the
14th century reformer declared heretic by Pope Martin V in 1415. Wyclif's books
were ordered burned by Pope Martin, and no images of Wyclif we have today are
actually from his time. Satterlee therefore had to restore the life of Wyclif
to us, much in the same way an archaeologist restores a whole garment from only
a few charred bits.
To this scant historical framework Satterlee brings the
wisdom and sensitivity of a mature writer. He uses free verse, sonnets, and
other forms to their best effect. His villanelle "A Young Italian Man
Healed of the Plague by Saint Bridget of Sweden" reminds me how muscular
this form can be in the right hands.
Satterlee gives voice to plague victims and survivors, The
Black Friars, William of Ockham, John Ball (executed leader of the peasant
revolt), The Flagellants, the Duke of Lancaster, Arab scholar Ibn Khtir (based
on Ibn Abu Madyan), assorted clerics, politicians, devotees, and a host of
others who filled the 14th century world we are invited to enter.
Here, Satterlee gives voice to Wyclif's trepidation over his
own writings. He has come to the point where he realizes that to follow God
will bring him into direct conflict with the Church. He agonizes:
*
All day I felt
too afraid to read
*
what I had written.
When the ink dried
I hid the page
*
beneath other pages, believing
that if I were right
pride would make it
*
impossible to write again,
and if I were wrong
shame would do the same. (1)
*
This task of historic reconstruction is one that
novels-in-verse and linking narrative poetry do particularly well, because of
the intimacy and focus of verse. Poetry, too, is allowed a looser, more
easygoing relationship with plot than its prose cousin enjoys; which allows the
poet to follow the map of the interior life, which plot-driven narrative often
must skip over.
Through his success Satterlee shows us how people lived in a
distant era of disease, religious turmoil and political upheaval. He returns us
to the voice of our cultural ancestors telling us how things were, and how they
might be again.
*
1. Satterlee, Thom. Burning Wyclif. Lubbock: Texas Tech University
Press. 2006. 52.
