Frank S. (colonelstech) reviewed The Potter's Field (Inspector Montalbano, Bk 13) on + 38 more book reviews
The Gospel according to Montalbano, June 2, 2013
by Colonel Frank Stech
Andrea Camilleri, Italian author, screenwriter, and film director, has been writing since 1944, before I was born. His erudition, wisdom, and joie de vive enliven every page of his mystery series featuring Detective Inspector Salvo Montalbano. Montalbano is truly a Pirandellian creation. On his website, Camilleri refers to Montalbano as a "serial killer of characters." Like other authors, Camilleri discovered Montalbano had achieved a life of his own, demanded much from his creator, to the demise of other Camilleri books and personages. Camilleri writes a Montalbano novel every so often so that his mischievously dangerous creation will be appeased and allow Camilleri to work on other projects. Not only in his creator's mind has Montalbano taken on a reality; his popularity in Italy led Camilleri's home town, Porto Empedocle - on which Montalbano's fictitious Sicilian port of Vigàta is modelled - to change its official name to Porto Empedocle Vigàta. Like Moby Dick ("as white as a mountain of snow") the white mountain of Montalbano's character takes on hauntingly mystical powers, over Callilleri, over Vigàta, and over us.
In "The Potter's Field," Montalbano assembles the pieces and ultimately solves his usual utterly chaotic collection of disparate cases. Montalbano is no classic sleuth, he puzzles out life's mysteries in the mosaic pieces of his cases as he puzzles out the absurd pieces of his own life. Through mystical dreams, Machiavellian machinations of da Vinci-esque ingenuity and finesse, literary allusions (including one to his own creator, Camilleri, and another to the Gospel of Matthew), and the tireless sleuthing of his faithful and altogether baffled fellow detectives, Montalbano sees the truth as if smitten by the vision of a convert.
Then Montalbano becomes the ultimate Machiavellian puppet-master, with Pirandello's exquisite sense that the absurdity of human failings has a crystalline logic and an inevitable justice, only appreciated by those broad-minded enough to appreciate all life's shining facets, while warily avoiding the lethally sharp edges of inevitable evil and sin. It all becomes clear, but only we and Montalbano fully understand and appreciate that none of us entirely escape life's gluey mud in "The Potter Field" of clay and corruption.
It is Camilleri's genius, and Montalbano's companionship, that let us receive this tragic vision with all the joy and comedy it fully deserves.
May they long continue to rule each other, and this most delightful corner of our reader's world.
by Colonel Frank Stech
Andrea Camilleri, Italian author, screenwriter, and film director, has been writing since 1944, before I was born. His erudition, wisdom, and joie de vive enliven every page of his mystery series featuring Detective Inspector Salvo Montalbano. Montalbano is truly a Pirandellian creation. On his website, Camilleri refers to Montalbano as a "serial killer of characters." Like other authors, Camilleri discovered Montalbano had achieved a life of his own, demanded much from his creator, to the demise of other Camilleri books and personages. Camilleri writes a Montalbano novel every so often so that his mischievously dangerous creation will be appeased and allow Camilleri to work on other projects. Not only in his creator's mind has Montalbano taken on a reality; his popularity in Italy led Camilleri's home town, Porto Empedocle - on which Montalbano's fictitious Sicilian port of Vigàta is modelled - to change its official name to Porto Empedocle Vigàta. Like Moby Dick ("as white as a mountain of snow") the white mountain of Montalbano's character takes on hauntingly mystical powers, over Callilleri, over Vigàta, and over us.
In "The Potter's Field," Montalbano assembles the pieces and ultimately solves his usual utterly chaotic collection of disparate cases. Montalbano is no classic sleuth, he puzzles out life's mysteries in the mosaic pieces of his cases as he puzzles out the absurd pieces of his own life. Through mystical dreams, Machiavellian machinations of da Vinci-esque ingenuity and finesse, literary allusions (including one to his own creator, Camilleri, and another to the Gospel of Matthew), and the tireless sleuthing of his faithful and altogether baffled fellow detectives, Montalbano sees the truth as if smitten by the vision of a convert.
Then Montalbano becomes the ultimate Machiavellian puppet-master, with Pirandello's exquisite sense that the absurdity of human failings has a crystalline logic and an inevitable justice, only appreciated by those broad-minded enough to appreciate all life's shining facets, while warily avoiding the lethally sharp edges of inevitable evil and sin. It all becomes clear, but only we and Montalbano fully understand and appreciate that none of us entirely escape life's gluey mud in "The Potter Field" of clay and corruption.
It is Camilleri's genius, and Montalbano's companionship, that let us receive this tragic vision with all the joy and comedy it fully deserves.
May they long continue to rule each other, and this most delightful corner of our reader's world.
