It is probably impossible to read several of Muriel Spark's novels without realizing that her Roman Catholicism is much more than an item of biographical interest: it is a potent force which has profoundly affected the shape of her art. For Miss Spark does not stop short at simply bringing the question of Catholicism into her work; she has chosen to place the traditionally Christian outlook at the very heart of everything she writes.
This "outlook" is perhaps best illustrated by one of her short stories, "A Playhouse Called Remarkable". In this, a character called Moon Biglow recounts how he and five other men descended from the moon shortly after the Flood. At that time mankind was a bored and dying race, with no conception of higher pursuits. Moon and his compatriots introduced the concept of art by opening a playhouse in which they enacted the "Changing Drama of the Moon", a myth-sequence relating to the eternal realities of the heavenly bodies. Such was the enthusiastic response to this drama that the people of the earth were rejuvenated, rediscovering the will to live. But this enthusiasm did not last. An opponent of Moon and his friends managed to suppress the drama, to expel most of the moon men, and to lure the people back to "pure and primitive passions". Nonetheless, the memory of the playhouse was not altogether stamped out. Earth-born artists gradually appeared, "attempting to express the lost moon drama". From that time on, Moon insists, the artist's task has been to "rise up and proclaim the virtue of the remarkable things that are missing from the earth".
This is a free excerpt of 268 words. There are 2,419 words (approx.
8 pages at 300 words per page) in the full critical essay.
Read the rest of this Criticism with our Spark, Muriel 1918–: Critical Essay by Victor Kelleher Access Pass.
