When it comes to historical fiction, James Meek has already proved himself. The People’s Act of Love, his literary page-turner set in Siberia in 1919, is extraordinary for many reasons, not least because it feels as contemporary as it does authentic. To Calais, in Ordinary Time takes place almost 700 years ago – in 1348 – but is, if anything, even more in dialogue with the present day.
In his other career as an award-winning journalist, Meek has written extensively about Brexit Britain. His collection of essays, Dreams of Leaving and Remaining, was published earlier this year and the themes of identity, belonging, xenophobia and migration in his new novel speak clearly to Britain’s current political turmoil. To Calais, in Ordinary Time is also overhung by the spectres of climate catastrophe, biological warfare and future pandemics. Meek’s characters are on the road, heading for France, as the Black Death that will destroy half of Northern Europe’s population moves towards them.
Each character is making the journey for a different reason: Bernadine, a noblewoman, to escape an arranged marriage; Will, a ploughman, for money and freedom; Thomas, a proctor, is returning to his adopted home in Avignon. They’re travelling with a band of archers, the most sadistic of whom has abducted a Frenchwoman and continues to rape her and keep her captive in a cart. Will is disgusted by this but is initiated into the band nevertheless and does nothing to help the woman.
They’re also joined by Hab, a “pigboy,” who is in love with Will and who becomes Madlen, Hab’s “sister,” when wearing one of two wedding gowns.
Medieval England
Meek finds numerous ways of making medieval England relatable. Some details are like winks to the reader. The travellers detour to a joust, reminiscent of a boutique music festival; the colour of patrons’ poignets or wristbands determines which areas they can access. But the novel is at its most current, and initially most convoluted, in its exploration of gender identity.
At first, Will claims Hab/Madlen represents a “demonic force” that dislocates “the correct position of people and objects in the world”. Later in the book, there are beautifully tender depictions of the couple’s love but the sub-plot of the wedding gowns is a distraction during their early interactions.
The gowns are a convenient symbol of doubleness. They allow Hab to transgress class and gender boundaries in the manner of some Shakespeare characters but Meek tries to do too much with them, creating unnecessary tangles in the story: at one point Hab suggests that “Lady Bernadine should pretend to be Madlen pretending to be Lady Bernadine.”
Thomas provides most of the commentary on the relationship between Will and Hab/Madlen, giving voice to complex theories about the connections between migration and self-realisation. Modern and analytical, he is in some ways our and Meek’s proxy, his pomposity waning as he tries to write himself into a state of absolution.
Guilt, forgiveness and confession are central motifs. Some of the characters believe the plague has been sent by God to punish humanity for sinning. Meek evokes a deeply Catholic England as well as highlighting widespread anger at church corruption.
Aristocrats’ classism
It’s fascinating and eye-opening on many levels. The extent of the aristocrats’ classism is quite shocking. Even Bernadine sees those who are not of noble birth as subhuman and incapable of experiencing certain emotions. “It’s only we of blood must endure love’s smarts,” she tells Hab. But Meek is more overtly concerned with holding a mirror up to today than Hilary Mantel in her Thomas Cromwell novels and he lacks Mantel’s lightness of touch, the playfulness and drive of his narrative obscured by its disquisitions and conscious literariness.
He’s partly investigating language and the contentiousness of writing history. Implicitly or explicitly, he references medieval texts such as the allegorical dream visions Piers Plowman and Le Roman de la Rose. There are obvious parallels with the Canterbury Tales.
While his erudition and research are almost too clear, his prose is often brilliantly fresh. He can inhabit multiple points of view and linguistic styles, from Thomas’s wordiness to the bawdy poetry of an archer: “He’s a whore bitch’s whelp, damned to hang by his whore tongue from the devil’s inmost arse hair.”
To Calais, in Ordinary Time is at its best and most immediate when the characters are allowed free rein. There are surprising and memorable scenes at the joust and towards the end when the plague becomes a terrible and inescapable reality. In a simple but standout moment, Will and Madlen approach an infected village, passing fields of ripe barley where oversized sheep “foreswallowed their own weight in men’s food.” Humanity is under threat but nature is persisting. It’s eerie, prescient and weirdly reassuring – unlike much of the rest of the novel, which may be a feat of imagination but is strained by over-intricacy.
