ZNote
Despite Lachman's best efforts, the book cannot fully escape the overall framing of historical fiction. The best way to glimpse Hildegard is not through this book or the movies that have been made about her like Visions, but rather in reading translations of her actual work, which are more present than ever. The Hildegard present in this book is, at-best, a construction assembled from her writings and biography. While ambitious, I could not help but feel like I was reading the thoughts of a homunculus. Especially given that Lachman uses the King James Bible for certain passages rather than a version that Hildegard would have been more familiar with, there's also a religious ideology distance that is unintentionally created. Hildegard as a religious and feminist (depending on who you ask) figure is too fascinating to be condensed in this manner.
That being said, the passages themselves are the product of thorough research and are rhetorically written in a way that makes for easy reading. It provides a surprisingly adept overview of the many feast days observed in the Christian liturgical calendar, as well as attempting to get to the heart of the sociopolitical climate of the time. There are, however, times where it feels that information is being crammed in as much as possible, creating pockets of density that don't make for the most mellifluous flow. Perhaps it is a necessary evil or consequence that Lachman's book can't quite "do everything" within the one year it explores, but as an introduction to Hildegard, it has its uses.
Despite Lachman's best efforts, the book cannot fully escape the overall framing of historical fiction. The best way to glimpse Hildegard is not through this book or the movies that have been made about her like Visions, but rather in reading translations of her actual work, which are more present than ever. The Hildegard present in this book is, at-best, a construction assembled from her writings and biography. While ambitious, I could not help but feel like I was reading the thoughts of a homunculus. Especially given that Lachman uses the King James Bible for certain passages rather than a version that Hildegard would have been more familiar with, there's also a religious ideology distance that is unintentionally created. Hildegard as a religious and feminist (depending on who you ask) figure is too fascinating to be condensed in this manner.
That being said, the passages themselves are the product of thorough research and are rhetorically written in a way that makes for easy reading. It provides a surprisingly adept overview of the many feast days observed in the Christian liturgical calendar, as well as attempting to get to the heart of the sociopolitical climate of the time. There are, however, times where it feels that information is being crammed in as much as possible, creating pockets of density that don't make for the most mellifluous flow. Perhaps it is a necessary evil or consequence that Lachman's book can't quite "do everything" within the one year it explores, but as an introduction to Hildegard, it has its uses.