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The Evening and the Morning: A Novel (Kingsbridge Book 4) Kindle Edition
An Amazon Best Book of 2020
The thrilling and addictive prequel to The Pillars of the Earth--set in England at the dawn of a new era: the Middle Ages
"Just as transporting as [The Pillars of the Earth] . . . A most welcome addition to the Kingsbridge series." --The Washington Post
It is 997 CE, the end of the Dark Ages. England is facing attacks from the Welsh in the west and the Vikings in the east. Those in power bend justice according to their will, regardless of ordinary people and often in conflict with the king. Without a clear rule of law, chaos reigns.
In these turbulent times, three characters find their lives intertwined. A young boatbuilder's life is turned upside down when his home is raided by Vikings, forcing him and his family to move and start their lives anew in a small hamlet where he does not fit in. . . . A Norman noblewoman marries for love, following her husband across the sea to a new land, but the customs of her husband's homeland are shockingly different, and it soon becomes clear to her that a single misstep could be catastrophic. . . . A monk dreams of transforming his humble abbey into a center of learning that will be admired throughout Europe. And each in turn comes into dangerous conflict with a clever and ruthless bishop who will do anything to increase his wealth and power.
Thirty years ago, Ken Follett published his most popular novel, The Pillars of the Earth. Now, Follett's masterful new prequel The Evening and the Morning takes us on an epic journey into a historical past rich with ambition and rivalry, death and birth, love and hate, that will end where The Pillars of the Earth begins.
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherPenguin Books
- Publication dateSeptember 15, 2020
- File size7240 KB
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From the Publisher
The Evening and the Morning | The Pillars of the Earth | World Without End | A Column of Fire | The Armor of Light | |
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Discover the entire Kingsbridge Series | Prequel | Book 1 | Book 2 | Book 3 | Book 4 |
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
Review
—Kirkus (starred)
“Follett has done it again. Readers will gobble up this exciting prequel.”
—Library Journal
“[An] absorbing and lengthy saga of life in a chaotic and unstable England on the cusp of the Middle Ages . . . Fans of Follett's ever-popular Kingsbridge series . . . will flock to this . . . while intrigued newcomers can start here.”
—Booklist
“Follett vividly re-creates the ancient era . . . in this feast for his fans.”
—AARP
Praise for Ken Follett and the Kingsbridge series
“The Kingsbridge books . . . are swift, accessible and written in a clear, uncluttered prose that has a distinctly contemporary feel. . . . Follett presents his worlds in granular detail, but the narratives never stand still. Something dramatic, appalling or enraging happens in virtually every chapter. . . . The result is a massive entertainment that illuminates an obscure corner of British history with intelligence and great narrative energy.”
—The Washington Post
“Follett takes you to a time long past with brio and razor-sharp storytelling. An epic tale in which you will lose yourself.”
—The Denver Post
“[Follett is a] master of the sweeping, readable epic.”
—The Philadelphia Inquirer
“Follett is a master.”
—The Washington Post
About the Author
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Chapter 1
Thursday, June 17, 997
It was hard to stay awake all night, Edgar found, even on the most important night of your life.
He had spread his cloak over the reeds on the floor and now he lay on it, dressed in the knee-length brown wool tunic that was all he wore in summer, day and night. In winter he would wrap the cloak around him and lie near the fire. But now the weather was warm: Midsummer Day was a week away.
Edgar always knew dates. Most people had to ask priests, who kept calendars. Edgar's elder brother Erman had once said to him: "How come you know when Easter is?" and he had replied: "Because it's the first Sunday after the first full moon after the twenty-first day of March, obviously." It had been a mistake to add "obviously," because Erman had punched him in the stomach for being sarcastic. That had been years ago, when Edgar was small. He was grown now. He would be eighteen three days after Midsummer. His brothers no longer punched him.
He shook his head. Random thoughts sent him drifting off. He tried to make himself uncomfortable, lying on his fist to stay awake.
He wondered how much longer he had to wait.
He turned his head and looked around by firelight. His home was like almost every other house in the town of Combe: oak-plank walls, a thatched roof, and an earth floor partly covered with reeds from the banks of the nearby river. It had no windows. In the middle of the single room was a square of stones surrounding the hearth. Over the fire stood an iron tripod from which cooking pots could be hung, and its legs made spidery shadows on the underside of the roof. All around the walls were wooden pegs on which were hung clothes, cooking utensils, and boatbuilding tools.
Edgar was not sure how much of the night had passed, because he might have dozed off, perhaps more than once. Earlier, he had listened to the sounds of the town settling for the night: a couple of drunks singing an obscene ditty, the bitter accusations of a marital quarrel in a neighboring house, a door slamming and a dog barking and, somewhere nearby, a woman sobbing. But now there was nothing but the soft lullaby of waves on a sheltered beach. He stared in the direction of the door, looking for telltale lines of light around its edges, and saw only darkness. That meant either that the moon had set, so the night was well advanced, or that the sky was cloudy, which would tell him nothing.
The rest of his family lay around the room, close to the walls where there was less smoke. Pa and Ma were back-to-back. Sometimes they would wake in the middle of the night and embrace, whispering and moving together, until they fell back, panting; but they were fast asleep now, Pa snoring. Erman, the eldest brother at twenty, lay near Edgar, and Eadbald, the middle one, was in the corner. Edgar could hear their steady, untroubled breathing.
At last, the church bell struck.
There was a monastery on the far side of the town. The monks had a way of measuring the hours of the night: they made big, graduated candles that told the time as they burned down. One hour before dawn they would ring the bell, then get up to chant their service of Matins.
Edgar lay still a little longer. The bell might have disturbed Ma, who woke easily. He gave her time to sink back into deep slumber. Then, at last, he got to his feet.
Silently he picked up his cloak, his shoes, and his belt with its sheathed dagger attached. On bare feet he crossed the room, avoiding the furniture: a table, two stools, and a bench. The door opened silently: Edgar had greased the wooden hinges yesterday with a generous smear of sheep's tallow.
If one of his family woke now and spoke to him, he would say he was going outside to piss, and hope they did not spot that he was carrying his shoes.
Eadbald grunted. Edgar froze. Had Eadbald woken up, or just made a noise in his sleep? Edgar could not tell. But Eadbald was the passive one, always keen to avoid a fuss, like Pa. He would not make trouble.
Edgar stepped out and closed the door behind him carefully.
The moon had set, but the sky was clear and the beach was starlit. Between the house and the high-tide mark was a boatyard. Pa was a boatbuilder, and his three sons worked with him. Pa was a good craftsman and a poor businessman, so Ma made all the money decisions, especially the difficult calculation of what price to ask for something as complicated as a boat or ship. If a customer tried to bargain down the price, Pa would be willing to give in, but Ma would make him stand firm.
Edgar glanced at the yard as he laced his shoes and buckled his belt. There was only one vessel under construction, a small boat for rowing upriver. Beside it stood a large and valuable stockpile of timber, the trunks split into halves and quarters, ready to be shaped into the parts of a boat. About once a month the whole family went into the forest and felled a mature oak tree. Pa and Edgar would begin, alternately swinging long-handled axes, cutting a precise wedge out of the trunk. Then they would rest while Erman and Eadbald took over. When the tree came down, they would trim it then float the wood downriver to Combe. They had to pay, of course: the forest belonged to Wigelm, the thane to whom most people in Combe paid their rent, and he demanded twelve silver pennies for each tree.
As well as the timber pile, the yard contained a barrel of tar, a coil of rope, and a whetstone. All were guarded by a chained-up mastiff called Grendel, black with a gray muzzle, too old to do much harm to thieves but still able to bark an alarm. Grendel was quiet now, watching Edgar incuriously with his head resting on his front paws. Edgar knelt down and stroked his head. "Good-bye, old dog," he murmured, and Grendel wagged his tail without getting up.
Also in the yard was one finished vessel, and Edgar thought of it as his own. He had built it himself to an original design, based on a Viking ship. Edgar had never actually seen a Viking-they had not raided Combe in his lifetime-but two years ago a wreck had washed up on the beach, empty and fire blackened, its dragon figurehead half smashed, presumably after some battle. Edgar had been awestruck by its mutilated beauty: the graceful curves, the long serpentine prow, and the slender hull. He had been most impressed by the large out-jutting keel that ran the length of the ship, which-he had realized after some thought-gave the stability that allowed the Vikings to cross the seas. Edgar's boat was a lesser version, with two oars and a small, square sail.
Edgar knew he had a talent. He was already a better boatbuilder than his elder brothers, and before long he would overtake Pa. He had an intuitive sense of how forms fitted together to make a stable structure. Years ago he had overheard Pa say to Ma: "Erman learns slowly and Eadbald learns fast, but Edgar seems to understand before the words are out of my mouth." It was true. Some men could pick up a musical instrument they had never played, a pipe or a lyre, and get a tune out of it after a few minutes. Edgar had such instincts about boats, and houses, too. He would say: "That boat will list to starboard," or: "That roof will leak," and he was always right.
Now he untied his boat and pushed it down the beach. The sound of the hull scraping on the sand was muffled by the shushing of the waves breaking on the shore.
He was startled by a girlish giggle. In the starlight he saw a naked woman lying on the sand, and a man on top of her. Edgar probably knew them, but their faces were not clearly visible and he looked away quickly, not wanting to recognize them. He had surprised them in an illicit tryst, he guessed. The woman seemed young and perhaps the man was married. The clergy preached against such affairs, but people did not always follow the rules. Edgar ignored the couple and pushed his boat into the water.
He glanced back at the house, feeling a pang of regret, wondering whether he would ever see it again. It was the only home he could remember. He knew, because he had been told, that he had been born in another town, Exeter, where his father had worked for a master boatbuilder; then the family had moved, while Edgar was still a baby, and had set up home in Combe, where Pa had started his own enterprise with one order for a rowboat; but Edgar could not remember any of that. This was the only home he knew, and he was leaving it for good.
He was lucky to have found employment elsewhere. Business had slowed since the renewal of Viking attacks on the south of England when Edgar was nine years old. Trading and fishing were dangerous while the marauders were near. Only the brave bought boats.
There were three ships in the harbor now, he saw by starlight: two herring fishers and a Frankish merchant ship. Dragged up on the beach were a handful of smaller craft, river and coastal vessels. He had helped to build one of the fishers. But he could remember a time when there had always been a dozen or more ships in port.
He felt a fresh breeze from the southwest, the prevailing wind here. His boat had a sail-small, because they were so costly: a
full-size sail for a seagoing ship would take one woman four years to make. But it was hardly worthwhile to unfurl for the short trip across the bay. He began to row, something that hardly taxed him. Edgar was heavily muscled, like a blacksmith. His father and brothers were the same. All day, six days a week, they worked with ax, adze, and auger, shaping the oak strakes that formed the hulls of boats. It was hard work and it made strong men.
His heart lifted. He had got away. And he was going to meet the woman he loved. The stars were brilliant; the beach glowed white; and when his oars broke the surface of the water, the curling foam was like the fall of her hair on her shoulders.
Her name was Sungifu, which was usually shortened to Sunni, and she was exceptional in every way.
He could see the premises along the seafront, most of them workplaces of fishermen and traders: the forge of a tinsmith who made rustproof items for ships; the long yard in which a roper wove his lines; and the huge kiln of a tar maker who roasted pine logs to produce the sticky liquid with which boatbuilders waterproofed their vessels. The town always looked bigger from the water: it was home to several hundred people, most making their living, directly or indirectly, from the sea.
He looked across the bay to his destination. In the darkness he would not have been able to see Sunni even if she had been there, which he knew she was not, since they had arranged to meet at dawn. But he could not help staring at the place where she soon would be.
Sunni was twenty-one, older than Edgar by more than three years. She had caught his attention one day when he was sitting on the beach staring at the Viking wreck. He knew her by sight, of course-he knew everyone living in the small town-but he had not particularly noticed her before and did not recall anything about her family. "Were you washed up with the wreck?" she had said. "You were sitting so still, I thought you were driftwood." She had to be imaginative, he saw right away, to say something like that off the top of her head; and he had explained what fascinated him about the lines of the vessel, feeling that she would understand. They had talked for an hour and he had fallen in love.
Then she told him she was married, but it was already too late.
Her husband, Cyneric, was thirty. She had been fourteen when she married him. He had a small herd of milk cows, and Sunni managed the dairy. She was shrewd, and made plenty of money for her husband. They had no children.
Edgar had quickly learned that Sunni hated Cyneric. Every night, after the evening milking, he went to an alehouse called the Sailors and got drunk. While he was there, Sunni could slip into the woods and meet Edgar.
However, from now on there would be no more hiding. Today they would run away together; or, to be exact, sail away. Edgar had the offer of a job and a house in a fishing village fifty miles along the coast. He had been lucky to find a boatbuilder who was hiring. Edgar had no money-he never had money, Ma said he had no need of it-but his tools were in a locker built into the boat. They would start a new life.
As soon as everyone realized they had gone, Cyneric would consider himself free to marry again. A wife who ran away with another man was, in practice, divorcing herself: the Church might not like it, but that was the custom. Within a few weeks, Sunni said, Cyneric would go into the countryside and find a desperately poor family with a pretty fourteen-year-old daughter. Edgar wondered why the man wanted a wife: he had little interest in sex, according to Sunni. "He likes to have someone to push around," she had said. "My problem was that I grew old enough to despise him."
Cyneric would not come after them, even if he found out where they were, which was unlikely at least for some time to come. "And if we're wrong about that, and Cyneric finds us, I'll beat the shit out of him," Edgar had said. Sunni's expression had told him that she thought this was a foolish boast, and he knew she was right. Hastily, he had added: "But it probably won't come to that."
He reached the far side of the bay, then beached the boat and roped it to a boulder.
He could hear the chanting of the monks at their prayers. The monastery was nearby, and the home of Cyneric and Sunni a few hundred yards beyond that.
Product details
- ASIN : B081Y47NRW
- Publisher : Penguin Books (September 15, 2020)
- Publication date : September 15, 2020
- Language : English
- File size : 7240 KB
- Text-to-Speech : Enabled
- Screen Reader : Supported
- Enhanced typesetting : Enabled
- X-Ray : Enabled
- Word Wise : Enabled
- Sticky notes : On Kindle Scribe
- Print length : 926 pages
- Best Sellers Rank: #10,365 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #28 in Historical Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Fiction
- #134 in Saga Fiction
- #186 in Family Saga Fiction
- Customer Reviews:
About the author
Ken Follett was only twenty-seven when he wrote the award-winning EYE OF THE NEEDLE, which became an international bestseller. His celebrated PILLARS OF THE EARTH was voted into the top 100 of Britain's best-loved books in the BBC's the Big Read and the sequel, WORLD WITHOUT END, was published to critical acclaim. He lives with his family in London and Hertfordshire.
Customer reviews
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Learn more how customers reviews work on AmazonCustomers say
Customers find the storyline catching and set the scene perfectly. They also appreciate the great characters and writing style. Readers describe the historical content as profound, accurate, and healthy. They describe the level of detail as works of art and entirely believable. Customers find it hard to put down. Opinions are mixed on the pacing and plot, with some finding it fast-paced and others saying it drags a little in parts.
AI-generated from the text of customer reviews
Customers find the storyline catching, enjoyable, and gripping. They also say the author puts them in the time and place, making the book an incredible experience. Readers also mention the period atmosphere seems authentic and in accord with what they know about the period.
"...Ken Follet writes historical fiction, he does it with such richly imagined details and such smooth prose that you may be physically reading the book..." Read more
"...this book as it is immersive and has great character stuff and a solid plot line. Heartily recommend if you’ve read the first three books!" Read more
"...bishop of the English town of Shiring who is clever, ambitious and treacherous...." Read more
"...The period atmosphere seems authentic and in accord with what I know about the period's history...." Read more
Customers find the characters interesting, good, and brave. They also mention that the plot is compelling, with good people and bad people.
"I thoroughly enjoyed this book as it is immersive and has great character stuff and a solid plot line...." Read more
"...The book also includes historical characters (like King Ethelred) and events (like Viking invasions), along with political plots, love triangles,..." Read more
"...What is great about this book: the characters, the plots, and the history!..." Read more
"...There are the good people and the bad people, and many of the good have flaws that make them seem even more real...." Read more
Customers find the writing style incredibly well written, with simple sentences that put them there. They also appreciate the descriptions as devious and real.
"...fiction, he does it with such richly imagined details and such smooth prose that you may be physically reading the book in 2020, but you're mind and..." Read more
"...There's no difficulty reading the text even if your eyes are not quite so good as they used to be.Things I didn't like?..." Read more
"...It's a familiar plot, but well-told, and I enjoyed reading this re-telling of that same tale as much as I enjoyed its previous three..." Read more
"The writing is - as always - incredible. I love that there is a HUGE cast of characters going about their daily lives...." Read more
Customers find the historical content profound, detailed, and well researched. They also say the book gives them a flavor of life around the turn of the millennium. Readers also say it's an uplifting and great story well told.
"...and ambitious monk, the challenged noblewoman, but when the formula is so engrossing, it's a welcome return...." Read more
"...Altogether, it gives the reader a very good idea what the start of England must have been like before the Normans came." Read more
"...At last Love triumphed. It also good to notice how moral values, patience, hard work and faith in God, will always favore those who strive to do..." Read more
"...Realistic, historicly accurate. An excellent read." Read more
Customers find the book amazing, realistic, and beautiful. They also say the characters are lifelike and believable. Readers also say it makes sense and comes together beautifully. They say the book is provocative, sexy at times, violent, suspenseful, and sad.
"...” characters - the intelligent, inquisitive builder; the headstrong, lovely, and brave noblewoman; the determined and godly monk; and the evil..." Read more
"...Read all his books. They are works of art!" Read more
"A wonderful prequel and vivid in it’s telling of the tale. A great way to find out how Kingsbridge came to be….enjoy the read!" Read more
"...None are as good as Pillars of the Earth, but this is close. Amazing detail and a riveting story!" Read more
Customers find the book hard to put down and a painless way to absorb some early history, culture, and ideas.
"This is a page turner and hard to put down. If you liked Pillars of the Earth, you will enjoy The Evening and the Morning immensely!" Read more
"...It moves right along and it is hard to put down once you start it. I read it in two days, and it's a big fat book!..." Read more
"...An engaging read that is hard to put down, but I enjoyed taking breaks and imaging where the story was going next." Read more
"This is a 900 page book but because it is almost impossible to put down and flows so well, I read this novel in a week...." Read more
Customers are mixed about the pacing. Some find the book fast-paced and hard to put down, while others say it drags a little in parts.
"A fast read from beginning to end. I can't recommend enough. No matter in what order you have read the trilogy, this one stands alone." Read more
"...Bad things happened, of course, but they tended to resolve fairly quickly, so the plot sort of moves from one crisis to the next rather than..." Read more
"...the correct book, an accurate description of the condition, and fast shipping." Read more
"...His villainous characters are always crafty, fast thinkers, and selfish. Book 4 takes us back before Kingsbridge was created...." Read more
Customers have mixed opinions about the plot. Some find it delightful and a real page-turner, while others say it lacks detail and nuance. They also say it has too many plotlines and very little architecture. Readers also mention the plot is simplistic and formulaic. They feel the book is raunchier than necessary and has too much anachronism peppering the dialog.
"...It has too many plotlines and very little architecture, and almost feels more like a spin-off than a true Kingsbridge novel...." Read more
"This is a page turner and hard to put down. If you liked Pillars of the Earth, you will enjoy The Evening and the Morning immensely!" Read more
"...Shorter sentences, simpler descriptions, less character development. An OK book, just not up to the standards of the others in the series." Read more
"...It was certainly a page turner. Ken Follett is a fantastic author." Read more
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Still, I've managed a little bit of series reading, and overall have knocked off almost three hundred books from the time I got really into reading in mid 2011. And, despite being one of the first books I read, Pillars of the Earth has always stood head and shoulders above 99.9% of the books I've devoured. It always will. It simply is one of the greatest novels I'll ever read. Ironically enough, had my Dad not hand me a beautiful gold-colored trade paperback, I may not have become the utter bookworm I am today.
"In a broad valley, at the foot of a sloping hillside, beside a clear bubbling stream, Tom was building a house." With this simple yet captivating sentence, I was unknowingly falling into a loving relationship with historical fiction.
Pillars of the Earth was such a good book, such an incredible experience, that I would have given anything to have read it again for the first time, to recapture that magic. Well, thankfully for me, years before I got back into reading, Ken Follet wrote the astounding World Without End, and, my God, it may have even outdone Pillars. I was HOOKED, and loving every single one of its massive 1100 pages. It was heaven, every single page, a dramatic, blood-soaked, historical heaven. I still give Pillars the slight, slight nod as my favorite only because it came first.
In between I knocked off other Follet novels, almost every one an excellent reading experience.
But wow, I was the luckiest guy in the world when, a few years ago, A Column of Fire was announced. I bought it brand new, devoured it, and now finally, we have The Evening and the Morning, another installment in the greatest series I've ever read, and this time we are taking a step back in time to before the characters of Pillars existed.
this book is simultaneously amazing and also disappointing. It's amazing because everything in the Kingsbridge series is, but more specifically, it's amazing because when Ken Follet writes historical fiction, he does it with such richly imagined details and such smooth prose that you may be physically reading the book in 2020, but you're mind and soul is living over a millennia prior. He's a great world builder, and you can almost taste the rain that falls, and the winds that blow can almost transpire through the page and make you shiver.
I don't really want to get into each of the characters and stories. Some of the book is formulaic, which isn't a bad thing. You should be expecting drama, conflict, war, religion, sex, and other similar themes found in the other books in this series. Follet will most certainly deliver on that. But the book also differs from the others, as it takes place over just one decade as opposed to several. Initially I was bummed about this, but it's still a terrific novel, and I can appreciate it for being different in that regard.
My other complaint is that the book is too short. Yes, it's over 900 pages (although the words are big and blocky and you can knock off 50 pages an hour), and I'm complaining that it's too short. It seems edited down to keep the pace fast, and thus the reader more engaged, and I found myself reluctant to keep reading (which of course isn't so easy with this series) because I don't want it to end. I would love a complete and uncut edition of this, like King's The Stand. I don't care if the publisher, or even Follet himself thinks it was extra, unnecessary fluff, I'll gladly read hundreds of pages of Kingsbridge fluff all day and all night before I'd crack open a million other books.
I think, for someone to complain that your 900 page novel wasn't nearly long, that you'd be hard-pressed to find a bigger compliment than that.
I love this series, particularly Pillars and World Without End, but The Evening and the Morning can proudly be the bridge (pun intended) that a reader must cross to get into the rest of the series.
Yes, it's more of the same in a sense, and yet, it's still not enough, not by a long shot.
Thank you Ken, for blessing me with roughly FOUR THOUSAND pages of incredible storytelling, that I not only can learn from, but can be transported from the stresses of everyday life to a world that, while it did exist, seems to be a place so perfectly crafted I couldn't personally imagine anything better.
*January 2024 review*
I didn't plan it this way, but in August I picked up WWE, then followed it with Pillars in September. The Armor of Light came out around then, which was finished by November. December was A Column of Fire, which I can now say is probably my least favorite in the series. It has too many plotlines and very little architecture, and almost feels more like a spin-off than a true Kingsbridge novel. It's still great, but after reading The Evening and the Morning again, I feel the first three novels chronologically are the best of the series. This feels truly like a return to form after Column, and it's a fantastic read. It's more formulaic than Column perhaps, with the evil bishop and ambitious monk, the challenged noblewoman, but when the formula is so engrossing, it's a welcome return.
Although I think we could have made it through this book without a certain scene (of which Pillars is littered with), the ultimate story of a builder, a noblewoman, and a monk all defying the odds and surviving in a near lawless world is riveting. Characters turn out to be not as expected, people get their comeuppance in the end, and even if things are tidied up a tad too neatly, the journey through the tumultuous decade of this book, with such tough living conditions, feels like a victory in the end, perhaps even more so than the rest of the series. Except for The Armor of Light, I've now read each Kingsbridge novel twice, and though all five are fantastic reads, the first three are truly a notch above, and safely rest near the top of my list of favorite books of all time. Ken Follet is the reason I love historical fiction, and re-reading these novels only reaffirm this.
By Ken Follett
Wedged in a ten year time span (997 to1007), Ken Follett’s epic novel “The Evening and the Morning (TEATM),” is essentially a love story. The story is woven around the attraction, then friendship, and finally an uncompromising devotion and love between Edgar, a gifted builder and craftsman and Lady Ragna a brilliant and beautiful noble woman. TEATM unfolds in the context of the complex class and power struggles of the Dark Ages of Europe. Follett weaves his story around four classes of European people.
First is the richest and most powerful class, that is, the Kings, Queens and the various noblemen. Ragna’s father, a nobleman, is the Count of Cherbourg a French area along the English Channel.
Second is the clergy. The novel is ripe with Follett’s depiction of the customs and rituals of Christianity as practiced during that era. The powerful in this class are the church leaders such as archbishops, bishops, and leaders of various other church and monastic institutions. However, within this class a range of diversity exists. Among whom we first meet Wynstan, bishop of the English town of Shiring who is clever, ambitious and treacherous. Wynstan uses his religious status to enhance power and wealth for himself and his family. Wynstan is contrasted with Brother Aldred, a pious monk who early in his monastic career committed a moral sin for which he was seriously condemned but who now, has devoted himself to the moral and material enhancement of the people. Aldred’s ambition is the development of edifice devoted to the translation of the bible and the education of the monastery.
The third class in TEATM is the merchants, craftsmen, farmers, men of arms, and others. This class includes the greedy and mean spirited Dreng, the owner of an alehouse, a place which provides food, wine, short-term accommodations, and prostitutes to travellers and others who visit this struggling village in coastal England called Dreng’s Ferry. Dreng is a cousin of Wynstan.
Finally the lowest class is that of the slave. Most slaves are the booty of wars between the various territories. Blod, a slave captured by the English during a conflict with the Welch, belongs to Dreng. Dreng prostitutes her and subjects her to indescribable brutalities.
Classless are the known thieves and outlaws who play a role in the narrative and are loathed by all. They are observed to be even lower than the slave class
Early in the story we have the marriage of Ragna to Wilfwulf (Wilf) a nobleman of Shiring, England and the half-brother of Wynstan. This marriage is both political and romantic. The political aspect is that it enhances an alliance between the English and the French. The theme of constant war --between the raiding, pillaging and Odin-worshipping Vikings vs. the Christian French and the Christian Englishmen-- is central in this story. Ragna who is very young at that time falls madly in love with Wilf when he visits her father to barter a political alliance. She is happy to be used as a political pawn in the transaction. And Wilf, as is his nature, is happy to have a young beautiful sex goddess as a wife. The marriage agreement is consummated in Cherbourg. Ragna happily moves to England to take on her role as the wife of a substantial nobleman. This is where she eventually meets Edgar, the young lower class builder. Over the span of ten years the novel weaves plots within the classes and between the classes for power, riches, and love. There are alliances formed among the competing factions. And, Follett allows that even the “good guys” in TEATM have faults. Wilf is murdered and Wynstan and Lady Ragna become even more bitter rivals for control over Wilf’s power and fortune. Eventually Father Aldred and the church diminish Dreng and become the overseers of Dreng’s Ferry. With financial support from Lady Ragna and Edgar’s building genius, Aldred is able to transform Dreng’s Ferry into a flourishing prosperous town. The river ferry owned and operated by Dreng is replaced with a more efficacious bridge designed and built by Edgar. With this new prosperity the name of the town is changed to King’s Bridge. Note that is a town in Follett’s outstanding novel “Pillars of the Earth.”
In the last phase of the novel Edgar oversees the building of the most massive church in the region encompassing the dreams and plans of Brother Aldred. With “Pillar’s” focus on the architectural detail early churches, it’s obvious why Follett calls TEATM a prequel to “The Pillars of the Earth.”
I highly recommend this novel.
dmcdet
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Reviewed in Sweden on January 15, 2024