Abstract
A number of recent writers have claimed that the 'Catholic Novel', associated particularly with Graham Greene in his middle period, Evelyn Waugh, Georges Bernanos and Francois Mauriac, came to an end some time ago. I shall argue rather that the 'Catholic Novel' still flourishes, but that it has changed its nature and geographical location, and widened its scope. The claim mentioned is made by Professor Bernard Bergonzi, among others, in his essay 'The Decline and Fall of the Catholic Novel'.1 There he characterizes the Catholic Novel as seeing life poised between Heaven and Hell, salvation or damnation, illuminated with possibilities of grace and divine mercy. He argues that this world-view has now collapsed, and has been replaced by the 'humanistic Catholicism' of the Second Vatican Council, exemplified in the Father Superior of Greene's A Burnt-Out Case. Bergonzi sees this development as both a loss and a gain:
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