Three Faces of Saul: An Intertextual Approach to Biblical Tragedy (review)

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JSOT Supplement 339. London and New York: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002. 276 pp. $90.00. This book, which originally was author's dissertation at University of St. Andrews, takes up question of Saul's portrayal in Hebrew Bible and in two later works in western world, Alphonse de Lamartine's drama Saul: Tragedie, and Thomas Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge. These three works constitute three faces of Saul. Nicholsoh's stated purpose in her book is a substantial investigation into story [of Saul] as viewed by poetic eye rather than simply critical (p. 11), a purpose she pursues through an intertextual approach, whereby she examines ways in which Lamartine and Hardy utilize and reinterpret biblical story of Saul to reflect their own contexts and historical periods. The book is organized with an Introduction followed by three sections (corresponding to three faces) of two chapters each. The Introduction provides an overview of scholarship on Saul, followed by discussions of literary theory and postmodernism, intertextuality, and tragedy. In Section I, Nicholson considers Saul as portrayed in 1 Samuel. Chapter 1 reviews scholarly proposals for interpreting Saul's story as tragic, then examines structural elements in 1 Samuel that lend themselves to tragic, including doublets and repetitions. Chapter 2 examines deity's involvement in Saul's story, involvement that Nicholson argues is decidedly ambiguous. Nicholsoh's consideration of deity as a character in 1 Samuel, Saul, and The Mayor of Casterbridge is one of strengths of her book. Section II considers Lamartine's drama Saul: Tragedie. Through an examination of plot and characterization in Chapter 3, Nicholson argues that Lamartine took tragic elements he found in Saul story and reinterpreted them in dramatic form in his play according to Aristotelian categories of tragic. Because Lamartine created a tragic drama through his interpretation of 1 Samuel, Nicholson cites this as evidence that the tragic vision exists in Hebrew Bible (p. 146). In Chapter 4, thematic and stylistic devices and role of God in Saul are examined, with conclusion that Lamartine lent elements of Greek tragedy to biblical myth (p. 175). Section III takes up Hardy's The Mayor of Casterbridge. In Chapter 5, after a brief review of Hardy scholarship and a discussion of Voltaire's influence on Hardy, Nicholson examines characters Henchard and Farfrae to argue they are modeled on Saul and David. Chapter 6 examines sociological and feminist approaches to The Mayor of Casterbridge (Nicholson includes here a sociological consideration of Saul's story). These two approaches point out similarities and differences between Hardy's work and his biblical source. The absence of deity from Hardy's work also is taken up in this chapter. Finally, in Chapter 7, Nicholson discusses intertextual relationships between Lamartine and Hardy's works, then provides her concluding comments. Three Faces of Saul is useful as an extended consideration of way two European writers reinterpreted Saul's story in light of their own cultural circumstances. Nicholsoh's discussion of previous scholarly work on Lamartine and, especially, Hardy make clear that her work fills a gap in scholarly literature. …