The Eighth Champion of Christendom (Book Review)

Edith Pargeter. The Eighth Champion of Christendom (1945) This is a patriotic book, with definite contrasts between the good and noble English and French, and the dastardly Germans. Of course it’s more complicated than that, and Pargeter can write, which makes this a book worth reading for its picture of war from a common soldier’s point of view.
      The plot is somewhat melodramatic, the characters just this side of stereotypical, and the style generally straightforward. Jim Benison, an ordinary bloke from an ordinary English village, signs up, spends a few idyllic weeks in France before the German onslaught, is separated from his unit during battle, makes his way back through German-occupied France to the coast, and almost dies when the boat on which he escapes is strafed. The Czech woman (married to French army captain, who is killed) who helped him is eventually shot by the Germans. You may read the story as a Bildungsroman, in which the naive hero learns not only what makes life worth living, but what stuff he’s made of. Benison has tougher mettle in him than he knew, and also more instinctive goodness. In other words, war brings out his character, as it will for any man or woman.
     Pargeter’s theme is the strength of the human spirit. There’s a lot of death, a good deal of heroism and cowardice, and odd dashes of sentiment. One would think from this description that the book’s a tediously us-vs-them tract, but it keeps you reading. It’s really a chivalric romance. Pargeter, who strikes me as a self-conscious artist, no doubt chose the title as a clue to the genre. Her Cadfael series (written as Ellis Peters) are even more blatantly romances, but it’s her skill at telling them in the naturalistic mode that makes them readable. Pargeter is especially good at creating mood and ambience, relying on familiar cliches that she varies just enough to make us see what she wants us to see. That naturalism also makes them eminently transposable into film and video. This book would make a good TV series, but the time for WW2 nostalgia has passed, I think. Still, I rate this book **½