Amy Welborn on the late novelist David Lodge:
Lodge’s two novels offer more than a helpful historical record. They offer a way of seeing the human beings who lived it, a way of seeing that is paradoxically sharp, yet at its heart, quite generous.
Lodge, as his own words make clear, ended up with more “progressive” notions of Catholicism. But because he is ultimately sympathetic to all of his characters and honestly explores their behavior and motivations, the reader never loses sight of the yearning at the heart of every person’s spiritual journey.
David Lodge treated the oddballs and searching denizens of his fictional Catholic worlds with humor, honesty and an attempt, at least, at understanding. Perhaps his work can encourage us, in our very real Catholic world, to do the same.
