Jo Waltons lent. Brother Gerralimo Salvaroga was a Dominican monk, doctor of theology, Priest, and First Brother at San Marco, a dominican monastery of the Lombardy chapter (following Geralimo’s secession from his overseer’ ) a proclaimed prophet and exorcist in his time, who amassed an intense following in Florence and was effectively a primary figure of government, an intensely orthodox reformer but whose influence was dealt a harsh blow when a rival Franciscan challenges Geralimo’s monastic brother and student Dominico to a trial by fire which ends inconclusively following ddealays in the trial and then disruption by rainstorm. organized clients of the Ballsy faction, those loyal to the medici, the Furious, the Greys, and the Lukewarms seized power when the 9 randomly* chosen* men were elevated to government, Gerralimo was excommunicated from the church militant, and burned alive as a heretic.

something i noticed in this most recent readthrough was the scene of Giralimo mourning Pico and how he’s imagining Pico in heaven and he wants to be there with him, and may even be jealous of Pico while interpreting his emotions as greiving, or if you will, playing a shell game with grief-objects. this resonates with later portions previously read .

immiediately therafter, in Jo Walton’s book Lent, Gerallimo slams into Hell and realizes* (*remembers) that he is a demon, that he has returned to hell following a lifetime as a deluded imposter, that he has lived this life and died this death not once but an infinite regression of times, that this was the last time, his last chance to escape this horrible reality but worse the horrible realization that he is infinitely and irredeemably outside of the grace of God,

that he has fallen is clear, but I am curious about the nature of this fall? has he fallen ontologically/is the ontological consequent, the fall-object? are his wings broken? why doesn’t geralimo ever

himm, maybe geralimo was a demon who entered his body when he touched the stone? but he doesn’t return to that moment, he returns to Lorenzo touching the stone? but then the next time he gets it he returns to first touching it.

the key Jesus gave Peter

was Peter also a demon?

is the stone being passed to Crookback, a prince of Hell, an alternative for Christ as well? when Christ next dies at the hands of the Roman State, will he chose to resurect in secret? to swear his disciples to silence, the skip town on the very heels of the rumors of his flight, rumors easily dismissed in the violent crackdowns on Passover, when memories of the slaughter of the first born are made tactile and bitter on the table

eating a meal is a kind of spell.

why find the stone in Santa Lucia as a donation from the king of Hungry?

following an eternity, Geralimo is lent from Hell again, and this time has the aid of his memories, his recognition and endorsement by certain living saints and a prophetess, and is informed by his pessemism. his desire to save others as he himself cannot be is incredibly tragic, melodramatic, theology worthy. he has to leave san marco, which he had in past etternities in Hell rebuilt and forced lesser demons to attend mass and sermons and act out the divine office all in hopeless and futile parody makes returrning equally necessary and impossible.

events repeat with his friend Count Pico effecting a close approximation for certain key political events, such that Florence is once again spared by Charles of France, and the city made more , what, into a welfare church-state? however, Geralimo and his friends do deviate in certain ways from past historical trends, hoping to avoid certain blunders so as to, for example, avoid torture. this on the whole fails to work, Geralimo and Pico and their co demonic conspiritors are executed as well, Gerallimo after being propositioned by Angelo, who in a prior life confessed to having sex with other men and who was able to percieve Lorenzo’s glow suggesting spiritual gifts, as differnt people could make it out to differnt degrees, including Pico and Marcellio, Marcellio being the more adept living saint, able to glow at will, to recognize what Geralimo was. Geralimo turns Angelo down. I think this is also the life he sees Crookback in.

of particular importance are the differences in the political coalition Geralimo has to work with. the fact that geralimo’s partnering with Lorenzo, who first recognized his nature and empowered the stone, leads to geralimo’s posse subverting what’shisname’s inheritience of Lorenzo’s clientel network. instead lorenzo insists on his deathbed that whatshisname go on a long fancy pillgrimage for like 5 years, during which marsilio and angelo and lorenzo’s second son/third child Leo, who was made a cardinal at 16, and a couple other cousins remain in power. they agree to have pico, now himself First Brother at San Marco (?) or does that happen latter? represent the city to Charels as replacement ot Geralimo/. however, pierro whatshisname returns and they decide to let crookback touch the stone? he steals it and it leads to their execution? idk i’ll be at it soon in my current listen.

i think this is also the first life marcelio absolves him of his sins, having also joinedat San Marco?

anyway, this time the old committee is partially booted out of power?sidelined by the ballsi and crookbacks men ?

this happens at the same time as Geralimo’s polittical winds turned in his previous lifetime. that’s a significnet motif, what changes and what stays the same. angelic/divine expirimentation with allowing demons to make karmic leaps ?

The execution leads to a worse arrival in Hell then any before it, for the prior knowledge of Hell leads to Gerallimo losing his power over demons, having fallen in status. he knows he will not be granted another chance.

These are pretty clearly alegories to depression, if you want to read them that way. The despair, the totalizing and particularizing agony which i suppose might see like a state.

who is Biennivendedi? the poet guy who is like too nice to everyone, like in DFW’s TPK…

The third life recounted is particularly tragic, geralimo rushes to try to enlighten his friends of their previous lives. this does not work, and will not work throughout the book. his efforts to enlighten Pico result in an irreparable tear in their relationship, with the former being alienated. however, following a show exorcism, Gerolamo is able to reestablish his position at San Marco. he does not preach the lenten sermons he was required to in the first life and ineligeble to in the second, presumably because he was already humiliated and brought to heel? other than Pico and Angelo surviving, this life starts off to a similar one to the first recounted, which is to say a deviation back from the second, with Marcelio being the one Geralimo confides to, and only when he arranges (?) for Lazaro’s daughter to visit Geralimo and return to him the stone, which he will now be able to try to take into hell (?) he dissuades charles himself, having stayed a monk and having to go through the torture of acting out divine offices, sacraments, etc. piero gets the ballsi kicked out. he doesn’t do the vanities this time either, i think. he gives refuge to Lazaro’s daughter and marcelio comes to him at this death to reassure him?

he dies.

Isabella in the first life, second, …

Yoou only get out of Hell after you give up all hope. quite Buddhist in a way. nightmare logic.

.. … … … … … … … … … … … …. … … …

Dream research during the study of ptsd* *shell shock ? cr history of ideas, History of Self Harm in Britain.

one of the repeating motifs is of self harm. in his ignorant life Pride was Giralimo’s self diagnosed fatal sin, but while he constantly mortified his flesh

in his other lives he…

• becomes pope and attempts to push for reforms to limited effect, and to perform ceremonies to harrow hell with the stone, to unknown effect, Pico his elevation to cardinal and likely successor, Marcillio his confessor? angelico his secretary when he was cardianl

• Pico maybe becomes pope in one of the ittereations, or maybe that was their plan B if Gerallimo is too radical to get ellected, so maybe he already was a cardianal? or just an archbishop?

• works on mending his soul traveling as a pilgrim

• goes to Jeruselem with Pico to try to leaad a world wide movement and is quickly killed

• marries Isabella and has children and grandchildren

• does the trial by fire, walking with the stone into the fire ready to die, the flames not even that bad compared to where he’s about to be. he not only agrees, but during the franscisian delaying he shrugs and goes by himself, clearly showing them up at least. not only does he time it close enough that the storm quenches the fire but he even is saved and survives. he and pico call a great church council, sidelining the pope and the politics of Rome, but he lacks his voice due to burns. on the eve of the council is assasinated never to know the outcome

• travels to the new world with columbus where he is killed by a spaniard? thiss is the return to hell where instead of ripping him apart a bunch of times crookback tries to talk to Gerallimo in hell and wants the stone, only rips him in half once

• repeats the firsst timeline nearly the same, even going to do the lenten fast where he preaches about poison managing to intimidate piero from poisioning angelo and pico, and abolishes torture but they torture him anyway, and gives the stone to crookback. he is executed, and in the last moments the rope twists and he stares up at the rooftops of the Tower and the houses, implying that he may have once again fallen onto his back like the dammed or perhaps forward onto his face like good people.

in the audiobook version the novel ends here. this is in my opinion the preferable version, but then again, the Gospel of Mark and possibly also John? have an ammended, more diffinitively happy endings attached at the end?

motifs of interest: self injury. in the first life, he’s constantly fasting, constantly using his hair belt, constantly reprimanding himself for pride (often for pride that sure isn’t morally great but not necessarily succeding in eg catching himself from being too proud to avoid political stumbles. often his accusations of pride suggest perhaps an internalized Accuser-Savior dynamic? in his life where he does the t

self injury: no mats for the stone floors in winter, hairshirt for constant accusations of sen, mortification of flesh, accusations of pride that are more for the purpose of being an accuser/sanctifier then eg political tact, recreation of San Marco in Hell, fasting (later to discover an overlove for food, quite characteristic of an accusatory narcestic dynamic

perhaps we are all in the process of harrowing the waiting room