(1969) The Seven Minutes (61 page)

‘To be brief-‘

‘Forgive me, Father, but there is no need to be brief. It would be useful to hear every detail you feel to be relevant to this trial.’

T thank you for your courtesy, sir. Let me say that in 1966, in keeping with the new Ecumenical Council spirit that pervaded the Church and all Christendom, Pope Paul VI abolished the title of the Supreme Congregation of the Holy Office, because it had long been held offensive by Protestants who associated it with what

they regarded as persecutions in early Church history. By the elimination of the Holy Office, the Section for the Censure of Books was also eliminated.’

‘Why was this done?’

‘As I have said, sir, it was in keeping with the new spirit of unity among the various Christian faiths.’

‘I see. I’m interested to know whether there were other motives. Is it not true, Father, that at the convening of the Ecumenical Council in Rome there were numerous Roman Catholic clerics who protested against the old Holy Office the very office that had condemned Jadway, because it did not hold fair hearings for authors, and these clerics felt that the Index of Prohibited Books should be permanently abolished?’

‘Well, there was a minority of clerics who felt that way. That is true.’

‘And, Father, is it not also true, as our Associated Press reported from the Vatican City, that “by wiping out the Section for the Censure of Books, the Pope made a dramatic gesture signifying a major de-emphasis of the Index mentality of the past” ?’

‘Of course, we must accept the fact that news services often employ sweeping generalizations and tend to exaggerate. In essence, I would say that there was this effort to de-emphasize any function of the Holy Office that had once antagonized non-Catholics.’

‘Wouldn’t it hold then, Father, in view of this new liberality on the part of the Church, that what the Church condemned and prohibited in 1935 it might not condemn and prohibit today?’

‘Sir, that is a hypothetical question which I have neither the qualifications nor the authority to answer. I can submit certain facts that might point to a conclusion. For one thing, the new Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, of which I am a member, is continuing to review and examine published writings denounced as contrary to the doctrines of the Church. For another, the Index has not been abolished. It still exists. His Holiness may assign any written work to the Index that he wishes. Finally, sir, I am here before you as a representative of the Vatican because the Church is just as concerned today as it was in 1935 about the publication and circulation of an immoral and sacrilegious work of fiction entitled The Seven Minutes.”

Barrett went no further on the procedure of the Church’s censuring apparatus. He had fumbled that one. Another tack.

Second, the infallibility of the Index.

‘Father, like the learned counsel for the People, I too have been examining a copy of the Index - in fact, the edition in which J J Jadway’s name was first listed - as well as some writings about the Index. I would like to ask you a number of questions about this censorship calendar or encyclopedia. I was surprised to find Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, and Pascal’s Pensees,

and J. S. Mill’s Principles of Political Economy, and Sterne’s A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy, and all of Zola’s works still listed in the Index and hence still prohibited. Why were they condemned - because they were obscene or because they were anticlerical?’

‘Because they were anticlerical.’

‘Not because they were harmful to morals?’

‘Because they were harmful to the faith.’

‘And The Seven Minutes, Father Sarfatti ? I remind you, this is a trial concerned only with the question of whether or not the book is obscene. Whether Jadway’s writings were contrary to the faith or anticlerical does not enter into the discussion in this courtroom. With this in mind, will you tell me officially, was The Seven Minutes condemned to the Index because it is obscene or because it is heretical?’

‘It was condemned because it is both - both obscene and heretical.’

‘Very well, Father. As to the burning question of what is obscene and what is not obscene, this is, of course, a value judgment. Do you feel you can recognize an obscene work when you read it or hear it read aloud?’

‘Speaking for myself, yes. I cannot speak for the Church.’

‘Suppose I read you a brief passage from a novel. Do you think that you could tell me whether it is immoral or obscene or neither ?’

‘I could try, but I would be speaking for myself alone.’

‘But speaking as an expert on obscene literature?’

‘Very well. As an expert.’

‘I will read to you two excerpts from a popular novel. I would appreciate your judgment of them. The first excerpt: “I found his hand in my bosom; and when my fright let me know it, I was ready to die; and I sighed and screamed, and fainted away.” The second excerpt: “But he kissed me with frightful vehemence, and then his voice broke upon me like a clap of thunder. Now… said he, is the dreadful time of reckoning come, that I have threatened - I screamed out in such a manner, as never anybody heard the like. But there was nobody to help me: and both my hands were secured, as I said. Sure never poor soul was in such agonies as I. Wicked man! said I…. O God! my God! this time this one time deliver me from this distress!” ’

‘Did God deliver her, Mr Barrett?’

‘He did … Father Sarfatti, do you judge these two excerpts to be obscene?’

‘I regard them as immature, suggestive, but I do not regard them, by today’s lights, as obscene. However, the Holy Office did consider them obscene in 1755 when it placed those passages, along with the rest of Samuel Richardson’s Pamela, in the Index. I am sorry to spoil your sport, Mr Barrett, but I will not question the wisdom of the Church in condemning Pamela in 1755 even as it

condemned The Seven Minutes in 1937. The modern trend toward permissive immorality may mock those old judgments, but if they had been heeded, all society and moral standards might be the better for it today.’

‘Are you saying, Father, that the censors on the Index are without human fallibility, having never committed errors of judgment?’

From across the courtroom, Duncan voiced his objection. Defense counsel was being argumentative. Objection sustained.

Barrett sought to rephrase his question. ‘Father Sarfatti, does any factual evidence exist that the censors assigned to the Index have ever, at any time, admitted to errors in judgment?’

‘Of course errors have been made,’ said Father Sarfatti calmly. ‘When members of the Holy Office, after further consideration, have found that they have been mistaken about any writings, they have never failed to see justice done, to admit their errors and rectify them. The works of Galileo were placed on the Index. When this was later proved unjustified, our censors removed the prohibition against Galileo’s writings. But I cannot persuade myself that the Church will ever remove its prohibition from J J Jadway’s book.’

Bloodied, Barrett considered releasing the witness. Yet, one more try.

Third, the meeting with J J Jadway in Venice.

‘Father, you stated earlier that a Vatican emissary had personally met with Jadway in Venice to ask him to repudiate the book. Do your records tell exactly where this meeting was held?’

‘In the ducal palace, the Doge’s Palace-in the Sala del Consiglio dei Dieci, the Hall of the Council of Ten.’

‘How long did the meeting last?’

‘Fifteen minutes.’

‘Did Jadway, in the affidavit he signed, give his reasons for refusing to repudiate The Seven Minutes ?’

There is no record of his reasons.’

‘According to Mr Leroux, this was a low point in Jadway’s life, a period when he was alleged to have been remorseful about having written the book and was only months away from taking his life because of it. If this were so, wouldn’t it have been natural for Jadway to repudiate the book and recant ?’

‘I possess no information about what would have been natural or unnatural for him at that time. I can only repeat that he was obstinate and refused to recant.’

‘Did the report of the meeting contain any description of Jadway?’

it did not.’

Barrett hesitated. He was inclined to end on this note. Yet he could not resist one more question.

‘Father Sarfatti, did the Vatican archives report whether Jadway was drunk at that meeting ?’

‘It did not report that he was drunk___On the other hand, sir, it

did not say that he was sober either.’

Barrett smiled. ‘Touche.’ He had deserved it. He had asked for it, and he had got it. He had broken a golden rule of the crossexaminer’s art: Never, never pose an important question unless you know what the witness will answer. You get to where you are going, and then you stop. You never ask that extra question, take that added step which leads into the unknown. Barrett surrendered

his witness with a bow of his head. ‘Thank you, Father___I have

no further questions, Your Honor.’

Following the Italian priest, District Attorney Duncan had brought a renowned British literary agent, just arrived from London, to the witness stand. He was appearing as a qualified authority to testify on the obscene nature of Jadway’s book. The agent, Ian Ashcroft, who reeked of Zizanie de Fragonard, was fey, amusing, charming. He was one of those people who always topped you, whose last lines always carried the quick lash and sting of a scorpion’s tail. He was the kind of person Mike Barrett always did poorly with in the living room. Ashcroft would be more dangerous in a court. Barrett determined to limit his crossexamination to a few minutes, no more.

As a young agent employed by a large literary agency in London in 1935, Ashcroft had been in charge of what is known in the publishing trade as permissions, the licensing of excerpts as well as the dispensing of foreign rights, and he had been given the opportunity to try to sell the foreign rights to The Seven Minutes. Duncan wondered how he had fared. He had fared poorly, dreadfully, Ashcroft confessed. He had submitted copies of the Jadway novel to cooperating agents or publishers in Great Britain, the Netherlands, Scandinavia, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Portugal. Except for brief interest shown by one publisher in Germany (‘morals had broken down there, anyway, more brothels than homes in Hamburg and Frankfurt’) - and finally even this publisher had declined - there had been no interest in the book anywhere. It had been rejected by every foreign publisher to whom it had been submitted.

Duncan wanted to know why The Seven Minutes had been unanimously rejected.

‘I think that’s fairly obvious,’ Ashcroft had said. ‘It was a frightful book, unfailingly indecent, total trash. Publishers in the Netherlands, Italy, Spain used nearly identical sentences in rejecting it. They wrote, in effect: “Mr Jadway has the dubious distinction of having written the most depraved and obscene book in the history of literature.’”

In crossexamination, Barrett handled the London agent gingerly. If Mr Ashcroft had held such a low opinion of The Seven Minutes, why had he sullied himself by representing it at all?

‘Mr Barrett, I was a pink-faced, cheeky young chap, ambitious, eager to make my mark, and at that time I should have been delighted to represent Mein Kampf if it had been handed to me.’

Would Mr Ashcroft agree that few American novels of that period, or even the present, were wisely translated and published in Europe?

‘I’ve had some American novels that I’ve sold to as many as a dozen foreign publishers.’

But a first novel by an unknown American author ? Was it to be expected that it would be published in Sweden, Germany, France, Italy, Spain?

‘No, Mr Barrett, I should not expect it to be translated and published in those countries. However, it would be published in Great Britain. I would expect at least one sale in Great Britain or elsewhere.’

Then what did Mr Ashcroft find so unusual about not being able to sell Jadway’s first little-known novel to foreign publishers?

‘Well, Mr Barrett, what was unusual about the experience was that The Seven Minutes was the only published novel I have ever handled or heard about that no secondary publisher - not one - in Great Britain, on the Continent, in the entire world, would agree to bring out. A remarkable nonachievement, you must concede, and worthy of inclusion in the Guinness Book of World Records alongside the notice that the crossword puzzle was invented by an Englishman named Arthur Wynne for a New York newspaper in 1913. I think we have something better here, don’t you?’

The next half hour had sped by, and now yet another witness was about to finish his testimony for the People under the guidance of Elmo Duncan.

This witness, smooth as velvet, exact as a computer, was Harvey Underwood, dean of America’s pollsters.

His appearance had been, for both Barrett and Zelkin, as unexpected as had Father Sarfatti’s, and at first they had been unable to discern what use the prosecution intended to make of this witness. Soon it had become clear, and even Barrett had muttered his admiration for the cleverness of the District Attorney.

Harvey Underwood was in the witness box to lay the foundation for the prosecution’s argument that The Seven Minutes appealed to prurient interest, according to the judgment of the average person. Usually in censorship cases, the prosecution made this point by presenting community leaders - a Parent-Teacher Association president, a college dean, a church pastor - people who presumably had regular contact with the average person in their community and who could speak authoritatively for the community on the corrupting possibilities of a given book. But Duncan had not been satisfied to reflect the feelings of the average person in the traditional way. In this electronic age of the computer, in this age of the scientific sampling poll for determining public opinion, Duncan had gone to the nation’s foremost authority to learn who that average person was, so that such a plastic-wrapped, perfectly-marketed person might be delivered before the court. It was madness, it was dehumanizing, it was ridiculous. It was reflective of the sorry state of a consumer culture that lived by numbers and surveys and committees and averages.