Simon Called Peter

by Robert Keable

This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.

Genres: Fiction

213 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1921

Reviews

[Doreen Petersen · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not worth the effort to bother with this one.

[Axslingin · Rating 1 out of 5]

The story of a priest who is infatuated (for the first time) with a girl and thinks he's in love. This could easily have been a story of teen angst, but instead was in a setting apparently familiar to the author. Alright, a priest falls for a girl-could be interesting. It all went downhill from there.

The writing itself was very herky-jerky, compounding an already stultifyingly boring story. Some sentences were so full of commas that I wondered if there was mistake in the printing: It was only, then, the mood of the moment, and when, he found himself really moving towards that finger-post he excused himself by thinking that as he was, by his own act, exiled, from, more familiar temples, he would visit this that would have about it a suggestion of France. And the book is littered with such sentences, making it a very difficult read. But the difficulty didn't end there. The guy was in the Army, and the acronyms being used for the various departments and what-have-you were a mystery to me. Add to that the English slang and there were parts of the book that were incomprehensible.

As for the characters...Apparently, you couldn't spit in those days without hitting a hooker, and the main characters were for the most part, chain smoking drunks. These people would drink right up to the moment they had to go to work. And the smoking never stopped. Sweaty, chain smoking drunks. That pretty much sums up the main characters. For all I know they may have been snorting something as well. ALL OF THEM had the annoying habit of asking questions in rapid succession, not waiting for an answer to any of them. As a result, most of the questions were never answered. It was completely unnatural "conversation."

If you haven't been to England or France, don't expect to get an idea after reading this book. The writing was so poor, and the descriptions depended on you being at least familiar with the various towns and landmarks. Yes, it was across the board bad, and I give it one full star because the author took the time to write it at all. I don't know why he did, but then, maybe I just missed something that others saw in this book. I doubt it though.

[Timmy Cham · Rating 4 out of 5]

Intriguing novel written in the 1920s, following a young Anglican chaplain during World War I.

I was especially interested in the spiritual reflections--Peter's observation that his religious training hadn't prepared him for the secular spirit he encountered on the battlefield:

"Men are different. Times are different," Peter says, "The New Testament people took certain things for granted, and even if they disagreed, they always had a common basis with the Apostles. Men out here seem to me to talk a different language: you don't know where to begin. It seems to me that they have long ago ceased to believe in the authority of anyone or anything in religion, and now to-day they actually deny our very commonplaces."

Even tending a dying man, Peter feels at a spiritual loss: "I had begun to feel about the uselessness of my old religion came to a head. I could do no more for that soul than light a cigarette…. Possibly no one could have done any more, but I cannot, I will not believe it. [The dying man] did not serve the devil; it was much more that he had never seen any master to serve. And I could do nothing. I had no master to show him."

So I read the book to the end, interested to see how Peter's religious beliefs might evolve. I found the resolution satisfying. I think this book might be profitably read side-by-side with T.S. Eliot's poem The Waste Land. (I've also learned, subsequently, that Keable's novel is mentioned (unfavorably) in The Great Gatsby. Also, the morals of the book were controversial for their time.)

[L. · Rating 1 out of 5]

Wanting to do his part during World War I, a young priest joins the British army. Once posted in France, Peter is shocked to discover people are having sex! With each other!

I need to be honest with myself and finally admit I am not enjoying this book. I don't know if this is regular Britspeak or World War I army slang or what but half the time I had no idea what anybody was saying. I needed an English translation of this English.

[Moz Copestake · Rating 5 out of 5]

This story works on so many levels, primarily (and superficially) as a forbidden love story. But then, the unwitting testimony of life in Northern France during the war is great. it is a life do far removed from trench life in Flanders, with which we have all become familiar. It is equally far from a "home Fire's burning" story. it is the privilege of officers.
It is about thinking between the Victorian morality and the imminent post war liberality of the Roaring twenties.
It is written with much attention to detail, especially to the emotions of young love. The confused religious backdrop and sensitivities to religious denominations, whether Weslian or Baptist or Chapel but also being in a Catholic country. The whole questioning of the existence of God, by a chaplain, plus should he exist, where is his ministry?
The army accommodation, the hospitals, the Channel Ports, the trains, all set a wonderful backdrop to an intimate love story. I was disappointed by the final chapter, possibly a consequence of its time, but the experiences of the protagonists leading up to it are beautifully described, without ever descending into gratuiy.
I can understand this being a runaway best seller in its time, how it disturbed the establishment and how well it reflects attitudes in the Great War years.

[Ksowder659 · Rating 2 out of 5]

Yech! could not finish this smutty book