Intimations of immortality: Catholicism in David Lodge's Paradise News

WITH this novel Lodge is less concerned with Catholicism as sociological data, with the day to day life of ordinary Catholics, and more concerned with philosophical questions, especially the question of an afterlife, that central belief of traditional Christianity, which is being deemphasized by theologians and intellectuals, but which remains of vital importance for ordinary Christians. In this sense, then, Lodge's theme in this book is more Christian than specifically Catholic. Nevertheless, with the protagonist a former priest and his father and aunt practicing Catholics, a substantial amount of Catholic material is used. But Paradise News is different from Lodge's earlier Catholic novels, not only in its theme and subject matter, but also in its tone. Although Bernard Bergonzi finds How Far Can You Go? bitter in places and marked by a "cold Voltairean irony" ("Conspicuous" 54), I suspect most readers find Paradise News more genial, tender, and affirmative.

Lodge describes himself as "by temperament tentative, sceptical, ironic" (Haffenden 152); so it is not surprising that the novel defers from speaking strongly or authoritatively on the question of religious belief in general and an afterlife in particular. Certain aspects of the novel-some postmodernist narrative techniques, and cynicism associated with the central metaphor of Hawaii as paradise-tend to erode the possibility of any grand philosophical ideal, any absolute. Expectations, preconceptions, hopes are subverted. Other forces in the novel, however, pull it toward affirmation. The central metaphor, which at first seems to destabilize the possibility of belief, ultimately allows for transformation and life out of death. Although initially described with cynicism and irony, Hawaii at times not only lives up to its promise of paradisiacal, unearthly beauty, but also offers transformative possibilities to the characters as well. Furthermore, the sense of sacramentality that suffuses the novel suggests that God's transforming presence is active, not only in the institutional sacraments of the Church, but in unexpected ways as well.

The "paradise" of the novel's title is both the eschatological goalheaven-referred to in Bernard's lecture, and Honolulu, Hawaii, where Bernard goes to visit his dying Aunt Ursula, and which is the setting for most of the novel. Bernard articulates the central metaphor when he reflects on his life as a priest: "The Good News is news of eternal life, Paradise news. For my parishioners, I was a kind of travel agent, issuing tickets, insurance, brochures, guaranteeing them ultimate happiness" (153).

The primary meanings of paradise are the garden of Eden and heaven, but the word is also so commonly used to refer to desirable vacation destinations like Hawaii or Tahiti that it is a dead metaphor. In this novel, however, the metaphor is not dead. Lodge repeatedly reminds the reader of Hawaii's association with paradise, as one of the tourists, anthropologist Roger Sheldrake, makes a point of noting down every instance of the word's use in Honolulu business: