Delicate, sensitive, brutal and unforgettable, as is a classical suite of music, An Ungrateful Instrument from Michael Meehan is a brilliant novel set in 18th century France, in the years before the Revolution, when to be considered a member of the Court of Louis XIV was the epitome of Society.
The powerful voice of the mute Charlotte-Elizabeth Forqueray, sister to Jean-Baptiste and daughter to the genius, if demonic composer Antoine, himself a child prodigy at the Court, tells the story of love, abuse, decadence and strength, that was the everyday life of the Forqueray family as their father forced his children to become what he once was, a Prodigy to the Court of Louis XIV.
In his obsession he believes that violence will achieve the desired conclusion, but in his doing so his brutality sees Charlotte Elizabeth choosing to remain mute, refusing to play the viola, Jean-Baptiste taking the force of the obsession, trying to live up to unimaginable expectations.
Their mother, Henriette-Angélique Houssou, once a talented musician who accompanied her husband on the harpsichord, is now a dreadfully unhappy, broken woman who filled their childhood with wild stories associated with the Greek Gods and other ramblings.
It is in this setting the powerful voice of the narrator tells of the tragedy, decadence and obsessive hatred of the father for the son, who even at a young age is a fine and rich talent, who takes punishment after punishment in the hope that he will be able to live up to his father’s demands. Eventually n his madness, the father, along with a group of Court lawyers sees the son exiled from France for many years, jailed and left destitute on the streets.
Threaded through the sad story is the beautiful balance of a woodsman, a craftsman, who crafts a beautiful Viola out of treasured pieces of wood for the young Jean-Baptiste. He is tutored in the fine art of viola construction, each segment explained in detail, each singular piece gifted with its importance to the whole instrument. This in itself is an eloquent tale of beauty in the depth of horror, a light to be held in the darkness.
Antione Forqueray was considered a genius in his compositions but he considered each piece so unique it should never be repeated, that the work should never be written down, that the piece should only ever be performed by either himself or his son.
Harpsichord was the only instrument to accompany these works and to this end Antoine in his later years, lusted after the brilliant second wife of Jean Baptiste, a harpsichordist of prodigious talent.
In a supreme irony, two years after his death Jean-Baptiste published 32 of this works; apparently more than 300 pieces had been composed over Antoine’s lifetime. His work was considered as extremely difficult if not challenging to play, so much so that after his death Jean-Philippe Rameau, Francois Couperin and Jacques Duphly composed works as a tribute to the complex and violent man.
Michael Meehan has out of tragedy, crafted a work that is exquisite, that sings, as do the strings of a Viola da gamba, voicing brilliance, tragedy, love and lust to tell a story; the words placed on the page with care and precision, so much so, the emotion has been neutralised in the retelling. The voice of Charlotte-Elizabeth more powerful for the precision.
It is perhaps a necessary conclusion to the work, to listen to one or more of Antoine Forqueray’s compositions, even if you don’t enjoy classical music, to appreciate the magnificent obsession that created such complex compositions.
