Umberto Eco was in his late forties, an accomplished man, a professor in Bologna, an important voice in literary circles, but without having produced a work of his own. And then, off the cuff, the big hit: “The Name of the Rose”. No wonder Eco once said that the follow-up novel “The Foucault Pendulum” was the real challenge for him. On his debut he didn’t have to prove anything to anyone, but the second album could have cost him his literary reputation – a mistaken fear, conspiracy theories have rarely been examined so well in literature.
More of a Philip Marlowe than a Sherlock Holmes
In 2022, at the age of sixty, Dirk Schümer made his first big bow to Eco: his novel “The Black Rose” is set a year after the events described in the Italian “Rose” and features the detective (and first-person narrator) Wittekind Tentronk, who is assisted by a certain William of Baskerville. With a big twenty-year step, the follow-up novel “The Black Lily” now moves on to Florence, right into the plague year of 1348. And Schümer handles his material with confidence. William makes a small guest appearance in a flashback, Wittekind has developed from a young man into a seasoned “agent,” which is why the second volume can be read independently of the first. The matured Wittekind’s disillusionment makes him think more of Philip Marlowe than Sherlock Holmes: he knows exactly how corrupt his brothers are.
He is currently in the service of Padrino, the head of the Peruzzi family. Schümer cleverly uses some gaps in the history of this legendary (authentic) bank, which was one of the most important in Florence during the Trecento. The problems accumulated in this century, which is considered the most painful of the late Middle Ages with the beginning of the Hundred Years’ War, uprisings and natural disasters. In Florence, the city with the lily in its coat of arms, the treasury was “suddenly empty like a Franciscan’s begging bowl,” but, oh wonder, “the two largest banks, which caused the ruin of so many people, were able to escape the general ruin rescue”. When the plague breaks out, the Peruzzis are not left empty-handed.
Investigator Wittekind intervenes
However, they are not completely spared from misfortune: the sons of the house are murdered one after the other. Wittekind should take care of the matter. The action picks up pace, and Schümer doesn’t shy away from some trivial moments, such as when he lets Wittekind survive a plague, but leaves Cioccia to die while being cared for. Wittekind had already planned a future “after the plague” with this extremely resolute market woman. All he can do is solve the murders – he can’t prevent them. It is a mosaic in the process of replacing the Peruzzis, because “those damn Medici or Machiavelli or whatever they are called” will continue to rise, shaping the next century and the Renaissance.
Schümer has remained true to himself. As in the first novel about Wittekind, he paints a profound picture of the time, this time perhaps focusing a little more on the present. The fact that the Priori “had the city gates barricaded in the summer and ordered all innkeepers to close the doors” can hardly be read today without corresponding associations. He doesn’t skimp on supporting characters, with the drunken son Dante and Boccaccio, who is still extremely unsuccessful as a writer, once again introducing himself as a literature-loving author. This is usually done with a wink. “I can’t stand novellas” – words he puts into Boccaccio’s mouth.
Humorous moments like this also have a certain comforting function. With slavery in Christianity, corruption and exploitation, Schümer addresses the themes of the time; he describes history more as a story of calamity. It should therefore be no coincidence that black flowers appear in the title of his books. However, before this color takes over, he weaves in a lighter flower here and there. He also won his bet on the second work and presented an entertaining historical novel with crime elements. An opulent bouquet.
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