Sed

The Testament According to Jesus Christ. Or The Testament According to Amélie Nothomb. The Belgian novelist dares to give voice to the protagonist, and it is Jesus himself who narrates his Passion. Pontius Pilate, Christ's disciples, the traitor Judas, Mary Magdalene, the miracles, the crucifixion, death and resurrection, Jesus's conversations with his divine father... appear in these pages. Characters and situations familiar to all, but given a twist here: they are recounted with a modern perspective, a lyrical and philosophical tone with touches of humor. Jesus speaks to us of the soul and eternal life, but also of the body and the here and now; of the transcendent, but also of the mundane. And a visionary and reflective figure emerges, one who knows love, desire, faith, pain, disappointment, and doubt. This novel reinterprets and humanizes a historical figure with a perhaps transgressive, even iconoclastic, perspective, but one that in no way seeks provocation for provocation's sake or cheap scandal. A sacrilege, a blasphemy? Simply literature, and good literature at that, with the power and seductive charm to which Amélie Nothomb has accustomed us. Her very human Jesus Christ will leave no one indifferent.