Urbain Grandier: Celebrated Crimes

In 1630s France, a charismatic priest named Urbain Grandier had everything: looks, intellect, the admiration of his congregation, and a gift for scandal. He also had enemies. When the nuns of Loudun begin screaming in tongues and contorting in convulsions, the town sees its chance. Accusations of witchcraft fly. But this was never about demons. It was about silencing a man who knew too much, who had mocked the wrong powerful men, who stood in the way of Cardinal Richelieu's consolidation of power. Dumas reconstructs the trial with novelist's instinct: the hysterical nuns, the bribed witnesses, the judge already handed his verdict. Grandier burned at the stake, maintaining his innocence to the end. This is historical true crime at its most vicious, a story about how easily faith becomes a weapon and justice bends before ambition. It has fascinated Huxley, Penderecki, Ken Russell, and generations of readers because it asks the question we still cannot fully answer: how does an innocent man die when everyone agrees he is guilty?