MO Scheme 3
  • As a narrative text
  • DB as a writer is moderate, essential, clear and effective
  • He demonstrates a command of narrative writing
  • He is more immediate and to the point in recounting facts often spoken of viva voce and in talking of dreams full of details
  • His dialogues are fluent
    • At times the dialogue highlights pastoral and educational attitudes dear to him
    • At other times he is apologetic: he shows things or argues with things passionately
    • At other times he is intimate and spiritual
    • While at other times he is ordinary, popular
  • Clear ability, refined over long period, to compose,
  • In scenes where he presents a typology of characters threaded with caricature the writing is very effective
  • He puts together tiny but complete tales of adventure
  • Tonal variety and shades of meaning
  • All in function of a narrative plan with great symbolic, practical intensity
  • Narrative order:
    • Events are not imagined
    • DB needed to work on a range of memories, events, emotions, sensations experienced over different periods
    • And he needed to order them according to a certain order: their reference to the Oratory of St. Francis de Sales
  • Surface structure
    • (chronology as organising principle)
  • Spatial structure
    • (geography as organising principle)
  • Deep structure
    • (inner organising principle)
  • The surface structure (declared in the introduction) is sub-divided into Decades
          • Ten years of early childhood
          • 1825-1835
          • 1835-1845
          • 1845-1855
  • Chapters , within these decades, highlight:
    • The character’s formational journey on the one hand
    • The progressive appearance and shaping of elements which make up the Oratory
  • Spatial structure
    • DB attributes particular value to places and settings where his oratorian vocation developed: These are points on a symbolic map
    • The variety and succession of places becomes an important organising principle for the narrative: values linked with spaces
    • Change of place: pilgrimage towards the promised land of the Oratory
  • The deep structure (beneath the surface)
    • Is made up of:
      • DB’s value systems
      • Beliefs
      • Mental framework (mentality, culture)
    • Emerges free, beyond any formal division
  • Behind it all there is DB the man, with his entire inner universe
  • This deep element (very much alive in the MO) gives the document intense polysemic value and makes it most precious for us
  • The various organisational structures enrich the overall scene with its glimpses and multi-faceted views, with tones and shades of meaning which attrracts a range of readers with different interests
  • Ideal readers DB had in mind:
    • Salesians of the ’70’s of the 19th century
    • with well-defined mental features
    • equipped with a bagful of tools for interpretation identical to his own,
    • a kind of spirituality typical for his setting
    • a theological and pedagogical terminology with meanings different to our own
  • The interpretation of the MO and full understanding of the author’s intentions requires:
    • A certain preparation
    • An historical acclimatisation
    • An appropriate lexicon and encyclopaedia