The Borgia Testament

by Nigel Balchin

The Borgia Testament is an account of the life of Cesare Borgia (1476–1504) told in the first person in novelistic form and largely in modern idiom. The narrative is principally concerned with the years between 1492, when Cesare’s father is elected Pope and Cesare himself is made a cardinal, and 1504, when Cesare is brutally murdered by his long-time adversaries the French. Aside from undertaking several missions as a Papal Legate, most of Cesare’s time and energy during this period are occupied with his grand plan to create a unified Italy, which involves forging alliances with rival powers, be they Italian, Spanish or French, conducting military campaigns and disposing of anyone who attempts to get in his way.

Genres: Historical Fiction

265 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1948

About the author

Trained originally as an industrial psychologist, in which capacity he helped Rowntree’s to successfully launch Black Magic chocolates in 1933, Nigel Balchin first received critical acclaim as a novelist during the Second World War when he wrote Darkness Falls From the Air. It was the first of three evocative novels (including the smash-hit The Small Back Room) that made good use of his wartime employment experiences at the Ministry of Food and later in the army. This trio was followed by a stream of other fine novels, such as A Sort of Traitors, Sundry Creditors and The Fall of the Sparrow. Balchin diversified into film scriptwriting after the war, winning a BAFTA for his work on The Man Who Never Was and penning what he whimsically described as “the first folio edition of Cleopatra”, being his original (unused) script for the Richard Burton/Elizabeth Taylor epic. When Balchin died in 1970, at the age of 61, the Guardian anointed him “the novelist of men at work”, a fitting epithet for one of the best fiction writers of the twentieth century.

Reviews

[Jenny · Rating 3 out of 5]

Presenting a somewhat apologetic account of Cesare Borgia's life, this book offers an uneven portrayal of Italy's favourite scandalous family, the Borgias. The family members themselves are all present, although Cesare and his father have the lion's share of characterisation, with Lucrezia and Giovanni flitting in and out of bit roles. Cesare himself displays a mix of naivety and also self satisfaction and callous disregard for others that is perhaps meant to come across as burgeoning monstrosity, but too often is communicated as childish pique. Many of his strategies are presented as happy accidents or the mechanisms of others, and he himself is blunt and boorish. While sneering at the theatrical Italians he remains young and unrefined, valuing the blunt face of military power and completely misunderstanding any of the nuances of diplomacy and political power. What is mainly lacking in the narrative tho is any semblance of charm - there are a few flashes of conversational humour but generally Cesare is so unremittingly focussed and uninterested in anyone else that it comes as a surprise when he boasts of friends in the Sacred College.

Overall this is not an impressive portrayal, instead suggesting that Cesare came to prominence largely through luck and the assistance of his retainers, and offering little substance to justify his power and influence in Italy

[N. Augustine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Discovered this old 1949 novel in an obscure vintage book store- what an iconic stereotype I fashion for myself! Anyways, if you enjoy Italian renaissance history; especially involving the great families such as the Medici’s, Sforza’s, Orsini’s, the tyrant Caesar Borgia who was so evil he inspired Machiavelli’s “The Prince”, the corrupt politics of 1500s Rome, the nepotistic papacy, and all that pre-reformation jazz, all from fictional first person perspective, then this book is the one for you! Very well written for something now difficult to track down. Good luck, you can’t have mine!

[Ben Bergonzi · Rating 3 out of 5]

A strange outlier amongst Balchin's fine novels, I have to say that it is sadly tedious. The leading character's endless self-justification amidst plodding narration which spends far too much time on his youth and early life and too little on the years of his adult scheming which latterly became quite adventurous (yet are consigned to a brief epilogue.) As a book aiming to get inside the mind of a man regarded by history as a villain, it is rather in the same genre as the Wolf Hall trilogy - and I make the comparison advisedly, because at times reading The Mirror and the Light the conversations between well informed but cynical men in power reminded me of such as Balchin's Darkness Falls from the Air. But Mantel knew that to make this work in a historical novel you have to do great deal more showing as well as just telling. You have to not only put in the time doing the research but put in the words using the research to build a world for the reader. There is little sense of period in The Borgia Testament, far too little visual description. If this had been a film script, and focusing on key issues - what was it like to be the son of a Pope? - it could have been very effective. As it is we have a few enjoyable dialogue scenes, but even these are deprived of humour by Cesare's solipsism. As a novel it is so underwritten that you don't remember who is who. Not the right project for Balchin. And the sad thing is that, given his relatively short life, he could have spent the time producing another real 'Nigel Balchin novel'. However, if you care about Balchin, you need to read it. I have read it twice over a period of about 40 years, but I don't think I'll be coming back to it again in this life.