SOURCE: "Unbelief and Martyrdom in C. F. Meyer's Der Heilige," in German Life and Letters, Vol. 21, 1967-68, pp. 111-22.

In the following excerpt, Walker discusses the major themes of Meyer's Der Heilige and traces the religious development of the novella's protagonist, Thomas Becket.

Critics will never agree whether the death of Meyer's Thomas Becket is the innocent martyrdom of a genuine convert, whether it is the act of an unbeliever taking revenge on King Henry for the death of his daughter Gnade, or whether the truth lies somewhere between these two extremes. Meyer himself indicated that the Novelle was 'absichtlich mehrdeutig', and he allowed his readers complete freedom of interpretation on the basic enigmas of Becket's passivity, his conversion, and his desire for revenge. His own comments on the work, while extremely illuminating, are so varied and contradictory that one could find some support among them for almost...