The Meddlesome Friar and the Wayward Pope

The Meddlesome Friar and the Wayward Pope tells the story of two men whom the patterns of Providence brought into mortal conflict: Fra Girolamo Savonarola of the Order of Preachers and Pope Alexander VI of the Borgia family. Each representative of certain High Renaissance ideals, they are well-known as historical figures yet poorly understood as individuals. For Michael de la Bédoyère, that poor understanding obscures the magnitude and complexity of their story. Was Alexander VI, the "bad Pope," scandalous, licentious, nepotistic, as dissolute as he appears? Was Savonarola, preacher and prophet and political firebrand, as just in pursuit of his cause as he seems? With broad, vigorous strokes, de la Bédoyère addresses these questions to produce portraits of Savonarola and Alexander with their virtues and flaws intact. Together, these portraits bring to light the great issue of their conflict, and one that is constant for human society: namely, the matter of obedience and whether the righteous man truly owes it to a politically lawful yet morally corrupt ruler.

First published in 1958 and the fruit of de la Bédoyère's lifelong "Savonarola-haunting," The Meddlesome Friar and the Wayward Pope integrates the various extant histories of its subjects into a fascinating interpretation of an extraordinary period of history, in which religious unity ultimately stood for little in the face of spiritual and moral chaos.