“He was dead—the head of a high tribunal, the upright magistrate whose irreproachable life was a proverb in all the courts of France.”

In The Diary of a Madman, a renowned and respected judge of the highest order dies at the age of eighty-two.  All his life he had dedicated to pursuing the most vicious criminals and to defending the weak and helpless. Defendants trembled because It was as if he could read the minds of those who were to be tried in his court.  At his funeral, soldiers carried his coffin and there were many tears as this respected and venerable magistrate was finally laid to rest.

Yet, reality is turned upside down when a notary finds a note in the judge’s desk, written by his hand.  The writing from that reverent judge starts by lauding killing.  Why shouldn’t people kill?  They have killed from time immemorial.  Even nature kills and the greater the killing, the more feverently there is rebirth.  In fact, the judge confesses that he would like to kill as well.  Finally, he takes his pet goldfinch and squeezes it but since it does not die quickly enough, he slits its throat.  He then moves on to murder a young child and a fisherman.  The fisherman’s nephew is convicted for the crime and is guillotined, for which the judge celebrates his pleasure to see the act done.

The story ends with the warning that there are many other lunatics in our midst who appear like ordinary gentlemen.

French Magistrate of Requests (1702) Hyacinthe Rigaurd ~ source Wikimedia Commons

Well, what a disgusting story.  If I can get over my distaste of it, I might be able to add some thoughts of my own.  First of all, I wondered if hearing stories of murder, etc. for probably fifty years or so began to affect his mind.  We tend be more susceptible to evil than we are to good (think of how we are told to choose our friends wisely or we may be led astray), so certainly evil entered his heart and expanded in a way that was truly horrifying.

Or perhaps the judge was always evil.  We have a date of the first note being 1851, but the story does not say what year he died, so we don’t know when these wicked thoughts began.

There was also no mention of family during his funeral, so perhaps he didn’t have anyone in his life to anchor him or moderate his thoughts. Definitely the whole emphasis in the story was his importance and position.  Perhaps he began to get a God-complex and therefore thought anything he thought or did was permissible.

The Madman by Francisco Goya
~ source Wikimedia Commons

Looking back on the story, I feel that there were a couple of clues which bring insight as to its meaning.  First of all, it is said the judge can almost read the minds of the criminals which, from what we learn later, must be because, unbeknownst to anyone, he is a criminal himself.  There is also a sentence at the beginning of the story that is telling: “Soldiers in red trousers had escorted him to the tomb and men in white cravats had spoken words and shed tears that seemed to be sincere beside his grave.”  The emphasis on the tears seeming to be sincere is an indication that they probably weren’t, and pointed to the fact that the judge’s life was solitary and therefore he was more able to carry out his twisted fantasies.

Okay, I’m so happy to be done with this one.  I hope this is the worst one from Maupassant.

There is another story by the same name by Nikolai Gogol and, especially since I so enjoyed his excellent Dead Souls last year, I’d like to read that one too.

Next upon on my Deal Me In Challenge is The Man Who Thinks Backwards by G.K. Chesterton