The first natural catastrophe to be a transnational news event, the Lisbon earthquake of 1755 is known above all for having shattered the school of thought called Optimism – which posited that God was good, the world as perfect as it could possibly be, and that humankind would enjoy conditions of continual improvement. A few years later, the most famous satire of the era, Voltaire’s Candide, mocked the Optimists with its tragicomic catalogue of mortal suffering.
Liz McSkeane’s new novel Aftershock, beautifully produced, shifts the focus back to the drama of court intrigue in Lisbon itself. A central figure in the plotting is Sebastião José de Carvalho e Melo (after 1769 dubbed Marquis of Pombal), a formidable example of the type of high state functionary who could accumulate great power under indolent absolute monarchy. Able to implement much-needed modernisations inspired by Enlightenment progressivism, Pombal also persecuted his opponents, both actual and imagined.
The subject of Aftershock is the conjunction between Pombal’s impunity and the cataclysm of the earthquake. His machinations take in the wider conflicts associated with Portugal’s colonial entanglements and religious discords, most notably involving the “alternative government” represented by the Jesuits.
In its form, McSkeane’s narrative alludes to 18th-century letters, with chapter headings in quill-pen font that advertise interesting scenes and incidents. The writing flows compellingly through the calculating minds of the protagonists. Even the earthquake’s tumult joins this elegant fluency. In a vivid description, a British diplomat relishes a carefree autumn morning, only to notice a ripple in his teacup and turn to see the houses around him “opening from top to bottom”.
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Aftershock deals with political scandal: the Portuguese king’s affair with the wife of the heir of a prominent noble family, the Távoras, an adultery blamed for provoking divine retribution against Lisbon – and a later attempt to assassinate the sovereign, for which Pombal held the entire Távora clan responsible.
In the scrupulous, stylish care of its concentration on aristocratic circles, McSkeane’s novel can feel distant from the real travails of history. Aftershock also seems to lack an impetus for its accomplished fiction, a forceful reason for existing. But it offers an engaging journey through the vanities surrounding a disaster in which contemporaries glimpsed the ruin of meaning.
