Fall on your Knees

Fall on Your Knees is a historical novel that uses real-time events—mining disasters, pandemics, wars, economic traumas—as backdrop. However, it is also part of the Gothic genre of literature. Gothic fiction, a mode that began with Horace Walpole’s 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto, is a loosely defined aesthetic that tends to feature elements of psychological horror, oppressive and fear-inducing environments, and an atmosphere of supernatural portent and paranormal dread. This genre in North American fiction typically also includes violence, disturbing or inappropriate sexuality, intense family dysfunction, and the corrosive effects of racism. At the same time, modern takes on this genre embrace the origins of white settlements in Canada and America as Catholic and Protestant experimental theocracies. The modern Gothic features in the works of such American writers as William Faulkner, Flannery O’Connor, Walker Percy, Don DeLillo, Cormac McCarthy, and Toni Morrison; and such Canadian writers as Robertson Davies, Margaret Atwood, and Alice Munro.

MacDonald’s characters often experience the paranormal: haunting dreams, swirling visions, feathery guardian angels, and, of course, terrifying devils. Within this novel, there are also dark Gothic touches of grotesque horror (for instance, the drowning of Ambrose, the discovery of the cat in the baptismal gown, and later the unearthing of the baby’s skull) and instances of violence as an expression of control (James’s twisted outbursts, for instance).

Adding to the generic complexity, the novel’s action is infused with the symbols, doctrines, and vocabulary of traditional Catholicism—often a feature of 18th- and 19th-century Gothic horror. The characters’ lives express the drama of damnation and salvation, and their faith in the premise of redemption creates extreme behavior that distorts belief into expressions of emotional terrorism, profane indulgences, or willful damnation. Because so many Catholic prohibitions center on the expression of sexuality and the tense conflict between the flesh and the soul, characters struggle with expressing their physical need for others. The novel suggests that repressed sexuality corrupts into aberrant behavior, most notably pedophilia and incest. Ironically, the novel’s most loving relationship, the one between Rose and Kathleen, would be considered an abomination in traditional Catholicism.