Oozing With The Smell of Decay: Pure by Andrew Miller

When you read Pure by Andrew Miller, it might be wise to have a strongly scented candle by your side. For this is a book which evokes stench and decay so powerfully I was convinced I could smell it on my clothes every time I opened the book.
Pure is set in Paris in 1785. Jean-Baptiste Baratte, a young, ambitious engineer, arrives at the palace of Versailles hoping to get a Ministerial commission that will help him make a mark on the world.
False Dreams of Utopia
He “dreams of building utopias where the church and its superstitions will be replaced by schools run by men like himself.” Instead, the task he is handed is not one of construction but of demolition.
In the Rue de Saint Innocents stands the oldest cemetery in Paris. More than 50,000 victims of bubonic plague were reputedly buried here in one day. The subterranean wall separating the living from the dead has collapsed and the bones and decaying flesh have released a miasma which fouls the air, taints the food and even the breath of those who live within its shadow.
Living Hell
It takes a year for Barratte and his team of miners to open the graves and clear away the past. It’s a job which almost costs Baratte his life as the cemetery becomes a kind of hell of burning fires and walls of bones and skulls. Few of those involved in the enterprise emerge unscathed physically or mentally. When they began they imagined they were engaged in a noble cause, building the foundations of a better future in which their endeavours would be marked for posterity.
“They will name squares after us ……..the men who purified Paris,” declares the foreman of works. But as the graves are emptied and the cemetery’s wild flowers wither, so the vitality drains out of the workers. Tobacco, alcohol, weekly visits by prostitutes – nothing can distract the team of miners from the sense of loss. ‘I had some good in me once’ one observes bleakly.
Belief Destroyed
Baratte too undergoes a transformation. The naïve young man is easy prey when he first arrives in the city. It takes little to persuade him to exchange his sensible brown suit for one of pistachio green silk or to join a group of drunken vandals who move about the city under cover of night painting obscenities about Queen Marie Antoinette. But it is not long before he finds he cannot sleep without a sedative and his ideals and belief in the power of reason are destroyed.
The cleansing of the cemetery is an extended metaphor for the cleansing that we as readers know these citizens will experience shortly, although on a significantly bigger scale. Andrew Miller provides plenty of symbolic references to the French Revolution, including naming one of characters Dr Guillotin and including dialogue that can easily be read on two levels. Take this example, from Baratte’s first meeting with the Ministerial aide, who gives him his commission:
It is poisoning the city. Left long enough, it may poison not just local shopkeepers but the king himself. The king and his ministers.
Yes, my lord.
It is to be removed.
Removed?
Destroyed. Church and cemetery. The place is to be made sweet again. Use fire, use brimstone. Use whatever you need to get rid of it.
“Flawless Historical Fiction”
Pure is Andrew Miller’s sixth novel and it won him the 2011 Costa Book of the Year award. The judges praised it as a “structurally and stylistically flawless historical novel.” I’m not going to argue with that assessment.
Miller avoids the mistake made by so many historical fiction authors who load up their narrative with too much info gleaned from research. What we get in Pure is plenty of detail about clothes, food and daily domestic life of the period but it’s seamlessly woven into the narrative. Pure is so magnificently atmospheric it reminded me at times of the early scenes in Patrick Sushkind’s Perfume,
But then we get the additional layering of the parallel between the hell of the graveyard and the hell that is to follow in the Revolution. Ultimately there is a sense of optimism at the end where flowers once more bloom again in the now empty cemetery and sunlight filters through the broken roof of the church to illuminate the darkness.
Pure By Andrew Miller: Footnotes

Andrew Miller gained his MA in creative writing through the prestigious programme at the University of East Anglia. He went on to complete a PhD in critical and creative writing at Lancaster University.
He has written eight books, all published by Sceptre, the imprint of Hodder and Stoughton, His first novel, Ingenious Pain, published in 1997 went on to win three awards – The James Tait Black Memorial Prize, The Grinzane Cavour Prize in Italy and The International Dublin Literary Award. Pure won the Costa Prize Novel of the Year. His most recent novel Now We Shall Be Entirely Free (see my review) won the Walter Scott Prize.
- Now We Shall Be Entirely Free (2018, Sceptre)
- The Crossing (2015, Sceptre)
- Pure (2011, Sceptre)
- One Morning Like a Bird (2008, Sceptre)
- The Optimists (2005, Sceptre)
- Oxygen (2001, Sceptre)
- Casanova (1998, Sceptre)
- Ingenious Pain (1997, Sceptre)
This review was posted originally in 2013. This is an updated version incorporating background info about the author and improving readability by shortening the paragraphs.
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I read this a few years ago but reading your review brought it all back.
It’s terrific!
Thanks for reminding me I really need to read this one
I’ve been meaning to read Pure since it came out. I’ve read, and enjoyed, a couple of his other books, such as Ingenious Pain and as the period and setting is a favourite of mine I should really like it. I’m glad you liked it.
A favourite film of mine, also set just prior to the French revolution, is Ridicule, directed by Patrice Leconte. Have you seen it?
I have also just read Pure, and loved it. I had not heard of Andrew Miller until he came to our Writer’s Festival last year (in Perth, Western Australia), and was impressed enough to buy and read his new book – Now We Shall Be Entirely Free. He writes so beautifully, and I will work my way through his other books when I get the opportunity.
Ingenious Pain remains my absolute favourite of Miller’s novels but this and Now We Shall Be Entirely Free are close seconds. Great review, Karen.
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This sounds a bit ghoulish but I’m curious to see if my sensation of the setting is as vivid as was yours. Nice review!
Let me know what your reaction is Lynn.
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I hadn’t heard of this before I saw it in my local bookstore and I was instantly intrigued. I haven’t bought it yet but every review I’ve read of it, has been very good so I think I have to get it. I’m not that much into historical fiction either but this one sounds like I would love it! Although need to wash my hands after finished reading…!
LOL – yes you certainly do feel a bit itchy and grubby after reading it!
Karen Heenan-Davies
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This is one on my list that I haven’t yet managed to get round to, but I can see I am going to have to move it up. Last Saturday at the Readers’ Afternoon one of the authors on the panel said that she had had an advance look at is next and she thought it was going to be even better. Unfortunately, she didn’t feel she could say anything more about it, so i can’t say what it’s about.
I didn’t know what to expect with this one – some historical fiction leaves me cold – but I bought it on a whim as one of those promotional offers in Waterstones (buy one, get second half price kind of thing) and didn’t fancy much else. So glad I did though. Now you’ve got me intrigued with the next one he is writing – will have to keep a close eye open Karen Heenan-Davies
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