Proggett
The sexton at St Athelstan's, forty, red-faced and permanently on the verge of swearing. He has decided that the Church of Christ means the actual walls, roof and tower of the building, and reports on the state of the belfry about once a fortnight.
The fabric of St Athelstan's kept standing. Everything he ever asks for is stone, timber, or the money to pay for stone and timber.
The book
At a glance
- Sexton of St Athelstan's, Knype Hill
- Forty
- Digs the Rectory garden in spring and autumn
- Chapter 1, by report in Chapter 4, and Chapter 5
Who they are in the book
Spoiler-freeProggett is the sexton of St Athelstan's, the parish church at Knype Hill in Suffolk. He works for the Reverend Charles Hare, the rector, and in practice for the rector's daughter Dorothy Hare, who does most of the parish work. He serves at the early communion, digs the Rectory garden in spring and autumn, and grows the vegetables the household eats.
George Orwell writes that he is too dim of intellect to hold any definite religious beliefs, and that he shows his piety instead through an intense solicitude about the state of the church buildings. He has decided that the Church of Christ means the actual walls, roof and tower of St Athelstan's. He pokes round the place at all hours, noting a cracked stone here and a worm-eaten beam there, and then comes to Dorothy with demands for repairs costing sums the parish has no way of raising.
The standing item is the bells. They have lain on the floor of the belfry for three years, because reswinging or removing them was priced at twenty-five pounds, and Proggett reports on them not less than once a fortnight. He is right about the danger, and the book says so: the floor will give way sooner or later. He is fond of pointing out that it will probably happen on a Sunday morning just as the congregation are coming in. The rector's answer is that the belfry has held up five hundred years and can be trusted to hold up a few more.
How the book draws them
- How he looksA man of forty with curly grey hair and a red, harassed face. His hands are huge and red, and the little communion bell is lost in them while he fiddles with it.
- What he wears at the altarA ragged cassock and vast labourer's boots. He clumps up the aisle in them to take his place at the side altar, and Dorothy Hare can hear them shuffling behind her through the consecration.
- At the serviceHe stands patiently by, uncomprehending but reverent, and rings the bell in the middle of "Therefore with Angels and Archangels".
- The word that never arrivesHe is one of those men for ever on the verge of swearing who always recapture the oath as it escapes between their teeth. What comes out is not a word but the ghost of one, and it seems to begin with a B. It happens twice in a single roadside conversation.
- How he opens"Beg pardon, Miss. I been wanting to speak to you, Miss--PARTIC'LAR." Dorothy sighs inwardly, because when Proggett wants to speak to you particular you can be certain what is coming.
- The fortnightly reportThe bells are splintering through the belfry floor in a way as it makes you fair shudder to look at them. He was up the belfry that morning, and he came down faster than he went up.
- "Yes, Miss"Told to pray that the jumble sale will bring in five pounds, he says "Yes, Miss" respectfully and shifts his gaze to the far distance. His own advice is practical: don't let Miss Mayfill hear that the tower is unsafe, or she will never come inside the church again.
- On the electionThe one subject besides the fabric on which he speaks with any confidence. Mr Blifil-Gordon's car goes past distributing smiles, and Proggett's verdict is that they are all honey and butter until they have made sure of your vote, and have forgotten your face the day afterwards.
- In the gardenHe does the heavy digging. By the last chapter he has dug the kitchen garden and sowed a few seeds, and the broad beans and the first peas are just showing. One of Dorothy's closing thoughts is that she must ask him for some young cauliflowers to plant out.