# Canon Docre — Là-Bas character guide

> Canon Docre in Là-Bas by J.-K. Huysmans.

**Role:** supporting

**Also known as:** Docre

**First appearance:** 0000-i

## Snapshot

A renegade priest whose honeyed manners and cold appraising eye mark him as the novel's most unsettling figure — a man of the Church who serves something else.

## Who they are

Docre appears in the Chantelouve household as a smooth, rotund man of affairs, pink cotton in his ears, capable of doing one a bad turn behind his pious smile. He speaks of saints and their filth with the same detached fluency he brings to everything else, and Durtal senses in him a cool unscrupulousness that the drawing-room setting only half conceals. He is the door through which the novel's occult underworld begins to open, and he knows exactly what he is doing.

## Relationships

### [Durtal](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/characters/durtal)

_rivalry_

Canon Docre, a renegade priest and Satanist, is Durtal's antagonist, embodying the dark spiritual forces Durtal investigates.

### [Des Hermies](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/characters/des_hermies)

_rivalry_

Canon Docre and Des Hermies are intellectual and spiritual adversaries, representing opposing occult traditions.

### [Durtal](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/characters/durtal)

_rivalry_

Canon Docre, a renegade priest and Satanist, is Durtal's antagonist, embodying the dark spiritual forces Durtal investigates.

### [Des Hermies](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/characters/des_hermies)

_rivalry_

Canon Docre and Des Hermies are intellectual and spiritual adversaries, representing opposing occult traditions.

### [Des Hermies](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/characters/des_hermies)

_rivalry_

Canon Docre and Des Hermies are intellectual and spiritual adversaries, representing opposing occult traditions.

### [Durtal](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/characters/durtal)

_rivalry_

Canon Docre, a renegade priest and Satanist, is Durtal's antagonist, embodying the dark spiritual forces Durtal investigates.

## In the story

### [V](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/chapters/v)

Described by Des Hermies as a defrocked abbé and a genuine monster of Satanism.

### [Chapter IX](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/chapters/ix)

Described as a renegade priest who evokes the Devil, consecrates hosts to feed white mice, and has Christ tattooed on his heels to trample on the Saviour.

### [The Visit](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/chapters/x)

Durtal speculates that Madame Chantelouve's behavior might be influenced by Canon Docre, a friend of hers, suggesting possible Satanic involvement.

### [XV](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/chapters/xv)

Canon Docre is discussed as a former confessor of Madame Chantelouve, accused of Satanism and celebrating the black mass; Durtal seeks to meet him.

### [XVI](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/chapters/xvi)

Durtal hopes to learn more about him from Hyacinthe.

### [XVII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/chapters/xvii)

Mentioned as a master Satanist, former priest, and former lover of Madame Chantelouve.

### [XVIII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/chapters/xviii)

Identified as the officiant of the Black Mass Durtal will attend; Durtal considers him the only interesting occultist.

### [XIX](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/chapters/xix)

Presides over the Black Mass, delivering a blasphemous invocation to Satan and desecrating the host.

### [XX](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/chapters/xx)

Subject of criticism for his Black Mass and inferiority to Gilles de Rais.

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/characters/canon_docre
- Book: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se
- All characters: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/l_bas_se/characters