Books and Persons; Being Comments on a Past Epoch, 1908-1911

by Arnold Bennett

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  Later, "... 'I hate you!' almost hissed poor Tamara." (Note the realisticexactitude of that "almost.") "Then his eyes blazed.... He moved nearer toher, and spoke in a low concentrated voice: 'It is a challenge; good. Nowlisten to what I say: In a little short time you shall love me. Thathaughty little head shall be here on my breast without a struggle, and Ishall kiss your lips until you cannot breathe.' For the second time in herlife Tamara went dead white...." Then follow scenes revelry, in whichMrs. Glyn, with a courage as astonishing as her power, exposes all that isfatuous and vicious in the loftiest regions of Russian fashionablesociety. Later, Gritzko did kiss Tamara on the lips, but she objected.Still later he got the English widow in a lonely hut in a snowstorm, andthis was "his hour." But she had a revolver. "'Touch me and I will shoot,'she gasped.... He made a step forward, but she lifted the pistol again toher head ... and thus they glared at one another, the hunter and thehunted.... He flung himself on the couch and lit a cigarette, and all thatwas savage and cruel in him flamed from his eyes. 'My God!... and still Iloved you--madly loved you ... and last night when you defied me, then Idetermined you should belong to me by force. No power in heaven or earthcan save you! Ah! If you had been different, how happy we might have been!But it is too late; the devil has won, and soon I will do what Iplease.'... For a long time there was silence.... Then the day-light fadedquite, and the Prince got up and lit a small oil lamp. There was a deadlysilence.... Ah! She must fight against this horrible lethargy.... Her armhad grown numb.... Strange lights seemed to flash before hereyes--yes--surely--that was Gritzko coming towards her! She gave a gaspingcry and tried to pull the trigger, but it was stiff.... The pistol droppedfrom her nerveless grasp.... She gave one moan.... With a bound Gritzkoleaped up...."

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  "The light was grey when Tamara awoke. Where was she? What had happened?Something ghastly, but where? Then she perceived her torn blouse, and witha terrible pang remembrance came back to her. She started up, and as shedid so realized that she was in her stockinged feet. The awfulcertainty.... Gritzko had won--she was utterly disgraced.... She hurriedlydrew off the blouse, then she saw her torn underthings.... She knew thathowever she might make even the blouse look to the casual eyes of hergodmother, she could never deceive her maid."... "She was an outcast. Shewas no better than Mary Gibson, whom Aunt Clara had with harshness turnedout of the house. She--a lady!--a grand English lady!... She crouched downin a corner like a cowed dog...." Then he wrote to her formally demandingher hand. And she replied: "To Prince Milaslavski. Monsieur,--I have nochoice; I consent.--Yours truly, Tamara Loraine." Thus they were married.Her mood changed. "Oh! What did anything else matter in the world sinceafter all he loved her! This beautiful fierce lover! Visions ofenchantment presented themselves.... She buried her face in his scarletcoat...." I must add that Gritzko had not really violated Tamara. He hadonly ripped open her corsage to facilitate respiration, and kissed her"little feet." She honestly thought herself the victim of a satyr; but,though she was a widow, with several years of marriage behind her, she hadbeen quite mistaken on this point. You see, she was English.

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  "His Hour" is a sexual novel. It is magnificently sexual. My quotations,of course, do less than justice to it, but I think I have made clear thesimple and highly courageous plot. Gritzko desired Tamara with the extremeof amorous passion, and in order to win her entirely he allowed her tobelieve that he had raped her. She, being an English widow, moving in themost refined circles, naturally regarded the outrage as an imperiousreason for accepting his hand. That is a summary of Mrs. Glyn's novel, ofwhich, by the way, I must quote the dedication: "With grateful homage anddevotion I dedicate this book to Her Imperial Highness The Grand DuchessVladimir of Russia. In memory of the happy evenings spent in her graciouspresence when reading to her these pages, which her sympathetic aid infacilitating my opportunities for studying the Russian character enabledme to write. Her kind appreciation of the finished work is a source of thedeepest gratification to me."

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  The source of the deepest gratification to me is the fact that theCensorship Committee of the United Circulating Libraries should haveallowed this noble, daring, and masterly work to pass freely over theircounters. What a change from January of this year, when Mary Gaunt's "TheUncounted Cost," which didn't show the ghost of a rape, could not even beadvertised in the organ of The _Times_ Book Club! After this, who cancomplain against a Library Censorship? It is true that while passing "HisHour," the same censorship puts its ban absolute upon Mr. John Trevena'snew novel "Bracken." It is true that quite a number of people hadconsidered Mr. Trevena to be a serious and dignified artist of ratherconsiderable talent. It is true that "Bracken" probably contains nothingthat for sheer brave sexuality can be compared with a score of passages in"His Hour." What then? The Censorship Committee must justify its existencesomehow. Mr. Trevena ought to have dedicated his wretched provincial novelto the Queen of Montenegro. He painfully lacks _savoir-vivre_. In theearly part of this year certain mysterious meetings took place, apropos ofthe Censorship, between a sub-committee of the Society of Authors and asub-committee of the Publishers' Association. But nothing was done. I amtold that the Authors' Society is now about to take the matter up again.But why?

  W.H. HUDSON

  [_24 Nov. '10_]

  I suppose that there are few writers less "literary" than Mr. W.H. Hudson,and few among the living more likely to be regarded, a hundred yearshence, as having produced "literature." He is so unassuming, so mild, sointensely and unconsciously original in the expression of his naiveemotions before the spectacle of life, that a hasty inquirer into hisidiosyncrasy might be excused for entirely missing the point of him. Hisnew book (which helps to redeem the enormous vulgarity of a boomingseason), "A Shepherd's Life: Impressions of the South Wiltshire Downs"(Methuen), is soberly of a piece with his long and deliberate career. Alarge volume, yet one arrives at the end of it with surprising quickness,because the pages seem to slip over of themselves. Everything connectedwith the Wiltshire downs is in it, together with a good deal notimmediately therewith connected. For example, Mr. Hudson's views onprimary education, which are not as mature as his views about shepherdsand wild beasts of the downs. He seldom omits to describe theindividualities of the wild beasts of his acquaintance. For him a mole isnot any mole, but a particular mole. He will tell you about a mole thatdid not dig like other moles but had a method of its own, and he will giveyou the reason why this singular mole lived to a great age. As a rule, heremarks with a certain sadness, wild animals die prematurely, theirexistence being exciting and dangerous. How many men know England--I meanthe actual earth and flesh that make England--as Mr. Hudson knows it? Thisis his twelfth book, and four or five of the dozen are already classics.Probably no literary dining club or association of authors or journalistsmale or female will ever give a banquet in Mr. Hudson's honour. It wouldnot occur to the busy organizers of these affairs to do so. And yet--But,after all, it is well that he should be spared such an ordeal.

  NEO-IMPRESSIONISM AND LITERATURE

  [_8 Dec. '10_]

  The exhibition of the so-called "Neo-Impressionists," over which theculture of London is now laughing, has an interest which is perhaps notconfined to the art of painting. For me, personally, it has a slight,vague repercussion upon literature. The attitude of the culture of Londontowards it is of course merely humiliating to any Englishman who has madean effort to cure himself of insularity. It is one more proof that thenegligent disdain of Continental artists for English artistic opinion isfairly well founded. The mild tragedy of the thing is that London isinfinitely too self-complacent even to suspect that it is London and notthe exhibition which is making itself ridiculous. The laughter of Londonin this connexion is just as silly, just as provincial, just as obtuse, aswould be the laughter of a small provincial town were Strauss'
s "Salome,"or Debussy's "Pelleas et Melisande" offered for its judgment. One canimagine the shocked, contemptuous resentment of a London musical amateur(one of those that arrived at Covent Garden box-office at 6 a.m. the otherday to secure a seat for "Salome") at the guffaw of a provincial townconfronted by the spectacle and the noise of the famous "Salome"osculation. But the amusement of that same amateur confronted by anuncompromising "Neo-Impressionist" picture amounts to exactly the sameguffaw. The guffaw is legal. You may guffaw before Rembrandt (people do!),but in so doing you only add to the sum of human stupidity. London may beunaware that the value of the best work of this new school is permanentlyand definitely settled--outside London. So much the worse for London. Forthe movement has not only got past the guffaw stage; it has got past thearguing stage. Its authenticity is admitted by all those who have keptthemselves fully awake. And in twenty years London will be signing anapology for its guffaw. It will be writing itself down an ass. The writingwill consist of large cheques payable for Neo-Impressionist pictures toMessrs. Christie, Manson, and Woods. London is already familiar with thisexperience, and doesn't mind.

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  Who am I that I should take exception to the guffaw? Ten years ago I tooguffawed, though I hope with not quite the Kensingtonian twang. The firstCezannes I ever saw seemed to me to be very funny. They did not disturb mydreams, because I was not in the business. But my notion about Cezanne wasthat he was a fond old man who distracted himself by daubing. I could notsay how my conversion to Cezanne began. When one is not a practisingexpert in an art, a single word, a single intonation, uttered by an expertwhom one esteems, may commence a process of change which afterwards seemsto go on by itself. But I remember being very much impressed by astill-life--some fruit in a bowl--and on approaching it I saw Cezanne'sclumsy signature in the corner. From that moment the revelation was swift.And before I had seen any Gauguins at all, I was prepared to considerGauguin with sympathy. The others followed naturally. I now surroundmyself with large photographs of these pictures of which a dozen years agoI was certainly quite incapable of perceiving the beauty. The beststill-life studies of Cezanne seem to me to have the grandiose quality ofepics. And that picture by Gauguin, showing the back of a Tahitian youngman with a Tahitian girl on either side of him, is an affair which Iregard with acute pleasure every morning. There are compositions byVuillard which equally enchant me. Naturally I cannot accept the wholeschool--no more than the whole of any school. I have derived very littlepleasure from Matisse, and the later developments of Felix Vallotton leaveme in the main unmoved. But one of the very latest phenomena of theschool--the water-colours of Pierre Laprade--I have found ravishing.

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  It is in talking to several of these painters, in watching their familiardeportment, and particularly in listening to their conversations withothers on subjects other than painting, that I have come to connect theirideas with literature. They are not good theorizers about art; and I amnot myself a good theorizer about art; a creative artist rarely is. Butthey do ultimately put their ideas into words. You may receive one wordone day and the next next week, but in the end an idea gets itself somehowstated. Whenever I have listened to Laprade criticizing pictures,especially students' work, I have thought about literature; I have beenforced to wonder whether I should not have to reconsider my ideals. Thefact is that some of these men are persuasive in themselves. Theydisengage, in their talk, in their profound seriousness, in their sense ofhumour, in the sound organization of their industry, and in their calmassurance--they disengage a convincingness that is powerful beyond debate.An artist who is truly original cannot comment on boot-laces withoutillustrating his philosophy and consolidating his position. Noting inmyself that a regular contemplation of these pictures inspires a wearinessof all other pictures that are not absolutely first rate, giving them adisconcerting affinity to the tops of chocolate-boxes or to "art"photographs, I have permitted myself to suspect that supposing some writerwere to come along and do in words what these men have done in paint, Imight conceivably be disgusted with nearly the whole of modern fiction,and I might have to begin again. This awkward experience will in allprobability not happen to me, but it might happen to a writer younger thanme. At any rate it is a fine thought. The average critic always calls me,both in praise and dispraise, "photographic"; and I always rebut theepithet with disdain, because in the sense meant by the average critic Iam not photographic. But supposing that in a deeper sense I were?Supposing a young writer turned up and forced me, and some of mycontemporaries--us who fancy ourselves a bit--to admit that we had beenconcerning ourselves unduly with inessentials, that we had been worryingourselves to achieve infantile realisms? Well, that day would be a greatand a disturbing day--for us.

  1911

  BOOKS OF THE YEAR

  [_12 Jan. '11_]

  The practice of reviewing the literature of the year at the end thereof isnow decaying. Newspapers still give a masterly survey of the motor-cars ofthe year. I remember the time when it was part of my duty as a seriousjournalist to finish at Christmas a two-thousand word article, full ofdiscrimination as fine as Irish lace, about the fiction of the year; andother terrifying specialists were engaged to deal amply with the remainingbranches of literature. To-day, one man in one column and one day willpolish off what five of us scarcely exhausted in seven columns and sevendays. I am referring to the distant past of a dozen years ago, beforeWilliam de Morgan was born, and before America and Elinor Glyn haddiscovered each other. Last week many newspapers dismissed the entirefiction of 1910 in a single paragraph. The consequence is that there hasbeen no "book of the year." A critic without space to spread himselfhesitates to pronounce downright for a particular book. A critic engagedin the dangerous art of creating the "book of the year" wants room tohedge, and in the newest journalism there is no room to hedge. So thecritic refrains from the act of creation. He imitates the discretion ofthe sporting tipster, who names several horses as being likely to win onerace. "Among the books of the year are Blank, Blank, and Blank," he says.(But what he means is, "The book of the year is to be found among Blank,Blank, and Blank.") Naturally he selects among the books whose titles comeinto his head with the least difficulty; that is to say, the books whichhe has most recently reviewed; that is to say, the books published duringthe autumn season. No doubt during the spring season he has distinguishedseveral books as being "great," "masterly," "unforgettable," "genius"; butere the fall of the leaf these works have completely escaped from hismemory. No author, and particularly no novelist who wishes to go down toposterity, should publish during the spring season; it is fatal.

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  The celebrated "Dop Doctor" (published by Heinemann) and Mr. TempleThurston's "City of Beautiful Nonsense" (published by Chapman and Hall)have both sold very well indeed throughout the entire year. In fact, theywere selling better in December than many successful novels published inthe autumn. Yet neither of them, assuming that there had been a book ofthe year, would have had much chance of being that book. The reason isthat they have not been sufficiently "talked about." I mean "talked about"by "the right people." And by "right people" I mean the people who make apractice of dining out at least three times a week in the West End ofLondon to the accompaniment of cultured conversation. I mean the peoplewho are "in the know," politically, socially, and intellectually--whoknow what Mr. F.E. Smith says to Mr. Winston Churchill in private, whyMrs. Humphry Ward made such an enormous pother at the last council meetingof the Authors' Society, what is really the matter with Mr. Bernard Shaw'slater work, whether Mr. Balfour does indeed help Mr. Garvin to write the_Daily Telegraph_ leaders, and whether the Savoy Restaurant is as goodunder the new management as under the old. I reckon there are about 12,055of these people. They constitute the elite. Without their aid, withouttheir refined and judicial twittering, no book can hope to be a book ofthe year.

  Now I am in a position to state that no n
ovel for very many years hasbeen so discussed by the elite as Mr. Forster's "Howard's End" (publishedby Edward Arnold). The ordinary library reader knows that it has been avery considerable popular success; persons of genuine taste know that itis a very considerable literary achievement; but its triumph is that ithas been mightily argued about during the repasts of the elite. I needscarcely say that it is not Mr. Forster's best book; no author's best bookis ever the best received--this is a rule practically without exception. Amore curious point about it is that it contains a lot of very straightcriticism of the elite. And yet this point is not very curious either. Forthe elite have no objection whatever to being criticized. They rather likeit, as the alligator likes being tickled with peas out of a pea-shooter.Their hides are superbly impenetrable. And I know not which to admire themore, the American's sensitiveness to pea-shooting, or the truly correctEnglishman's indestructible indifference to it. Mr. Forster is a youngman. I believe he is still under thirty, if not under twenty-nine. If hecontinues to write one book a year regularly, to be discreet andmysterious, to refrain absolutely from certain themes, and to avoid a toomarked tendency to humour, he will be the most fashionable novelist inEngland in ten years' time. His worldly prospects are very brilliantindeed. If, on the other hand, he writes solely to please himself,forgetting utterly the existence of the elite, he may produce somefirst-class literature. The responsibilities lying upon him at this crisisof his career are terrific. And he so young too!