antic hay a study in post war disillusionment

8/19/2019 Antic Hay a Study in Post War Disillusionment

1/127

ANTIC

HAY

TU Y

IN

POST WAR

DISILLUSIONMENT


2/127

he age demanded an image

f

t

accelerated grimace

Something for

the modern stage

Not at

any ra te an Attic grace

EZR POUN


3/127

ANTIC HAY:

A

STUDY

IN

POST WAR

DISILLUSIONMENT

By

JAMES DALTON

MULVIHILL

B A

A Thesis

Submitted to

the

School of Graduate Studies·

in

Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements

for the Degree

Master of

rts

McMaster University

September

978


4/127


5/127

STR CT

In Antic Hay Aldous Huxley wanted, as

he

stated, to

depict

the

l i fe

and opinions of the

post-war

generation.

The considerable cr i t ic l and

popular

response el ic i ted by

the newly

published novel

indicates that u x ~ y had indeed

made a

statement

which,

at

the

time,

was

of urgent

importance

to

his contemporaries. Reader reaction varied from virulent

condemnation to an uneasy acknowledgement

of

the

author s

ta lents

to outr ight

acceptance. Signif icantly,

Antic Hay

received i ts most enthusiast ic reception from Huxley s

immediate

contemporaries

the

y oun g members of the post

war

gen eratio n for whom

the

novel

had been

written.

Whatever

i t

was that

at tracted

or repelled Antic HeY s

original

readers was a

quality

inherent in

the

f ict ion i t se l f

which embodied or reflected

a transformation

of

sensib i l i ty

taking place

at

the

time.

If some readers deplored the

surface flippancy and

the

seemingly

irresponsible

brut l i ty

of the

novel,

others

saw

in

these

same

features

a

fundamental

seriousness. Huxley himsel f maintained that

his

intention in

writing Antic Hay was ent irely serious and explained any

possible

confusion

as arising from the novel s incongruous

blend of farce

and tragedy,

fantasy

and realism. And in

fact , his

conviction

that farce could at once mask and yet

effectively

convey

a

sense

of tragedy

const i tutes

the

basic

i i i


6/127

premise of Antic Hay

Set

in

the

London

of the

1920 s

Antic

ay

partakes

of

the decade s mood of pessimism and a ban do ne d h ed on is m.

Always

behind the

reckless gaiety of c a ba r e t

scenes

and

night e xc ur s i ons

behind

the mocking cynicism which animates

the nove l s

d ialo g u e

is a profound sense of d isil lu sio n m e n t.

This

d isil lu sio n m e n t

has

o rig in a te d

in

the

Great

War

which

concentrated

in the

figure

of

yra

Viveash

c a s t s

i t s

shadow

over

the e xi s t e nc e of a l l the nove l s c h a r a c t e r s . The War s

influence on the f i c t i o n a l world of Antic ay is pervasive.

Evoked through a l l u s i o n s and

fragments of personal

memory i t

~ r o v i s the a ppr opr i a t e

c u l t u r a l

perspective from which to

consider the n ov el s events. The cynical r e j e c t i o n of p ast

values

and

b e l i e f s

springs

from a

consciousness of

imminent

c ult ura l d is so lu tio n

which ha s rendered

impotent

the

capacity

fo r

p os itiv e v is io n. The

hopelessness

of such a p l i g h t is

shown by the desperate

attempt

to

escape

a consciousness of

spir i tu l

impotence in a continual round

of

vain d i s t r a c t i o n s .

The

resul t

is only

f u r t h e r

d isil lu sio n m e n t;

the

n o v e l s

final

vision

is

one

of

ut ter

pessimism.

In

Antic

Hay Huxley pungently depicts and examines

the

p l i g h t of his contemporaries. But his

detachment as

a

commentator is

undermined

by a

curious

s u s c e p t i b i l i t y

to the

vi t i t ing

str in

of

sentimentalism and a f f e c t a t i o n c h a ra c te r-

i s t i

of the nove l s f i c t i o n a l world. The outward mask of

cynicism

which

emphatically

announces

the

disappointed

v


7/127

idea l i s t

within is as much

feature

of his own att i tude s

that

of

his

characters .

t

w s

Huxley s

fai lure

to

ful ly

transcend

the

prevailing mood of his ge whi h must h ve

m de

Antic Hay s

evocation

of

the

pos t-war e thos so

compelling

nd

relevent

to

i t s

original readers.

the

s me time,

this

flawed

perspective

--

indispensible to Huxley s

appeal

in

the

1920 s

h s m de Antic y somewh t of period piece ,

fascinating

as

n

account

of

i ts

age,

but

of

l imited

s igni f i -

cance

as

work of ar t

v


8/127

CKNOWLEDGEMENTS

would l ike

to

thank Professor G ishop

for

his

generous contributions of time nd encouragement

vi


9/127

Introduction

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter

III

Chapter IV

Conclusion

Notes

Bibliography

TABLE CONTENTS

vii

Page

4

79

2

6

5


10/127

INTRODU TION

t is a commonplace that Aldous Huxley was a spokes-

man for his

generation,

that

his

works ref lect the opinions

and

feel ings of

his

contemporaries.

He

is

the

most

fasci-

nating

spokesman of a

generation

disi l lusioned by war and

inte l lectual

confusion

everywhere,

wrote

Carl

Van

Doran

in

1925.

Huxley himself implied as much when in a

l e t te r

to

his

fa ther , he stated the

premise

of one of

his

novels:

t

is a book writ ten by a member of what I may call the

war-generation for others

of

his

kind; and

i t

is

intended to ref lect

the l i fe

and opinions of an

age which has

seen

the v io lent d is ruption of

almost

all

the

standards, conventions and values

current in the

previous epoch.

2

The novel in question was

Antic Hay

and i t was written

in

923

jus t

one

year af te r the

publications

of

The Waste Land

and Ulysses. Like the writers

of

those

works,

Huxley was

concerned

with depicting his

age:

the events recorded in

Antic

Hay

take

place

in 922 and are thus vir tual ly contempo

raneous with the composition

of

the

novel.

If Eliot had br i l

l ian t ly

evoked a

prevail ing sense

of urban al ienat ion and

Joyce

had recorded minutely and powerfully the

events

of a

June day

in

Dublin, Huxley f i l led his novel with

topical

refe

rences

to

Lloyd George p.92), Marie Stopes

p.55),

Unamuno

p.16), Schoenburg

p.16),

Picasso p.116),

the

present con-

dit ion of

certain London dis t r ic t s l ike

Paddington

and


11/127

2

Pimlico, and, of course, the Great War But while those

works

of

Eliot

and

Joyce

a re con sid ered

to

be

landmarks

of

modern l i t e ra ture

Antic

Hay

i f read

at a ll now makes a

r el ati ve ly s lig h t

impression on today s

reader.

The topica-

l i ty

of the novel is par t ia l ly to

blame,

as i s undoubtedly

and indeed f inal ly

Huxley s

self-admitted fai l ings as an

ar t i s t .

Yet the assert ion, repeated time n ~ again by

cri -

t ics

and

readers, that

Huxley

was a

major

spokesman

of his

age,

urges

a considerat ion of what made Antic

ay

so per t i

nent

to i ts original readers.

In the preface

to his

study. Aldous

Huxley: Satire

and

Stfucture,

Jerome Meckier

dismisses

the viabi l i ty of

approaching

Huxley on the basis of his in i t i a l p o p u l r t y ~

claiming

that

I t

is of

l i t t l e benefi t

to

base

the case for

him on

his

appeal

to his

original audience of the 1920 s and

30 s .

o point out the immeasurable ways in which any Huxley

novel is a

vir tual

index

to

the

ideas,

trends, and

fads of the years surrounding i t s composition might

make

fascinating

reading but would inevitably

reduce

Huxley

to

l i te rary

history, perhaps

even

sociology.3

Meckier

suggests that

Huxley s main interest

for

us

l ies in the continuing

relevence

of his thought and convic-

t ions.

Indeed,

various a sp ec ts of his work dealing with

science, mysticism,

pacifism,

as well

as

numerous other

concerns,

are certainly

of

interest to any modern reader.

Thus,

a large

portion of

Huxley crit icism deals with these

relevent aspects of

his

work while general surveys of


12/127

3

modern

f i c t i o n

mention

Huxley i f

a t a l l as a minor and

more

or

le ss

d is cre dit ed n o ve li st .

Novels

l i k e Antic

Hay

have

come to be regarded even by

Huxley s

admirers merely

as e a rly i n d i c a t i o n s of

the

w r i t e r s

l a t e r

i n t e l l e c t u a l

development o r a l t e r n a t i v e l y

as the p a r t i c u l a r

brand

of

l i g h t

s a t i r i c a l

f i c t i o n t h a t

Huxley

abandoned for more

experimental

novels

l i k e

Point Counter Point and y l ~ s s in

Gaza and the much l a t e r didactic f i c t i o n of I s l a nd.

s

a

consequence

of such p reo ccu p atio n s

the d istin g u ish in g

c h a ra c te r of

Huxley s

very e a rly f i c t i o n has been la rg e ly

overlooked.

Meckier s contention t h a t a c ons i de r a t i on

of Huxley s

o r i g i n a l

impact

on his contemporaries would be of

merely

so c i-

ological i n t e r e s t assumes t h a t the w r i t e r s appeal

lay in

an

uncanny

a b i l i t y to

portray accurately the a g e s lIideas

t r end s a n d fad s But a s H ux1ey s s t a t e

men

t to

his

fa t her

i n d i c a t e s

the basic premise

of

Antic

Hay

involved a serious

concern

with

profound

s t i r r i n g s

of

c u l t u r a l

unease.

The

IIlife

and opinions of an ag e

which he sought to depict would

in e v ita b ly r e f l e c t

the

a g e s

s u p e r f i c i a l

c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s as

indeed does

the p ic tu re drawn by E l i o t in The Waste

Land.

One reviewer of Antic Hay p e rc e p tiv e ly a s s oc i a t e d

the

two

works:

Mr

Huxley

has the American p o e t s f l a i r for topical

wit

of

a

d i s t i n c t l y metropolitan fla v o u r.

London of

the thea

t r e s and e l e c t r i c b i l l b o a r d s the smart cabarets and dan

cing p la c e s

the parks and the dingy suburbs

is

evoked

with the s k i l l of a sle ig h t-o f-h a n d performer. I t i s

perhaps

a

l i t t l e

higher

on

the

soc ia l sc ale

than

Mr E li o t s c i t y with a l i t t l e more money

to

spend.


13/127

4

But

i ts

point of view is

much the same.

4

Crit ics

have drawn

connections

between

Huxley s

progression

from his early

cynicism to

the

mysticism

of his l ter

f ict ion

and

Elio t ls

similar movement from The Waste Land and liThe

Hollow Men

to

the

Four Quartets.

But

the vast differences

of medium and range which separate the two writers suggest

that what character is t ics they have

in

common are due to the

fact

that

they

were

writing

at

the

same

time

and

under

simi-

l r conditions.

What

is

important

is

that

they dealt

with a

contemporary mood of disil lusionment and uncertainty, although

in different

ways.

In this connection i t is

interest ing to

note an essay

ent i t led Accidie which Huxley published in 1923.

In i t

he

discusses

the

changing

concepts of

accidie,

f i r s t

seen

as

one

of

the deadly s ins ,

then

as a disease, and f inal ly as an

essent ia l ly lyr ical

emotion,

f rui t ful in the inspiration of

much

of the

most

h r terist i

modern

l i t e r t u r e ~ Huxleyls

use

of

the word

c

h r ter is t i

l

here is s ignif icant ,

for i t

implies a part icular status for the ennui

of his

age.

And

indeed,

he

goes

on

to argue

that th is

most

recent

form

of

accidie

is his gener at ion s peculia r inhe rit ance : among

the

contributing

factors

to

this

condition

he includes

the increas-

ing urbanization

of the

n inete en th cen tu ry ,

a resul tant

res t -

lessness

and

need

for new

distract ions

an

d f inal ly ,

to

crown this vast structure

of

fai lures and disi l lusionments ,

the

r e

cam

e

the

War

0

f 1

9

4

He

con c1u

des:


14/127

5

Other epochs have witnessed

disasters

have had to

suffer

disil lusionment;

but

in

no

century

have

the

dis i l lus ion

ments

followed on one another s heels

with

such

uninter

mitted rapidity as in the

twentieth,

for

the

good reason

tha t

in

no

century

has change been so

rapid

and

profound.

The

mal

du siecle was an inevitable

evi l ; indeed, we

can

claim with a cer tain pride that we have a r ight

to our

accidie.

With us

i t is not

a sin or a disease

of the

hypochondries;

i t

is

a

state

of

mind

which fate has

forced upon us.

7

If

there is a

hint

of se lf -sa t isfac t ion in

these l ines,

i t is

a

note

which was

in tune with

the

prevail ing

att i tude

of

the decade. I t

is

such

an

age

of

IIfacile

despairs ,

backyard

Hamlets,

cheap return t ickets to the end

of

the night

that

George

Orwell

cr i t i c izes in his

well-known

essay, Inside

the

Whale

S

Looking back on the

1920 s

in

a

rare mood of re t ro-

spection,

Huxley

himself

states

that

what he cal ls lithe popu-

larizat ion of meaning lessness was a convenient

way

of excus

ing

various

forms

of i r responsible behaviour.

9

But

i f the

older

Huxley

had

long

since abandoned such an at t i tude

writing

to

John Middleton

Murray

in

946

he

was

anxious

to

dissociate himself from the fashionably cynical young writer

of the 1920 slO

his asser t ion

in

9 3 that Antic

ay re-

flected the

p

inions

and

l i fe

of the

post-war generation

must nevertheless be taken at face value. Although Antic

ay

partakes of the mood of faci le despair deplored by Orwell,

i t

is

only within such a context that

the

novel can be pro-

perly understood.

For

Huxley s conviction,

stated

in

Accidie and implied in the l e t te r to his father , that

ennui is a state

of

mind which fate has forced upon us


15/127

6

const i tutes the fundamental at t i tude behind Antic Hay

I t

is

v lith

singular aptness that Cyril

Connolly

calls

Huxley

lithe most

typical

of

a generation,

typical

in

his

promise,

his

e r udi t

ion, his

cyn i ci

and i n

his

pee u1i a r b ran d

0

f

pro

1i

f ie

s te r i i t

y

This

study

does not propose to make a case for Huxley

as

an a r t i s t

To attempt

to

place Huxley

in the

f i r s t rank

of fiction writers is unreal is t ic as he himself

would have

asser ted.

To

argue that he belongs

to a t radit ion dis t inc t

from the mainstream

of

English l i te ra ture

that of Peacock

and

Mallock, for example

is

perhaps more

helpful; but

again

the

steep

decline of Huxley s

popularity in the

1920 s

to

his

re la t ive

obscurity

today

suggests that an

understand-

ing

of

this

writer

demands a consideration of

his

contempora-

neity. s

Raymond

Mortimer wrote in 1923,

IIMr

Huxley s deco-

rations are nothing i f not voguish.

Ephemeral

too? Well,

i t

is

we for

whom

they

are

destined and not our

possib le poste-

t

3

y. I t

is the intention

of this study,

then)

to

examine

Antic Hay with a view to appraising i ts

cogency as

an expres-

sion

of

i t s age.

In Chapter I

the reception of

Antic H

9

by

i ts

original

readers will

be

considered, as will

be

the interact ion of the

novel s

comic and

t ragic elements: both these

concerns

will

be discussed in

regard

to Huxley s

sta te d in te ntio ns

in

writing Antic

Hay

Ess en tia lly , th is

chapter

will attempt

to

establ ish

the proper

context

in

which

to

view

the novel.


16/127

Chapters II and I I I will examine in d e t a i l the pi c t ur e

of

the

post war

epoch

presented

in Antic

Hay

the

former

will

deal

with the mood of

d isil lu sio n m e n t

which informs the novel;

the l t ter will

discuss

the h ed on is tic p ur su its indulged in

by

the novel

c ha r a c t e r s

as they re a c t

to t h i s

is i l lus ion-

ment. Chapter

and

the conclusion will serve

the

purpose

of

examining and

ev alu atin g

Antic

Hay s f i na l statem ent of

pessimism.


17/127

CH PTER I

I can predic t the consequences. Mr

Huxley

will have

shoals

of

imitators . His l icence will provoke clever

young men and clever young women to out-A ldous Aldous.

e

shall

have herds of

l i te ra ry

rats exploring

every

sewer. The

craf t

of le t te rs will be debased and

degraded

until

l i te ra ture

becomes a synonym

for

bad smells and

bad drains.

The

cloacre

of vice will

be

dredged

for

fre sh infam ies.

There will

be a popular cul t of blasphemy and a

prof i table

school

of nameless innuendo. There are few turpitudes

which

cannot

be limned by

the expert

juggler with words.

Literary subtlety

can

adumbrate

moral cancers and lepro

sies

tha t

make

even

the pathologist shudder

in his con

sulting-room. There

is

no l imit to the

resources

of

wordcraft

when i t is prost i tuted to the

abysses

of base

ness.

l

So wrote

James

Douglas in

a

review

of

the

newly publish-

ed

Antic

Hay

in 1923. His was an extreme reaction, but in i ts

virulence i t

i l lus t ra tes the remarkable

impact that

Aldous

Huxley had

on

the l i te rary

world

of the

1920s. Although no

other reviewer

matched Douglas s in tens i ty

the cri t ica l

res-

ponse to

Antic

Hay indicates that

the

book was

of

a controver

sial

nature.

Reviewers noted

what they

described

as the novel s

savagery, i ts blasphemy, i ts

diabolical

cleverness

and

br i l l i -

ance. H Boynton, in

the

Independent,

described

i t as

consti tut ing

a

new

and immensely smart f ic t ion .

Joseph

Wood Krutch called

Huxley the

age s

most accomplished expo

nent of impudent modernity . 3

The novelty

of

Antic Hay was immediately

apparent,

but the

epithets

which

greeted i t

8

clever ,

smart,

impudent


18/127

suggest that the

novel s

innovations were viewed with ambi-

valence. A certain uneasiness

is

evident in even some of

Huxley s more

sympathetic

cr i t ics which manifests

i t se l f

in a tendency to

regard the

cleverness and

the

Ibr i l l ianc2

as products of adolescent precociousness.

Referring

to the

f l ippant humour

of

Antic Hay

Gerald

Gould

wrote,

Mr. Huxley

will have his l i t t l e joke, and i t must be one that , however

inexplicably,

every

schoolboy

shares .4 But Boynton revealed

the antagonism

underlying

his colleagues

uneasiness

when

he complained that Huxley has

the

usual scunner of

his

gene-

ration against

everything

else before or

outside

his genera

t ion .5

Yet while the l i te r ry Mahatmas of

the weekly

reviews

m y have

dist rusted

Antic Hay s cleverness and irreverence,

the book was greeted enthus ias t ica l ly y Huxley s immediate

contemporaries.

From

accounts

given y people who when

young had read Huxley avidly, i t seems

that

Huxley s early

works had a profoundly

l iberat ing influence on

his

generation.

David

Cecil , for example,

remarks on

how in the

formative

period

between

thir teen

and

twenty he

[Huxley] had, as

i t

were, re leased them, had freed their sp i r i t s from

the

con-

ventions of

the

past

and the

inhibi t ing conditions of

the

6

present

age. The

early short s tor ies the poetry

for

i t

was as a poet

that

Huxley f i r s t emerged

and, most

important, the

l ight s t i r ic l

novel, Crome Yellow 1 9 2 1 ~

had

established

Huxley

as

a

figure

of

scandal in the

l i te r ry


19/127

1 0

world; the mocking i rreverence

of

these

works set

him up

as

the defini t ive model of

smart,

rebell ious modernity. Antic

Hay however,

while retaining the lethal f r i v o l i t y

which

cha-

racterized Huxley s oth er early writ ings ,

seemed more

provo-

cat ive. Of

his reaction to this novel in par t icular , Angus

\ o i 1son wri

tes:

The

revolutionary

forces that

released

me were

all

and

more than all that I

expected.

I t seemed a revelation

of emancipa tion

and intel lectual

richness.

To be preco

ciously

sophis t icated,

then,

was

indeed

very heaven .

For many

years

Antic Hay

and

Point o u t ~ r

Point

were

my fa i t e s . Sma r t i n

t e l l

e ct ua 1 and a r t i s

t i c

Lon don

was a f t e r all j u s t outside my door.

The inmates

of the

Kensington hotels where I l ived might talk

as they

would,

but in every bus and tube on which I

t ravel led

to and

from school

there were b r i l l i a n t

twisted

Spandrells,

blaspheming Colemans, or

perhaps

even

c

ivi l ized

Mr. Mercaptan

going home to

Crebillon f i l s Sofa. A few

years more and I , too, would be a

Gumbri1.

7

Wilson

r e c a l l s t h a t

at

the

time

(the

1920s),

Crome

Yellow

and

h o ~

Barren Leaves (1925)

were le ss e xc itin g

because the i r

i d y l l i c set t ings did

not

seem immediately

relevant

to his

own l i f e .

8

nd

indeed,

set

against the

background

of

Antic

~

seedy

back-alleys

and

fas t cabarets , Huxley s inso

lent

flippancy

must

have acquired a more

d isqu ie ting char ac te r.

Although

not

so

profound

an

expression

of

disi l lusionment

as

T

he L0 ve Son g 0 f

J .

A1f

red

Pru fro c k II 0 r The

Was

t e L and, the

world-weary sophis t icat ion of Antic Hay expressed

cogently

the contemporary

mood of

d i s s a t i s f a c t i o n

and rest lessness.

In a l e t t e r

written not

long a f t e r the publication of

Antic

Hay

Huxley

responded

to his f a t h e r s expressed disl ike

of the novel,

I

can

I

t

say tha

t I

expected

you woul d

enjoy


20/127

the book.

ut on

the other

hand I expected

my contemporaries

would; and so

far as

I know by what people have written to

me

they have .9 Huxley s contention that Antic ay would

undoubtedly appeal to his young

contemporaries

seems to

suggest

that the par t icular character of the

novel

which

disturbed

the

elder

Huxley was, in his son s view, represen-

ta t ive of the younger

generation s

sta te of

mind.

e claimed

that

the

book has a certain novelty being a work in which

a ll the ordinari ly separated categories

t ragic , comic,

fantast ic

rea l i s t ic

are

combined so to say

chemically

into a single

ent i ty

whose

unfamiliar

character makes i t at

f i r s t

sight rather repulsive .lO Huxley maintained that

Antic ay was fundamentally serious, and his comments here

indicate

that

he

was

aware

that

his

intentions

could

be

mis-

construed

because

of this

unfam iliar

character .

The

comic-

fantastic

aspects of A n ~ 9 y are sal ient and could inval i -

date, for

some

readers, the novel s claims to seriousness.

In

this

connection, Mary

Thriplow,

a lady

novel ist depicted

in Those Barren l ~ a e s voices

a

similar complaint:

They

always

seem

to misunderstand

what

one

writes

They l ike my books because they re smart and

unexpected

and rather

paradoxical

and

cynical

and

elegantly

brutal .

They

don t

see how serious i t

all is

They don t see

the tragedy

and

tenderness

underneath. You see

I m

trying something new a chemical compound of

all

categories .

Lightness and tragedy and

loveliness

and

wit

and

fantasy

and realism and irony and

sentimental i ty

all

combined.

l l

s well as

pract ica l ly

quoting

parts of Huxley s l e t t e r

Miss Thriplow

indicates the

ambivalence of at t i tude that a


21/127

12

book

of Antic

Hay s

nature

can evince.

s

a

character

named

Cardan y

to

her, i f

you must

complicate the

matter

by

writing

tragedy

in terms

of

farce

you can

only expect confu

sion.,,12 But i f

the farcical surface

renders

equivocal the

author s

in tent ,

the

farce

is

none-the-less

necessary. Antic

Hay s

is

a

special kind of seriousness,

the

resul t of

a com-

bination of

disparate elements

which together form a

single

ent i ty . This resultant combination

of

comic-fantastic and

t rag i - rea l i s t ic

elements

is

intended

as

an embodiment

of

a

par t icular at t i tude

ref lected

in

the

generation

for

whom

Antic ay was writ ten.

This at t i tude might be compared to

the stance

of

del i

berate inconsequence character is t ic of

the

Dandy. Huxley

could not be fa i r ly

termed

a Dandy-writer, as

Max

Beerbohm

or

Ronald

Firbank

could,

although Cyril

Connolly

sees

him

as having gone through a period

of dandyism

in his very early

writ ings. Connolly s defini t ion

of dandyism, however, stresses

style and he in fact argues that Antic Hay , lacking the

irony

and lyricism of Crome Yellow and

the

early short s tor ies is

not

an example of Dandy

l i te ra ture .

13

But while style is

central

to

a

consideration

of l i te rary

dandyism,

i t is

a

pro-

duct of a fundamental at t i tude

namely,

insolence and rebel

l iousness .

Of more interest with regard to Huxley

are

Connolly s

remarks

concerning

the Dandy s

requisi te

affectat ion

of fr ivo

l i ty :

I t is one of the vleaknesses of the Dandy s position

that

the

seriousness on which i t is

based must

at all costs be

concealed .

14

Martin Green

suggests

a

description

of

the


22/127

Dandy s position

in this

respect

as a turning

of the

back

h

ld

f

f

· 15

on t

orms 0

serlousness.

The farcical character

of

Antic

ay

ref lects

such

a

stance.

The impropriety and

irreverence, the

apparent

immaturity

and mere precociousness

noted

by many of the novel s reviev Jers manifest

an

at t i tude

seemingly

inimical to

serious

concerns. n anonymous

review-

er

fe l t

that Mr.

Huxley is at leas t having his revenge

upon

his forebear, the biologist ,

and

his

kinsman, Matthew

Arnold,

the apostle

of

law and

order,

sweetness and l i gh t , in art.,,16

However the specia l s er iousnes s of Antic ay is f i n ~ by

the novel s incongruous

surface

fl i ppancy

agai

nst

the hi

gh

seriousness

of an o lder gener ati on . I ts farcical aspects

give

the

novel

an un famil ia r cha rac te r d iff er ing r ad ic al ly

from conventional expressions

of

serious intent ;

but, as

Huxley

maintained,

Antic

ay was intended to

ref lec t

fantast ica l ly , of

course,

but

none the

less

fa i thfu l ly l?

the e ssen tial p lig ht of his generat ion.

ow

closely

do

Huxley s claims

for Antic

ay

relate

to the

novel i t se l f?

In his

study

The Vanishing Hero, Sean

Q Faolain

is

troubled by

what he

feels to be a lack of

since-

r i ty

on

Huxley s

part ;

he

finds that rather

than being accurate

and

fai thful

documentaries,

the early

no /els

are fa i r

car iu . -

8

tures

of

an era . Certainly ca ric atu re is a sal ient

fea-

ture of Huxley s f ict ion in general . Antic

Hay s

characters

have names l ike Gumbril,

Boldero, Dr.

Jol ly ;e tc . The

des-

cr ipt ions

of these characters

have an

ar t i f i c ia l ,

cartoon-


23/127

l ike

quali ty: Mr o r t e c u ~ is p i l lar-boxical in

his

appea

rance

and

wears

musical

comedy

trousers

(p.31);

Mr

Alber

marle, the gallery director, is a

round,

smooth

l i t t l e man

with

a head l ike an

egg

(p.39); the

elegant Bruin

Opps is

simply

a

top hat,

a

shi r t front ,

a

long grey

face and a

gli t ter ing monocle (p.5S).

Similarly,

yra

Viveash

and

Rosie Shearwater

are

dol l - l ike vamps Certain descript ions ,

like that

of

r

Bojanus s

natty

appearance

such

a

sense of

pure

and

abstract conic-ness in the sleekly rounded

skir ts

(p.32)

and that of rs

Viveash

and Bruin Opps

standing

among workman at a

coffee

s ta l l

ta l l tubed

hat

and a s i lk-faced overcoat, a cloak of

f l a m e c o l o u ~ e d

s3tin

and in bright , coppery

hair

a great Spanish comb of

carved

tor toi se-shell

(p.

57) evoke

a

peculiarly caricature-

l ike

sense of the novel s cultural milieu.

O Faolain s

remarks,

however,

imply

that these

surfa-

ce distor t ions are reflected in the final world-view presented

in the

novels. This, essent ia l ly is what disturbs

Elizabeth

Bov en

who

observes of

Huxley s f ict ion that

in

a great glare

of

in te l lec tual

hi lar i ty

his

characters

dangle

rather

too

jerki ly; they

are morality characters with

horrif ied

puppet

faces

•

19

The deliberate exaggeration

associated

with

carica

ture

connotes a

necessarily

l imited approach to real i ty:

selected

deta i l s

of an object

are

magn ified while others

are

ignored,

thus

creating an

exaggerated impression

which does

not

accurately

ref lec t

every-day

real i ty If

as

O Faolain


24/127

15

claims, Antic

Hay s

depiction of the post-war era is a c a r i

cature ,

is the

seriousness

of i t s intent

impaired? In an

essay on Ben

Jonson, Huxley writes:

Humours do

not,

of

course, exist

in actual i ty ;

they

are

true

only

as caricatures are t rue. There

are

times when

we wonder

whether

a

car icature

is

not,

af ter all, t ruer

than a

photograph;

there

are others

when i t seems a

stupid 1ie.

2

Huxley does

not

specify under

what

conditions. the t ruthful

ness

of

caricature

can

be

determined, but the

implication

is

that veracity is

a

question of

context and point of

view.

Thus, even a del iberate distort ion of

rea l i ty

can carry a

truth

of

i t s own.

A frequent

cri t icism

made of

Huxley s

character iza-

tion

is that

i t often appears to be needlessly

insensi t ive

and

cruel.

The

author

gives the impression

that he

hates

and despises

his characters .

He

is without pity

in the

expo-

sure of

their weaknesses

and

the ir

turpi tudes, writes

2

Arnold Bennett. Indeed, Huxley often magnifies

his

charac-

ters

deviations

to the

point

where

they

become monstrous

t ravest ies His apparent bruta l i ty

in

this respect suggests

a

capriciousness

inimical to

serious

moral

concerns.

Such

an at t i tude seems

to

extend to

the

general character of his

writing. For example, he

described

one of his early sho rt

s tor ies as so heart less and cruel

that

you

wd.probably

scream

i f

you read i t The concentrated venom of i t is quite

de1i

cious .22 Hence

the charges

of irresponsible bruta l i ty

Huxley,

however,

does

deal with these charges in his

essay


25/127

16

on

Ben

Jonson.

Rejecting the

orgies of quaint

pathos

and

sentimental

comedy to which he believes people have become

accustomed, he

favours the

brutal comedy

of

Jon son's plays:

There is

a

certain hardness

and

brutal i ty about

them

all

due,

of course,

ultimately to the

fact

that

the

cha

racters are not

human but

rather marionettes of wood

and

metal th at collide

and

belabour

one

another, l ike the

ferocious puppets

of the

Punch and

Judy s w ~ without

feeling

the painfulness of the

p r o c e e d i n g s ~

He qualif ies

these

remarks

by

adding that

Jonson's

heart less-

ness is not the

l ight ,

cynical heartlessness of la ter

Resto-

ration

comedy

but

something more ponderous: I t reminds us

of one

of those enormous,painful

jokes which

fate sometimes

plays on humanity.,,24

Comic

exaggeration

in

such

a

context,

then,

has a

cer tain

weightiness. Through the i r very incon-

gruity

the

elements

of farce

and

caricature

pungently

delinea-

te

the underly ing

tragedy of a

s i tuat ion .

The farce of Antic

Hay

operates along the

l ines of

one

of these

huge

painful jokes ; s er ious imp lic ations

exis t

beneath

the novel 's comic surface.

In an

early

poem

ent i t led The Ideal Found

Wanting ,

Huxley

depicts

a

weary

music-hall

performer

who

sick

of

clowning

and owlgl

ass

t r icks , longs to break

through

his prison of stage-props

and

fake scenery to rea l i ty ,

Dark blue and calm

as

music .

Instead, he

finds that the

laugh's turned on

me /I kicked

at card-board,

gaped at red l imelight , jyou

laughed and

cheered my l a tes t knockabout . I t is not

fortuitous

that

Huxley

should

choose

to

express

the

modern

themes

of


26/127

1 7

disillusionment

and n ih i l i s t i c

despair in terms of clownish

knockabout. In Harlequin s S tic k, C ha rlie s

Cane,

Dave Madden

suggests that these concerns are deal t with

similarly

in

the

drama of Beckett and the films

of

Godard.

6

And

Martin Green

points out that images

such

as the circus-ring and show-booth

occur frequently in l i t e ra ture and ar t of

the

189 s and early

twentieth

century, and come to exemplify the modern sensi

bi l i ty 27

Green

mentions in

par t icular the

profound

influence

of

the

commediadel l ar te:

The commedia figures had become

prominent in

the a r t of

the

1890 s

in both England and

France.

They had always

been in the music

hal ls

where for

instance Dan

Leoo s

clowning was much admired by dandy-aesthetes

l ike

Max

BeerDohm They became a

popular

success

in

the

early

movies in

the

work of Charlie

Chaplin,

Buster Keaton,

Laurel

and

Hardy,

and the Marx

Rrothers.

They

inspired

modern poetry through Jules

Laforge

and T .5.

Eliot .

And

in

the

1920 s

they

entered

f ic t ion

8

The

painful

consciousness evident

as

the clown

pits

himself against

the cruel machinery

of farce aptly describes

the peculiar ethos of Antic Hay The comic distort ion of the

novel s surface and

the

apparent

insensi t ivi ty

of the

charact-

erizat ion operate in

a context

of farce

and knockabout. And

s igni f icant ly there are frequent

references

to

stages

and

entertainments throughout

the novel.

The most notable, of

course, is the lovely bloody farce

(p.180),

as Coleman cal ls

i t presented at the

cabaret.

I t is

during an

~ n t r c t e

that

Gumbril recal ls the

entertainments

of

his

childhood:

An but i t was a

long

time since he had been to a Christmas

pantomime.

Not

since

Dan

Leno s

days

the

panto-

mime

went on and on, glory af ter glory, under the

shining


27/127

arch of the

stage.

Hours and hours; and the

grown-ups

always wanted to

go

away

before

the har1equinade (p.174).

But

the

puppet-shows

of

childish

memory

are

a

far

cry

from

the

more s inis ter

farce in

which Gumbri1 and

his friends play.

There

is a

pronounced

sense

of theatr ical gesture in the

novel which suggests the capers of puppets and

mannikins;

Huxley s characters

are

incessantly gest iculat ing

or

making

exaggerated

expressions. Playing

the

clown

in

Chapter XIV,

Gumbril

hoots with

laughter,

limping

and

leaning

heavily

on

his cane (p.16l). Coleman

laughs

a ferocious r t i f i i l

laugh

(p.51)

and

indulges

in

theatr ical

displays of diabolism.

r Mercaptan sings Offenbach and longs for

another

comic

Napoleon

(p.56).

Confronted

with

Gumbri1

clowning, yra

Viveash

des-

cribes

a

plot

remarkably

similar

to

that

of

a commedia

sce-

nario: The fickle lady, the jealous lover, the s tab, the

~ l £

El

r i v ~ ~ ~ the mere Anglo-saxon black eye all

judged by the house-surgeon at the

Miseri co rd ia curab le in

five

days (p.162). The brutal

slapst ick

of such intr igues

finds i ts way into the spir i ted exchanges amot\9

the

novel s

characters.

Thus, in

the

res taurant

scene

of

Chapter

IV,

Lypiatt makes grandiose gestures while Mr. Mercaptan counters

\ Iith

witty

repartee and laughs his own applause (p.46).

uch

l te r Mrs. Viveash remarks on

how

interest ing these two

are when they

are

put together ,

l ike

bear and mastiff

(p.233).

Indeed,

in Chapter XVIII they actually come to blows

in

Mr.Mercaptan s

boudoir;

a similar incident occurs in Chapter


28/127

19

XIX

when Mr

Boldero visi ts

Lypiatt and soon finds

himself

being kicked down

a

f l ight of s ta i rs During

the

restaurant

scene, Coleman, l ike Harlequin with

his

st ick constantly

prods Mr Mercaptan in the stomach with a cane.

Coleman's

relat ions

with his mistress,

Zoe,

seem to be based ent irely

on violence

as

she

incessantly

bi tes hits and stabs him

All

these

c ha rac te rs , lik e the

wood and

steel

marionettes

described

by Huxley in his study

of Jonson,

co

l l ide and

belabour each

other l ike

the

ferocious puppets

of the

Punch

and

Judy show . As

a

character

named Spandrell

exclaims in

Point

Counter

'Point (1927),

lIWhat a farce What

knockabout

What an incomparable

idiocy ,,29

And controll ing

this

violent

interaction of inimical at t i tudes and temperaments is Huxley

who seems to hate his characters as much as they hate each

other, for i t is he who has condemned them to the i r intermi-

nable and

fut i le

capers.

However l ike Ben Jonson's b ruta l comedy the

farce

and exaggeration of Antic

Hay

have grave implications for the

world

i t depicts.

Of

the

seemingly

incongruous

elements of

the

commedia Green writes:

The

elegance

and a r t i f i c i a l i ty and unseriousness

of the

commedia

f igures ,

the i r power

to

excite

lyr ic ve l le i t ies

of

melancholy, gaiety, and nostalgia

even while

including

the

most brutal sadism, madness,

and

murder in thei r

action these t ra i t s set them

in

opposition

to all

mora li st ic ' re al ism ', 3

This is similar to Huxley's description of Antic Hay in

which

the

usually

separated categories of tragedy,

comedy

fantasy


29/127

20

and realism are combined into

a

single

ent i ty

which may, as

Huxley

told

his

father ,

appear

strange

and

repulsive

at

f i r s t

sight . But there exis ts a seriousness

beneath the

farce and

car icature,

although

i t is not the conventional seriousness

of moralist ic

rea

l ism' as

Green puts

i t . ~ ~ h i l e the

promi-

s e 0 f

the

novel' s e

pig

rap h i s f u1f i l l ed men 1

ike

satyrs

grazing on the lawns/Shall with their 9oat-feet

dance

the

Antic

Hay

the

brutal

knockabout

is

not

gratuitous.

Considered in

a part icular

context

and from a

certain

point

of

view,

i t underlines a pathetic aspect in these characters '

s i tua t ion .

As she muses

over

her

personal

relat ionships , Myra

Viveash

ref lects :

There

are

music-halls

as

well

as

confidential

boudoirs;

people are adm itted to the tea-party and the t g t e ~ t ~ t e

others ,

on a stage

invisible,

poor things

to th emse lves,

do

the i r l i t t l e

song-and-dance, r o l l ou t their characte

r i s t ic patter and having

provided

you with your entertain

ment

are dism issed with thei r

due

share of

applause

p .79 .

There is a

lack

of free will implici t

in

the

capers

of manni-

klns

and puppets which evokes a

grotesque

pathos. Imprisoned

on

the

stage

at

the

ends

of

thei r s tr ings,

they

must go

through

the i r

routines, act out the

scenario

provided. Thus, when

Gumbril

is coerced

by Mrs.

Viveash to lunch with

her,

instead

of

going

to

Emily in the country, he becomes a

clown:

He was

taking no

responsibi l i ty

for him self. I t was the clown's doing

and

the

clow

n, poor

c

rea

t ur e was

~ Q . ~ com po

s,

not

en t ire 1y

there,

and

couldn't

be

called

to

account

for

his

actions

(pp. 161-162). But

although

Gumbril

has

assumed the

role

of


30/127


31/127


32/127

portentous

s t i r r ings

of

c u l t u r a l

unease

consciousness

of

which must

su re ly

h ve een

behind

Huxley s claim

t ha t

Antic Hay

w s

serious

book.

t is

due

to t hi s ins is ten t

undertone which will e discussed in de t a i l

in

the following

c h a p te r

t h a t

Antic Hay s

puppet-like

c ha ra c t e rs in their

h o r r i f i e d re a c tio n s to p o i n t l e s s

knockabout

uni ve r s e

ref le t

what the generation of the

1920 s

believed to e

t h e i r

own

p l i g h t .


33/127

CHAPTER II

Look down Conquistador

There on the val ley 's broad

green

f loor ,

There l ies

the

lake;

the

jewelled

ci t ies

gleam;

Chalco and Tlacopan

Await the coming Man.

Look down on Mexico, Conquistador,

Land

of your golden

dream

(p.44).

The

above

poem The Conquistador ,

is

loudly and

tremulously

recited by

Casimir

Lypiatt

in

Chapter

IV. The

exhortation

of i ts

refrain

L

00

k

dow

n

Con qui

s

tad 0

r

expresses, in

ringing, declamatory

tones, the will to

impose

order and significance on

nature,

the

val ley 's

broad green

floor

In his

capacity

as a

conquistador, the coming

Man

obviously

represents the que sting

romantic

ar t i s t However

delivered

with an emotion

that

never seemed

to

vary with

the varying

subject

matter of his poems

(p.44)

and

couched

in

conspicuously

poetical language

the

jewelled ci t ies

gleam

this

composition ref lec ts

the negative side of

romanticism.

Lypiat t 's

poem seems

too ins is tent

ration hollow and contrived.

i t s

inspi-

But more

important

than

the poem i t se l f is the response

which

i t e l ic i t s Lypiatt would go on declaiming

t i l l

his

auditors

were overwhelmed with such a confusion of embarrass-

ment and shame,

tha t the blood

rushed to

thei r

cheeks and

they

dared not meet one another 's

eyes::

(p.44).

he winces

of the

restaurant

patrons

are

not just the

resul t

of

Lypiat t 's

24


34/127

5

ineptitude

as

a poet.

Apart

from being

merely bad,

The

Conquistador

seems

glaringly

out of

place:

in

i t s

transcen

den t vagueness this poem represents

a

buoyant opt imism

which

i t cannot

j u s t i f y

or validate

and

which, in the age depicted

by

Antic

Hay, cannot be countenanced. The

poem s

final l ine

Land

of

your

golden

dream

is

immediately jumped

on

you can t

Not

dream

Asked

why

not,

he

r e p l i e s

Not in this year of grace,

To Lypi

a t t

s exasperated IIBut

by Theodore

Gumbril who objects ,

possibly

say dream

you knovJ .

IIGh because one simply c a n t

nineteen

twenty-two (p.45).

why?lI, Mr. Mercoptan declares , Because i t s altogether too

late

in the

dayll (p.45),

adding in the next paragraph,

Times

have changed

(p.45). Despite these explanations,

however,

Lypiatt

s t i l l

i n s i s t s But

why is

i t

too

late?lI.

Mr.

Mercap

tan can only reply

vaguely,

IIDreams

in

nineteen

hlenty-two

.

and

shrug

his shoulders

(p.45).

The

objections of

Gumbril and

Mercaptan to

liThe Con-

quistador indicate these

characters notions

of what is no

longer acceptable or

meaningful --

what belongs to the past

and,

by

implication,

a

consc iousness o f

l iving

in

a

time

which

is

one,

notably, of t r a n s i t i o n .

The strength

of t h e i r convic

t ions

in this

respect

is

made

emphatically clear by

Gumbril

s

chee r f u1

stu

bb

0

r ne s

s

i n

per sis

t i n g

t hat the

w

0

r d

d

rea

ms

is inadmissable

(p.48).

Indeed,

Gumbril

is able to

point

out

that this term s only significance now l i e s in i t s

Freudian

connotations

while

Mr.

Mercaptan

can

erudi tely

place


35/127

6

i t i n

the

age

of Rostand Cp.48).

But

exactly why

dream

is

inadmissable

in

1922

is

not

so

clear ly

evident .

A

tentat ive explanation exists in

Mr.

Mercaptan s

remark tha t i t s a matter of

l i te rary

tact

(p.48).

Super-

f ic ia l ly

this comment

refers to the

blatantly

romantic

nature

of

Lypia t t s poetry. However

the notion of l i te rary tact

carr ies more profound implications of tone and context.

Considered

in

this

l igh t ,

the

references

to

Freud

and

Rostand

take on his tor ica l and cul tu ra l s igni fic ance . In an

age

in

which

dreams signify sublimated sexual impulses, the lyr ical

associa t ions attached to dream

by a previous

era

must

ine-

vitably be seen i ronical ly . Thus, the very premise

of

The

Conquistador ,

in t r ins ic poetic

merit

aside ,

is

rendered

invalid

by

the

context

in

which

the

poem

has

been set :

the

preoccupation

with

an

Absolute

impl ic i t ly

understood

to exis t

the inf in i te

nothing

T.E. Hulme cal ls i t

l

is vi t ia ted

for the

m

0 r e s

cep

t ic

a 1

de rn

sen sib

i

l i t y, by i ts

b

rea

d

th o

f

vision.

Hence

the

wry

commentary which accompanies

Lypia t t s

reci ta t ion:

The Conquistador, Lypiatt had made i t

clear ,

was

the Art is t ,

and the Vale

of

Mexico on which he looked down

the

towered

ci t ies

of Tlacopan and Chalco,

of Tenochtitlan

and Izta-

palapan, symbolized well , i t was

d i f f i cu l t

to say

precisely what.

The

universe, perhaps?

(p.44).

Wonder

must cease

to be wonder,,;2 besides

indicating

tha t

the term inology

of romanticism

is

inimical

to

the

modern

age,

Hulme s s ta tement implies

tha t the kind of transcendent

vision behind a word l ike

wonder

or

dream

for

that


36/127

matter

is l ikewise unacceptable. Even

Lypiatt

seems

27

to

be

aware

of this

as he

ins is ts , l Oh, I

call

them dreams

I don t mind being thought a fool and old-fashioned

(p.46). To him the

reject ion of

the idealism advocated in

liThe Conquistador

indicates

s pir i tu al p ov er ty .

weak-

ness and pett iness and impotence

(p.46).

e maintains that

nothi

ng

decent

or sol

i d can be

achi

eved

i f

you don t even

bel

i eve i n dec en cy 0 r sol i d i t

(p.

48). A1 tho ugh his 0 wn

attempts in

this direct ion

are admitte dly i l l -conceived, he

has

accurately

described

the

v iew -poin t of

his

contemporaries.

For, the 0 b j ec t ion s r a i

sed

he use 0 f d

rea

m hav e t he i r

source

in

a s ceptic al m is tr us t

the idealism suggested by

that term. Much l a te r in the novel, during a confrontation

with

Lypiat t ,

Mr.

Mercaptan

will

complain:

I merely suggested that you protest too much.

You defeat your own ends; you lose emphasislby trying

to

be over-emphatic. All this

folie

grandeur,

all

this

hankering

af ter

t e r r ib i l ta

i t s

led

so

many

people astray. And, in any case, you

can t

rea l ly- -

expect

me to

find i t

very

sympathetic (p.198).

If the hankering

for

I size and vehemence and

spir i tual

signi-

ficance

(p.39)

sounds

ridiculous

in

Lyp ia t t s

mouth,

i t

is

reduced to

absolute

absurdity

in the

preciously

comic tones

of Mr. Mercaptan.

Indeed,

the

favorite theme

of

Mr. Mercaptanls precious

middle

art ic les

is the pet t iness , the simian l imi ta t ions ,

the insignificance and

the

absurd

pretentiousness

of o ~

soi-disant

Sapiens

(p.45).

This

character

models

himself

af ter

the

exquis i te c iv i l i t i es of eighteenth-century France,


37/127


38/127

29

What

do

these

characters opinions

indicate with

respect

to

the ir

conceptton

of

the

modern

age?

In The

Social

Context of Modern

English

Literature , Malcom Bradbury

observes

tha

t:

Through many of

the

accounts of

i t se l f

that , in

thought

and ar t ,

the

modern

age

has given, there has

run

a

strong sense

of

the uniqueness

of

modern

times.

Indeed

often in these accounts there is , whether expl ic i t ly or

i m p l i i t l ~

a basic assumption

that our

age

is not simply

an age of change or t ransi t ion, but, much more u l t i m t e l ~

an

age

of

cris ts

(p.14).

That

Gumbril and Mercaptan

should

ins is t that

the

ageless theme

of man s imaginative conquest of his world,

enunciated

in

The Con qui stad 0 r , i s

no lo

nger val i d in 1922 ce r t a i n1y a r

gues a strong

sense of the uniqueness of

modern times . The

age of Rostand has passed and

along

with i t

the

significance

of

words 1i

ke

dream

and

wonder .

The

new

age

is

the

epoch

of the

iconoclasts ,

Freud,

Darwin and Marx. Old

concepts

and

terms of

reference

are

merc il essly inter rogated

and rejected.

Hen ce Gumb r i 1 s t a il

0

r , Mr. B

0

jan

us, pre di c t s i i nen t rev

0

lution I t l l be Shibboleth a l l ove r again (p.33)

and Gumbril

Sr . s

model

of SLPaul s

cathedral fal ls from

a

table

and

l ies

on

the

f loor

in

disastrous

ruin

as though

shattered

by

some appalling cataclysm . The

old

archi tec t s

subsequent remark that

1

m

afraid

that dome will never be

quite

the same again

(p.29) carr ies overtones

of

i rrevocable

and

radical

t ransformation. I t is within this context of

cultural ferment that man has been defined

by

his

simian

l imitat ions , that the romantic associations of dream have

been undercut

by Freud s

starker , more reductive

concepts.


39/127

30

nd behind the

scepticism

and the

debunking

is Gumbril

J r .

exclamation,

After

youlve

accepted the

war,

swallowed

the

Russian famine . .

Dreams

(p.46). This

statement

at

once evinces the cynicism

of

the

age

and the traumatic histo-

r ical consc iousnes s out of which this cynicism has ar isen.

The dizzying heights from

which

Lypiatt 's

Conquistador

looks

down upon Land

of your

golden dream are

no

longer attainable

as

a

r e s u l t

of

h i s t o r y s

perfidy.

Of the

destruction

wreaked by the Great War the

speaker

of

Hugh l ~ y n Mauberly cries:

Daring

as never before,

wastage

as never before

Young blood and

high

blood

Fair cheeks, and fine bodies

Frankness as never before,

Disil lusion

as

never

told

in the

old days.3

Antic Hay provides brief glimpses of the war1s effects in the

form of legless

soldiers

grinding barrel organs

(p.68)

and

brass bands of unemployed ex-soldiers playing mournfully on

s t r e e t

corners (p.133).

In

Chapter

V Gumbril relates

to

Shearwater

his

eye-opening

encounters

with the bureaucrat ic

dehumanization

of the

war.

But

the

theme

of post-war

d i s i l l u -

sionment

in Antic Hay finds i t s most

v iv id expre ss ion

in the

figure of Myra Viveash. This character i s

as

Peter Bowering

aptly puts i t

the

s p i r i t

of

the

age ,4

and she embodies

mordantly the legacy of d is il lu sionmen t inhe ri ted

by the

post-war

generat ion.

The

land

of

the

golden

dream

which

Lypiatt 's

Conquis-

tador

triumphantly surveys has been

replaced for

Myra

Viveash


40/127

by steppes af ter steppes of

ennui,

hori zon af ter

hori

zon,

for

ever the

same

(p.157).

The

desolate

waste

into

v.Jhich

she

steps in

Chapter XIV

is

in

outward

appearance

a pleasant summer

day, but:

She remembered

suddenly

one shining day

l ike

this in

the

summer of 1917, when she had walked along this same

s t ree t

slowly,

l ike

th is on

the

sunny s ide, with Tony Lamb. All

that

day, that night, i t had been one long good-bye. He

was going back the next morning. Less than a week la te r

he

was dead (p.157).

In The Great War and Modern Memory Paul Fussell notes

that

the

summer preceding the outbreak of war has assumed the

status

of a permanent symbol for anything innocently but irrevocably

los t that i t

embodies the change

from fe l ic i ty to despair ,

from pastoral to anti-pastoral .5 For Myra Viveash that day

in 1917 has assumed

such

a s ignif icance. s this character

says

to

Gumbri1 concerning Lamb s

death,

He was kil led in

1917, jus t about this time of

the

year. I t seems a

long time

ago, don t you think? (p.164). This

statement

indicates

a

sh i f t

of perspective which has

transformed

summer usually

signifying youth and innocence, to a symbol of

death,

a fore

boding of

the

change

from pastoral to ant i -pas tora l . This

transformation

of

at t i tude serves to define the deeper signi-

ficance of

Antic Hay s outwardly idyl l ic spring

set t ing .

The

warm and airy and br i l l

ian

t c1i te t hat Eve 1yn aug h has

seen

as

establ ishing a

l ight pastoral tone

in

the

nove1

6

in

fact

const i tutes

an iro nic a llu sio n to

that

fateful summer

of 1917.

In

this

context, Land

of your

golden dream can

carry

only bi t te r associat ions .


41/127

Musing over the fate

of

the

dead

Tony Lamb Myra

Viveash

r e f l e c t s

Tony

they

had

ki l led , shot

him through

the head.

Even

the bright eyes

had

rot ted, l ike

any

other

car rio

n

(p. 1

).

The los s 0 f her 1a ve r i nform s

the

whole

being

of

this character

and

is behind

the

agonized smile

with which she

faces the

world.

Of the traumatic significance

that the war-dead

had

post-war

f ict ion in general, Martin

Green

writes:

There

was a concentration

of

feeling about and upon these

handsome young

men

in uniform who so often

don1t know

quite what they are doing or what is

happening

to them,

whose soul is in t h e i r Qink

cheeks

and ready smile and

puzzled stubborn frown.?

In Antic Hay the

dismay

and

bit terness

which has arisen from

a

sense

of

betrayal

of having been

duped

is

centred

around

the

uncomprehending nalvete

of

Tony Lamb. This

charac-

t e r s surname carr ies suggestions of innocence

and

s a c r i f i c e .

And in Myra

Viveash s mind, at l e a s t with his c lear

blue

eyes

and

the f a i r

bright hair (p.164) Tony Lamb was led to the

slaughter .

The

lamb-like

innocence associated with

this

figure has

engendered an intense bit terness with

regard

to

his ultimate fate: the moral dicta, promulgated in

the

years

preceding

1914 and

under

which Tony and

most

young

men of his

generation

fought,

can now be

viewed only

with scepticism.

Hence Pound s

ironic

treatment

of

the Horatian

l ine

in

Se1wy Mau be r 1

y:

0i e d some pro

pat r i a

/ non d u1ce I non le t

r l e ~ , 1 1 8

U

\

•

hymn

\ n i r

I n

\ \


42/127

opening

pages

33

Simple i t was, uplif t ing and manly p . l l )

belongs to

a

pre-war

age; in

i t s

present

context i t

is

defiantly

i ronic

and reflects

what

Cyril Connolly

cal ls the

d isbel ief in action and

in

the putting

of

moral slogans into

action

engendered by

the Great

War .9

Signif icantly,

the

thoughtless complacency behind

such

slogans finds i t s

incarnation

in an anonymous martial gentle-

man

(p.158)

who

appears

brief ly

in Chapter

XIV

Pigeon-breasted

and twirl ing

between

his finger and thumb the ends of a

white

mi.litary moustache ,

this

personage

over-hears Myra Viveash s

murmured avowal of

l o s t innocence, never again

(p.158). His

r ich,

port-winey, cigary

voice

(p.158)

echoes

the timbres of

nineteenth-century

cer t i tudes; his reaction to Myra s plight

demonstrates incomprehension

which seems

almost

culpable

in

i t s smugness:

Poor

thing, he

thought,

poor young thing.

Talking to

herself .

Must be off her head. Or perhaps she took

things.

That

was more

l ikely .

Most

of

them

did nowadays. Vicious

young

women Lesbians,

drug

fiends, nymphomaniacs, dipsos

thoroughly

vicious.

He

arrived

at his club

in

an excel lent

temper

(p.158).

In

the

context

of

Myra s sorrowful

reveries

this

old

p a t r i a r c h s

fleeting appearance

str ikes

a note of bit terness

with

regard

to the

i r responsible

s a c r i f i c e of young men l ike Tony Lamb The

intended pathos

of this

episode

is surely

derived

from what

S.

Fraser

character izes

as notions

about

youth and

the

old

men

t ho led

us into the

warl,,;lO

Sean

O Faolain

speaks,

in

such

a

connection,

of the

post-war

generat ion s

elegy

for


43/127

The Good Time Our Fathers Lost

Us .ll

Similar resentment

must

l ie behind the

unflat ter ing

depiction of the

loquacious

old

man,

encountered

on a t rain in Chapter XVII, who

bears

a str iking

resemblance

to Emperor Francis Joseph. In his

t i rade

against what he sees as the country s

decline,

this

character

protests that he is not interested in

causes

(pp.19l-192):

but

from the view-point

of

Myra. Viveash s gene-

ra t ion, he and his contemporaries have been respon sib le for

their present plight .

0 i s i l l us ion. . a s neve r .

told

in the old

days : Pound s

l ine evokes the bi t te r experience

separating

the pre- and

post-war

worlds

in

the modern

consciousness. Waugh recal ls

that

when

he

read

Antic

Ha1 at

the

age of twenty, he

found

Mrs.

Viveash

appallingly

mature .12

Indeed, for this

character

i t

was ten

centuries

ago

(p.175)

that Tony Lamb was ki l led.

Her name roughly, l iving ash epitomizes the emptiness

of her existence since the war. Mrs. Viveash s

sole

commerce

with

the world now is

carried

out from that death bed on which

her res t 1 e s s s p i r i t

for

eve

r n d we a r i 1y ex er

ted

i t s

e lf

(p. 66) .

nd behind the

weariness

of sp i r i t is the consc iousness o f

irrevocably los t

innocence.

The refr in

Never such

innocence

again,

that

Fussell sees as summing up the bi t te r kno\ Jledge

ga ined through the war

13

finds i t s way into Myra Viveash s

mourning for her dead

lover:

Never

again,

never again:

there

had been a time when she

could

make

herself

cry,

simply

by

saying those

two words

once

or

twice,

under

her

breath.

Never

again, never

again.


44/127

5

She

repeated

them,

soft ly

now But

she

fe l t no tears

behind her

eyes. Grief

doesn t ki l l

love

doesn t

ki l l ; but

time ki l l s

everything,

ki l l s

desire , kil ls

sorrow, kil ls

in the

end

the

mind

that feels them;

wrinkles

and softens the body while i t s t i l l l ives

rots i t

l ike

a medlar, kil ls i t

too

at l a s t Never

again,

never again.

Instead

of crying,

she

laughed,

laughed aloud

(pp.157-158).

The

bi t terness

which

has

dried

up

Mrs

Viveash s

eyes,

which has kil led her desire and sorrow, has

created

a

r i f t

between her

and

the

past.

Thus, in

Chapter

XXI she sardoni

ca lly refers Gumbril to a por t ra i t of herself :

Look at me,

she pointed

at

herself ,

an

d me again

She waved

her

hands

towards

the sizzling bri l l iance of

the

por t ra i t

Before

and af ter

Like

the advertise

ments, you know

Every

picture

te l l s

a

story (p.225).

As she complains, Nothing s the same now I feel i t never

will

be,

to which Gumbril adds,

Never

more

(p.164). His

statement, a few l ines la ter

liThe past is

abolished

(p.164) is true in that pris t ine innocence has been los t

forever;

but

the

consc iousness o f that

loss , the resentful

bi t terness

which has

accompanied the d is illu sionment, is s t i l l

very much part of

these

characters sens ib i l i t i e s

In the

face

of thei r pl ight . Emily s si tuat ion stands out in

sharp

re l ie f

as

the mock

case-history

imagined by Gumbril demonstra-

tes: Miss Emily

X born in

1901, was

found to

be

in

a state

of

perfect

innocence and ignorance at the time of the Armistice,

11th November 1918 (p.142). O stensibly , Gumbril is speaking

of Emily s virginal s ta te But

his

allusion to the

Armistice

is

as

pointed a reference to the War s

bi t ter

legacy as the

mention of the year 1922

in connection

with liThe Conquistador


45/127

36

Certainly neither Myra

Viveash

nor any

of

her contemporaries had

retained

thei r

innocence

by

the

time

of the

Armistice.

The

signif icance of the

chasm

separating these

characters

from

pre-war innocence involves

a

radical devaluation of the

past conventions and bel iefs . Mrs. Viveash s murmured never

again,

never

again expresses a sense of

irreparable

damage

which Gumbril Sr. has unconsciously noted

as

he views his shat-

tered

model

of

St. Pau l s .

s

a

character

named Lucy

Tanta-

mount says in

Point

Counter Point, I came out

of

the

chrysalis

during

the

War when the

bottom

had been knocked out

of every-

thing. I don t

see how our

grandchildren

could

possibly knock

i t

out

more

thoroughly

than i t was

knocked

out then

.14

In a previously cited

statement

to his

father ,

Huxley identif ied

the

war s

vi ol en t d is rupti on

of almost

a ll

the

standards,

con-

ventions and values current in the

previous

epoch as the basic

. f t ·H 15

premlse

0

ay. Thus,

the novel s

openi ng pages fi nd

Theodore

Gumbril

scornfully dismissing

the

portentous

boomings

of

Mr. Pelvey in the midst

of

English Gothic all blue and

jaundiced and

bloody

with nineteenth-century glass (p.?) and

indulging

in

frivolous

musings

in the face

of

a

Crucifix

in

the grand manner of eighteen hundred and sixty (p.10).

Standing in front

of

a

spread brass

eagle

the Reverend

Pelvey

can

speak

of God s

existence

with an

enviable cer tainty

p.? .

Ensconced in the trappings

of

nineteenth century complacency,

he evinces the smugness of

the

martial gentleman

of

Chapter

XIV

nd

Gumbril,

wondering

i f

this

old

pedagogue,

foghorning

away


46/127


47/127

38

excruciation;

but

he

loved

her

all

the more

because of the

torment

and

because

of the odious

truth., ,16

With

her

dead

white

skin, s c a r l e t mouth and

shiny,

metal-black

hair ,17

Lucy

is

a rather

s i n i s t e r speciman of

modern womanhood;

she

typif ies a

new kind

of creatu re who, as

she

herself points

out,

has

emerged

from

the chrysalis of the war.

Anti

c

Hay s

action

takes place the

Great r has been over for

five

years.

But

the

mood

of

pessimism

born

of the

war

generates,

in the

person

of

Myra

Viveash,

a

negative ambiance

which

pulls at

the

seams of the novel s f ict ional world.

For,

most

of Antic Hal s

male cha ra cte rs a re ,

or

have been

at

one

time,

involved

with this lady. Hence George Woodcock characterizes

Myra

Viveash as

a

Circe figure

18

and Peter Bowering

sees

9

her

as a femme

fatal ell .)

The

pull

whi ch

she

exerts

is

deri

ved

from

the weary

languor of a voice always on

the

antic hay a study in post war disillusionment

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