A Tale of Two Anthonys

Posted on July 15, 2018 by Jeffrey Manley

The current issue of the London Review of Books has an essay by Prof Perry Anderson on Anthony Powell.  This considers the recent biography of Powell by Hilary Spurling and morphs into a longer critical consideration of Powell’s works. It is Part 1 of what will be a two-part essay. Anderson notes at the beginning that Spurling’s supposedly official biography of Powell is considerably shorter than Martin Stannard’s work on Waugh as well as some of Spurling’s own biographies of other subjects; he also wonders about:

her relationship with the subject, a close friend whom for many years she knew and admired – Christopher Sykes on Waugh is the nearest parallel? In such cases, affection can shape the compass of a biography, personal knowledge lighting up but also limiting what can be said. Perhaps there are traces of that here; but, on the whole, in the warmth and grace of Spurling’s account there is a natural tact but little sign of inhibition. … Aesthetically speaking, at all events, the economy of her study is not out of keeping with its subject: Powell, a disciplined writer with a laconic streak of his own, would have appreciated it.

In the end, Anderson thinks Spurling gets it just about right. After an extended comparison of Powell’s Dance to the Music of Time with Marcel Proust’s Search for Lost Time, Anderson compares Powell’s works with those of his English-language conetmporaries. This includes a comparison of Powell’s prewar novels with those of Evelyn Waugh:

The verdicts of Koyama Taichi, in The Novels of Anthony Powell: A Critical Study (2006), comparing them with Waugh’s output in the same [prewar] period, are brisk. Similarities abound – Decline and Fall: Afternoon Men (’the merry-go-round of manners’); Black Mischief: Venusberg (‘topsy-turvy in a foreign land’); Vile Bodies: Agents and Patients (‘satire of the fast set’); A Handful of Dust: From a View to a Death (‘the country house is falling down’); Scoop: What’s Become of Waring? (‘the dinginess of hacks’) – but Powell lacks the gusto of Waugh’s ‘wild, grotesque flights of the imagination’, his energy-saving variants yielding no more than a ‘light, prosperous disdain for the sordid affairs of the world’. That could be thought too harsh. But Koyama is perfectly correct in pointing out the most striking feature of the early novels. They contain, virtually without exception, only flat characters.

In an article in the Jesuit magazine America, the religious position of novelist Anthony Burgess is reconsidered by Christopher Sandford. The article provides this comparison with the approaches to religion of Burgess and Waugh :

Although [Burgess] proudly identified himself as an “unbeliever” from the age of 16, he continually returned to spiritual themes, whether in his novels, his poems or his screenwriting of the acclaimed 1977 miniseries “Jesus of Nazareth.” Burgess told me in 1987 that this aspect of his life was “an endlessly scratched itch.” Not that he ever for a moment identified with other prominent Roman Catholic authors of his generation (again shunning the lure of the club), telling The Paris Review in 1973 that he felt himself to be “quite alone…the novels I’ve written are really medieval Catholic in their thinking, and people don’t want that today.” Unlike him, Burgess continued, even the greatest of English Catholic writers “tend to be bemused by the Church’s glamour, and even look for more glamour than is actually there—like [Evelyn] Waugh, dreaming of an old English Catholic aristocracy, or [Graham] Greene, fascinated by sin in a very cold-blooded way…. I try to forget that Greene is a Catholic when I read him. Crouchback’s Catholicism weakens [Waugh’s] Sword of Honour in the sense that it sentimentalises the book. We need something that lies beneath religion.”

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Waugh and Brexit (more)

Posted on July 14, 2018 by Jeffrey Manley

Waugh gets several mentions in the weeklies in connection with the Brexit debate. Two of these relate to Tory politician Jacob Rees-Mogg, a leading proponent of Brexit. These are based on Dominic Green’s interview of Rees-Mogg for The Weekly Standard on which he also comments in The Spectator. In The Weekly Standard, Green reports:

There is much of P.G. Wodehouse in Rees-Mogg. When he canvassed door to door in his first, unsuccessful attempt to win a seat in parliament, nanny came too. When the papers reported that he was driving around in a Bentley, he objected that it was only a Mercedes. A contemporary of Rees-Mogg’s at Eton recalls how the pupils wagged him by humming the national anthem during class, so that young Jacob would jump out of his seat and stand to attention. But there is more of the serious comedy of Evelyn Waugh. Rees-Mogg’s anachronistic, almost theatrical overdressing; his posh, staunch, and fecund Catholicism, and his conviction that the old days and old ways were better all recall later Waugh. His constituency, North East Somerset, is in Waugh country.

He may mean that last phrase literally since the family of Arthur Waugh lived in Midsomer Norton (which is, indeed, in Rees-Mogg’s constituency), and Evelyn visited his aunts there many times as a child. In summarizing the interview for The Spectator, Green closes with this:

As I leave, I ask Rees-Mogg, a Catholic MP for a Somerset constituency, to name his favorite Evelyn Waugh novel. ‘Scoop,’ he says. ‘It’s such fun.’

American conservative journalist Roger Kimball, whose day job is publisher of The New Criterion magazine, also reports in The Spectator on Brexit in connection with this week’s visit of Donald Trump to Britain. He thinks Trump sees Brexit as a matter of sovereignity and closes his article with this quote from Evelyn Waugh:

The beautiful people who titter over the Baby Blimp and denounce President Trump’s policy of “America First” might take a page from Evelyn Waugh. “I believe in nationality,” he wrote in 1938 [sic], “not in terms of race or of divine commissions for world conquest, but simply this: mankind inevitably organises itself into communities according to it geographical distribution; these communities by sharing a common history common characteristics and inspire a local loyalty; the individual family develops most happily and fully when it accepts these limits. I do not think that British prosperity must necessarily be inimical to anyone else, but if, on occasions, it is, I want Britain to prosper and not her rivals.”

The quote is from Waugh’s book Robbery Under Law (1939) pp. 20-21 (Penguin, 2011 ed.).

UPDATE: Quote is from book published in 1939. Text is changed accordingly.

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Waugh: Letter and Portrait

Posted on July 13, 2018 by Jeffrey Manley

A letter from Evelyn Waugh to Hugh Heckstall-Smith was auctioned earlier this week. A copy is still posted on the internet. The year is missing from the date but it is sent from Combe Florey so would have been sent in the last decade of Waugh’s life. Here’s the excerpt:

ALS signed “E. Waugh,” one page, 6 x 8, Combe Florey House letterhead, September 11. Letter to Hugh Heckstall-Smith. In part: “Yes Spencer was my informant…His suicide, I now remember, was autumn 1941 at Hayling Island. I knew him only as a Marine but saw quite a lot of him. He was a keen officer but full of frustrated ambitions (I thought). As far as I know he was in no disciplinary trouble & his death came as a surprise to all in the Corps. I suspected him of Communist sympathies, perhaps quite wrongly.” Continuing, Waugh refers to J. F. Roxburgh, adding: “Did J. F. not appoint his own Masters? At Lancing they were chosen from the most suitable of the assistant Masters. J. F. never had any sexual or romantic interest in me…Looking back I see J. F. as a show-man in the best sense. Great style, but a dangerous model for the young. I hear his trusty tones in many voices.” In fine condition, with a few rusty staple holes to the upper left corner.

“Spencer” refers to a Capt Spencer mentioned by Waugh in letters to his wife. He was serving with Waugh in the Marines. Letters dated 22 January 1940 and [October] 1941. His suicide was reported in the latter (Letters, p. 156). Of what he was Waugh’s “informant” is unclear. J F Roxburgh taught at Lancing College. Hugh Heckstall-Smith was a school teacher and taught for a time at Gordonstoun. He is probably the author of A Doubtful School Master (1962). The British Library holdings of Waugh’s archives show a fairly active correspondence for a two-year period:

ff. 20-42v Evelyn Arthur St John Waugh, novelist: Hugh Heckstall-Smith: Letters to Evelyn Arthur St John Waugh from Hugh Heckstall-Smith: 1962-1964.

That would be 22 pages of incoming correspondence. If any of our readers has a copy of his book or knows more about Heckstall-Smith or the aforesaid correspondence, comments are invited below.

The Salisbury Museum is holding an exhibit of the paintings of Henry Lamb. This includes Lamb’s portrait of Waugh which was the cover illustration for Evelyn Waugh and His World. Here’s a description from the Persephone Post:

Henry Lamb’s famous portrait of Evelyn Waugh is in the Salisbury Museum exhibition. It’s 1930, Waugh was 27, and the painting is rather poignant because Waugh became such a grumpy old man, here all is before him.

The exhibit continues through September after which a smilar exhibit will be mounted in the Poole Museum. Details here.

UPDATE: According to BL files, the correspondence with Heckstall-Smith began in 1962, the year his book was published. The above text has been modified accordingly.

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Vile Parties

Posted on July 11, 2018 by Jeffrey Manley

The website Londonist has published an artcle on “6 Debauched Parties We Wish We’d Been Invited To”. These are all from the Bright Young People days that were described in Waugh’s novel Vile Bodies. There is one which involved Waugh directly:

4. The Bruno Hat exhibition party (23rd July 1929, Buckingham Street)

A mysterious art exhibition in July 1929 brought guests ranging from Lytton Strachey to Winston Churchill to a house in Buckingham Street, where the work of emerging artist Bruno Hat was celebrated at a cocktail party. Evelyn Waugh had written the catalogue for the exhibition and many guests spoke admiringly of the work on display. However, the next day revealed the truth: ‘Bruno Hat’ was a hoax dreamed up by Brian Howard, an ambitious member of the Bright Young Things who longed to throw his own legendary party. Waugh, Strachey and a number of other people were well aware of the charade. The event was described by the Daily Express as an “amazing hoax on art experts”, with the ‘artist’ at the party actually being Tom Mitford in disguise. We’ll level with you — we think some of the hoax art’s pretty good.

The story includes an interesting set of photos from The Graphic which illustrate some of the paintings as well as Mr Hat himself. Among others included in the Londonist’s selection are a Circus Party and Bath and Bottle Party. Both of these are among those listed by Waugh in the well known party paragraph of his novel which was published in January 1930 (CWEW, v2, p. 82).

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Unsung Waughs

Posted on July 10, 2018 by Jeffrey Manley

A posting by Ralph Berry on the weblog of the “paleoconservative” journal Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture cites one of Waugh’s least read novels:

I was lately in Exeter, hoping to see something of the Islamic Centre at the University. As it was a Sunday when I visited, I thought they might have been open for business. But the doors were locked and no access was possible. I did however read a massive plaque outside, which read in its entirety:

THIS BUILDING OWES EVERYTHING TO THE VISION AND GENEROSITY OF HIS HIGHNESS SHAIKH SULTAN BIN MOHAMMED AL-QASIMI  PhD (EXON) THE RULER OF SHARJAH 3 JULY 2001

I was put in mind of Evelyn Waugh’s Black Mischief, which opens with the Emperor Seth, ruler of Azania, and his titles. They include “TERROR OF THE SEAS” and “BACHELOR OF ARTS, OXFORD UNIVERSITY.” The ruler of Sharjah follows in the same tradition. But Evelyn Waugh is not mocked. There has never been a film or TV drama of Black Mischief, unlike Waugh’s other major novels. I expect the authorities found the title too incendiary.

Another neglected Waugh novel comes up in another post. This is by Sara Haslam, editor of the Complete Works of Evelyn Waugh edition of Helena. Waugh thought it his best novel and was probably the one to which he devoted the most time relative to its size. Dr Haslam, who is a Senior Lecturer of English Literature at the Open University, recently conducted some research on her edition in the Waugh Archives of the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas. She reports the results of her visit on the website of the University of Leicester. Here’s an excerpt:

Searches of the [A.D.] Peters papers turned up many useful documents and letters; for example, Waugh’s ‘Notes on Translating Helena’ that was thought lost. Waugh’s instructions for translators were on two sides of the same notepaper used and bound to make the Helena MS. One reason they may have been thought lost is that they seem to have been mis-filed. … Finally, on those kinds of discoveries that justify archive-fever, the collection holds an advance proof copy of Helena, which I hadn’t been able to tell from the catalogue. It’s this proof (and probably this copy of this proof) that Waugh (or someone) copied and then stuck into the back of the AMS for him to annotate, creating UK1’s version of the final lines of the novel.

I returned to the UK with a clearer and near-final version of the MDATV [Manuscript Development and Textual Variants], as well as many pointers for the Introduction. Taking images of covers was the one thing I struggled with. The lights in the HRC have, apparently, foxed many folk trying to do the same thing.

Finally, the death of a somewhat neglected actor is in the news. This is Tab Hunter whose death at the age of 86 was announced earlier this month. According to his obituary in the Guardian, his film career peaked in the 1950s when he played clean cut “beefcake” roles in several popular films. He was already past his peak when he appeared briefly as a guide at Whispering Glades in the 1965 film of The Loved One. He was one of several actors who landed cameo roles in that film. Others included Milton Berle, Liberace, and James Coburn. Although the Guardian describes something of a comeback linked to the John Waters’ film Polyester in 1981, he never returned to the level of popularity he achieved at the beginning of his career.

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Fence Mending at Castle Howard

Posted on July 9, 2018 by Jeffrey Manley

The Daily Telegraph reports that the family feud previousy noted at Castle Howard, the setting for both of the film adaptations of Brideshead Revisited, may be on the mend:

Simon Howard’s wife says despite being forced to move out of the iconic building, which was made famous by the TV adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s novel Brideshead Revisited, her husband still keeps in contact with Nicholas. “My husband has shown such grace and dignity – too much in my opinion – and still speaks to his brother,” Rebecca Howard told the Mail on Sunday’s You Magazine…Nicholas Howard, who is married to former HarperCollins boss Victoria Barnsley, made his younger brother step down from his roles as chief executive and chairman of the company that runs Castle Howard. The full details of how and why the eviction was orchestrated have never been revealed.

The family are reported to have been fully supportive of both film adaptations according to the film makers. Brideshead still features in the Castle Howard promotional efforts.

Meanwhile, another Waugh novel has been implicated in a first novel by Pakistani writer Nadia Akbar. Her novel entitled Goodbye Freddie Mercury concerns today’s Pakistani party goers. As she explains in an interview with a subcontinental website Scroll.in:

Q. I was intrigued by your author photo, which partially hides your face with a copy of Evelyn Waugh’s Vile Bodies. Is there a story behind that?

A. Vile Bodies parallels our worlds in a strange way. I feel linked to Waugh in both subject and background in some ways – social class, his chosen literary subjects, social critique. Perhaps the style of the novel is also remotely connected. I love the idea of voices being shared in threads, the balance of truth and reality tipping and regaining balance. That is partly why I chose first person voices. I also love the irony of the photo. Are we vile or are we beautiful?

 

 

 

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Waugh and Religious Satire

Posted on July 8, 2018 by Jeffrey Manley

Prof Terry Lindvall of Virginia Wesleyan University has written a book entitled God Mocks: A History of Religious Satire from the Hebrew Prophets to Stephen Colbert. In his broad survey, he gives some time to a brief consideration of the satire of Evelyn Waugh. To begin with, however, he discusses in his Introduction the difference between the religious satire, which is his subject, and social satire. Waugh, along with many other of the book’s subjects, wrote both:

Secular satirists take on the corrupt state and the mores of the people. Religious satirists focus on the people of God, their own community of faith, and its hypocritical leaders…The umbrella of satire employed in this book distills two recurring characteristics. First, as satire is used to attack, it aims not just to slice and dice but to correct and reform…Second, satire employs wit and humor; it entertains. It is not always funny but it appeals to a recognition of the ridiculous.

As his title suggests, Prof Lindvall ranges back to the prophets of the Bible,  passing through several historic phases of satire such as Classical, Medieval, Reformation and Augustan. When he gets up to modern times, he considers satirists in Britain separately from those in America and on the Continent and then takes on the present day. In his lengthy Chapter 9 “Brtish Catholics and Curmudgeons” he considers British satirists from John Dryden and Alexander Pope to C S Lewis and Malcolm Muggeridge. Within that chapter there are separate sections devoted to, for example, “Satirist Named Smith” (this is Sydney Smith who was vicar at the Anglican church in Combe Florey in the early years of the 19th century), “Victorian Wit” (Oscar Wilde), “ChesterBelloc” (they need no introduction), and finally “Hard Knox” (i.e., Ronald). It is in this last section that Waugh gets a look in. The section begins with a discussion of Knox’s writings on satire as well as his satirical writings in his books Essays in Satire and Let Dons Delight.

This brings the story to Evelyn Waugh, Knox’s literary executor and biographer. According to Prof Lindvall, Waugh

would revolt against modernity in all its plastic and superficial postures of progress…he rebelled against the modern wasteland. He rejected behaviors of the hollow men and women as inadequate, pompous and, to use one of hs favorite words, “bogus.”

As examples of Waugh’s use of satire in a religious context, Prof Lindvall cites the faux religious characters in Vile Bodies, Fr Rothschild and Mrs Melrose Ape. This was written before Waugh’s conversion to Roman Catholicsm. Afterwards he wrote Brideshead Revisited where his use of satire is exemplified by Rex Mottram’s conversion of convenience, which quotes at length Rex’s clueless conversation with the priest who is providing his instruction. Prof Lindvall also discusses Waugh’s use of the device from Chesterton of “the twitch upon the thread” which is applied to the characters in Brideshead. Some consideration of Waugh’s later satire in Love Among the Ruins might also have been useful.

The book concludes with a consideration of the latter day satirists on TV such as Monty Python, The Onion and Stephen Colbert, where religious themes were also brought within the scope of their comedy.

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Weekend Roundup: From Germany to Mayfair

Posted on July 7, 2018 by Jeffrey Manley

Waugh’s 1931 travel book Remote People is receivng more attention in Germany. This may be due to the issuance of a new edition of the full German translation that was originally published in 2007. In a Deutchlandfunk radio broadcast (or possibly podcast) dated 18 June 2018, the commenatator (Pieke Biermann) concludes a discussion of the book (for which a transcript has been posted) with this:

“Remote People” (In German, “Befremdliche Völker, seltsame Sitten“) is wonderful prose, as clear as it is atmospherically dense, as knowledgeable as it is thoughtful, and brilliantly translated by Matthias Fienbork. A highly political book, in defiance of all the good intentions of the author, who states soberly …. :

“I set off without any definite opinion on British colonial policy, nor did I intend to form an opinion, but the problems were so persistent that I had no choice but to deal with them.”

… In German, except for a 1949 collection, nothing of Waugh’s travel prose has yet been published. The Other Library has dug up a gem after 66 years…

Another German review of the same book by Vera Reusch has also been posted on another Deutschlandfunk website. On a German bookblog (Frau Lehmann liest), the blogger read the same book and, after a summary of the narrative, concluded:

In Karl May’s travelogues, as a teenager, I always skimmed through the endless landscape descriptions and went from adventure to adventure, even then with a big smile at the everlasting heroism of [Karl May characters] Old Shatterhand or Kara ben Nemsi. It would be horrible to think that these novels would have existed only from landscape descriptions! Waugh, however, would not be Waugh, if not from time to time brilliant tips would stand out from the rather boring sentence pulp, such as his small climb in Aden. All in all, though, I would advise you to take a closer look at his social studies and leave the adventures to Mr. May. He was sitting at a desk while Waugh was actually out and about.

The same bookblog also has a review of the new paperback edition of the German translations of Waugh’s short stories, Ausflug ins wirkliche Leben (Trip to Real Life):

Fifteen cold-sparkling diamonds, well-formed and usually provided with a rather black-humored punch line, will be found by the reader in this booklet. Most written in the thirties, almost [between] the author’s weddings. [There’s one] about an unusual honeymoon, others about the world of the movie, about the occasional strange behavior of the British upper classes, about the dangers of excessive author worship and so on. Of course, some such stories please one more than others, at least in my case, but all in all I can say that this selection gives a very good idea of ​​Evelyn Waugh’s style and preferred subject matter, and the level is consistently high. Personally, I am very pleased that the Diogenes Verlag is so lovingly dedicated to this author, who unfortunately is not well known in Germany. Lately, quite a few beautifully designed Waugh volumes have come out, which I wish [will have] many enthusiastic readers…

The translations ot the book reviews are by Google with some editing. Both of these translations were recently discussed in previous posts.

The Spectator is celebrating its 190th anniversary, and in its current issue, it recounts some of its achievements. Among these is this patagraph summarizing its coverage of literature:

The Spectator also made its name as an infamously stern critic of the arts: its independence of political party was matched by a disdain for pushy publishers. While George Eliot, Thomas Hardy, Rudyard Kipling and Joseph Conrad were hailed as heroes, the writings of Bulwer-Lytton were ‘baby-fancy’, Tennyson’s ‘namby-pamby’, Dickens’s ‘vulgar and detestable’ and Emily Brontë’s ‘too coarse’. To Charlotte Brontë, a bad review in The Spectator was all the worse because of its influence. ‘Most future notices will in all likelihood have a reflection of The Spectator in them,’ she wrote, after one gentle trashing. But ‘if Jane Eyre has any solid worth in it, it ought to weather a gust of unfavourable wind’. Undaunted, however, many a literary lion has joined The Spectator pride – John Buchan (assistant editor), Graham Greene (film critic and literary editor), John Betjeman and Lionel Shriver (columnists). Among the infinite list of occasional literary contributors stand T.E. Lawrence, Aldous Huxley, H.G. Wells, T.S. Eliot, Evelyn Waugh and Ian Fleming.

The Wall Street Journal has a story about the successful makeover of the Mayfair bookstore Heywood Hill. Evelyn Waugh was a patron as well as a supplier of product, especially during Nancy Mitford’s wartime tenure in the sales department. It also helped that the store was adjacent to his barber. The makeover was undertaken at the direction of Peregrine Cavendish, 12th Duke of Devonshire, after he inherited some shares. During the previous management, profitability had been allowed to slide, but now, the WSJ reports:

This year, the now-profitable landmark store on Curzon Street in London’s upscale Mayfair neighborhood, is expected to generate in excess of £2 million ($2.64 million) in revenue, up from £540,000 in 2011, says Nicky Dunne, chairman and the duke’s son-in-law…The secret sauce is its highly personalized subscription service based on interviews with its customers, either in person, online or via telephone. At a time when discounted books are as close as one’s cellphone or tablet, the Duke of Devonshire says the shop’s ability to predict what customers will want to read next based on past reading experiences is a crucial difference maker. Heywood Hill gets its share of casual walk-in customers, but more than half its revenue comes from assembling libraries for people or institutions. The rest comes from consumers in the U.K. and abroad willing to pay a bit more in exchange for books tailored to match their tastes. It’s a bit like having a favorite college English professor whispering in your ear, making recommendations.

Among the reportedly popular items in these subscription orders are the books of Evelyn Waugh and Nancy Mitford.

A Mayfair art gallery (Michael Werner, 22 Upper Brook St, W1) has announced an exhibit it calls “Vile Bodies”. According to this report in Time Out, however, the art on view seems to have little if any connection to Waugh’s novel:

‘Vile Bodies’ is best known as the title of Evelyn Waugh’s interwar novel about flapper era Londoners drinking their days, nights and fortunes away. But don’t expect to see any pictures of flamboyant 20s debutants at this exhibition. Bringing together paintings, sculptures and works on paper by 24 different artists, the show shines a light on how the human form (in all its wobbly, bumpy glory) has been recreated in art.

 

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Waugh and Modernism: Picasso

Posted on July 6, 2018 by Jeffrey Manley

Duncan McLaren has now added the second part of his posting relating to Waugh and Modernism. The first was posted several days ago and related to Waugh and Gertrude Stein. The new one deals with Waugh and Pablo Picasso. This is more of a challenge since Waugh for a period closed his letters with the catch phrase: “Death to Picasso !”

McLaren starts his essay with a discussion of Waugh’s visit to the 1945 exhibition of Picasso’s works at the V&A museum. He has found a catalogue of the exhibit and tracked down copies of several of the paintings exhibited. These were all from Picasso’s own collection and were painted during the war years–so this was something like an update of his career. To start his discussion, McLaren posts one of the paintings on show and then imagines how Waugh might have reacted to it. He then goes on to the next, and so on. It’s a bit like attending the exhibit with Waugh as your guide. In the second part he goes through Waugh’s several letters to his friends discussing his reaction to the exhibit. It should surprise no one that these are mostly negative. Among the letters included are those to Diana Cooper, Nancy Mitford, Robin Campbell, Penelope Betjeman, and Mary Lygon. The essay concludes:

So far in this piece I’ve managed to use over half of the 25 paintings that Waugh would have seen in the Picasso show at the V&A at the end of 1945. Let me finish with an extract from Brideshead Revisited, and with two pictures I’ve already reproduced above.

As I implied earlier, [one of the portraits] puts me in mind of Teresa, Evelyn and Laura’s seemingly prim daughter, who was destined for a career in the church as far as her facetious father was concerned. As seemed Cordelia Flyte in Brideshead. At one point, Cordelia earnestly consults Charles Ryder about something:

“Charles,” said Cordelia, “Modern Art is all bosh, isn’t it?”

“Great bosh.”

“Oh, I’m so glad. I had an argument with one of our nuns and she said we shouldn’t try and criticise what we didn’t understand. Now I shall tell her I have had it straight from a real artist, and snubs to her.”

UPDATE (7 July 2018):I am pleased to report that this is not Duncan McLaren’s last posting on Waugh and Modernsm. He is already working on an additional entry on Picasso which will involve another exhibition Waugh visited.

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Exploding Scotland

Posted on July 5, 2018 by Jeffrey Manley

In a post on the website Catholicism.org, Dr Robert Hickson offers another in his series of annotated Evelyn Waugh passages. In this case he posts a copy of Waugh’s 1942 letter to his wife about the demolition of Lord Glasgow’s tree by Waugh’s Commando unit. See previous posts. The letter contains Dr Hickson’s bracketed explanations and highlighted passages to help Americans and those lacking military experience to understand the humor. Unfortunately, in this case this information rather spoils the humor by interfering with the flow of Waugh’s text. The information might better have been put in footnotes and the textual emphasis dispensed with to allow the text to speak for itself.

Dr Hickson goes to some length to explain the background of several people mentioned in the letter but offers no hint of the identity of “Miss Cowles”, mentioned at the beginning of the letter. This is probably Virginia Cowles [1910-1983] cited a few pages earlier and identified by the editor as “American journalist, married Aidan Crawley in 1945.” Letters, p. 154, n.9. She met Waugh again a few years later on his trips to the USA, but what she may have been doing in Scotland in 1942 remains a mystery. She was probably on assignment as a war correspondent (for which she received an OBE after the war). Why she should want to be “Colonel in chief of the commando” must have been a private joke between her and Waugh.

Another Scottish explosion during WWII and mentioned by Waugh goes unmentioned by Dr Hickson. This occurs in Officers and Gentlemen and is from a passage that is noted in another context in yesterday’s post. That story may even have been loosely inspired by Lord Glasgow’s desire to have his tree demolished. When Guy and Tommy Blackhouse visit the Laird of Mugg (referred to in the novel as “Mugg”) upon their arrival on the island, he repeatedly seeks their help in providing to him some explosives from their military stores. He needs these to carry out a project he has planned to remove some large rocks that are blocking the beach adjacent to a hotel on his property. This passage actually rivals in its humor the letter cited by Dr Hickson.

The theme of Mugg’s interest in explosives continues through to the end of the “Happy Warriors” section.  Guy is sent on another visit to Mugg, who reiterates his abiding interest in exlosives as a means of improving his property and points out the beach that is covered with granite boulders, apparently the result of an earlier demolition effort gone wrong. The Army does not comply with Mugg’s request for more explosives. When they embark for the Middle East, however, they must leave some of their sappers’ supplies behind. These are temporarily unguarded while a group of the sappers (also left behind) are off on a useless excercise. Before the remaining sappers return, “Mugg crept out to pilfer [their] stores” (O&G, Penguin, 1977, p. 105). In the original novel, that is where the story of the Laird and the explosives ends. But in compiling the one-volume recension of Sword of Honour, and apparently for avoidance of doubt, Waugh added this line: “The great explosion which killed Mugg and his niece was attributed to enemy action” (SoH, Penguin, 2001, p, 313).

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