A Reader's Companion
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John Cowper Powys: Autobiography A Reader’s Companion W. J. Keith with substantial assistance from Jacqueline Peltier October 2008 “Reader’s Companions” by Prof. W.J. Keith to other Powys works are available at: https://www.powys-society.org/Articles.html John Cowper Powys: Autobiography, A Reader’s Companion W. J. Keith December 2005 University College, University of Toronto, Toronto, M5S 3H7, Canada. Preface The aim of this list is to provide background information that will enrich a reading of Powys’s remarkable autobiography. It glosses biblical, literary, and other allusions, identifies quotations, explains historical and geographical references, and offers any commentary that may throw light on the more complex aspects of the text. Page-references are to the Macdonald / Colgate University Press edition published in England in 1967 and in the United States in 1968, which follows the pagination of the first English edition. (Unlike the first edition, this one has the benefit of an index, which is highly desirable, though it is important to realize that it is decidedly spotty.) References to JCP’s other works are to the first editions, with the following exceptions: Wolf Solent (London: Macdonald, 1961), Weymouth Sands (London: Macdonald, 1963), Maiden Castle (ed. Ian Hughes. Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 1990), Psychoanalysis and Morality (London: Village Press, 1975), The Owl, the Duck and—Miss Rowe! Miss Rowe! (London: Village Press, 1975), and A Philosophy of Solitude, in which the first English edition is used. Details of all other books and articles quoted (and details of JCP’s posthumously published writings) will be found in the concluding “Works Cited.” When any quotation is involved, the passage is listed under the first word even if it is “a” or “the.” Biblical quotations are from the King James (Authorized) Version. Because Autobiography ranges widely over England, Europe, and the United States, large numbers of people and places are encountered briefly. Comprehensive coverage would lead to massive annotation, which is not practicable. Often enough, in any case, few factual details about many of these people are readily accessible. I relay any information that has come to my attention, but have not gone to Herculean lengths to track down obscure facts not likely to add much to our understanding of the text. Where individuals are passed over in silence here, I have nothing to add to what JCP provides. By the same token, I omit glosses on places that can be discovered readily enough in an atlas, unless other relevant information deserves to be included. I usually give page-references only to the first appearance of a word or phrase, unless other references seem significant. However, the occurrences of all artistic and literary references are indicated. I would like to acknowledge special thanks to Jacqueline Peltier, who also helped so valiantly to make my previous “Companions,” to A Glastonbury Romance and Porius, available on web-sites and in booklet-form, and has been invaluable in improving this one. Thanks also to Lihua Gui for technical assistance. Any corrections or additions will be welcomed. W.J.K. 4 Autobiography “acquiring merit” (431) — A standard religious A term. Pilgrims acquire merit by going on “a deep and liquid rest, forgetful of all ill” (372) — pilgrimages. In the East, people still acquire merit From Shelley’s “Adonais” (l.63), also quoted in by giving alms to priests. Rodmoor (456), A Glastonbury Romance (300), In Acreman House (98) — The “new” residence for Defence of Sensuality (159), Mortal Strife (58), Sherborne Preparatory School in 1885, still in use, Elusive America (43, 141), and Diary 1929 (117). west of the town centre. “A fine, clean, upstanding youth” (516) —ad infinitum and ad nauseam (443) — “Endlessly” Perhaps a parody of A.E. Housman (“What, still and “to a disgusting extent” (Latin). alone at twenty-two / A clean, upstanding chap like you?”), written by Hugh Kingsmill Addisonian Spectators (118) — The famous (1889–1949). periodical, The Spectator, first appeared in 1711. It was written primarily by Joseph Addison “a glimmering square” (369) — The” casement (1672–1719) and Richard Steele (1672–1729) and slowly grows a glimmering square” from was most famous, perhaps, for the character of Tennyson’s lyric “Tears, Idle Tears” (l.14), Sir Roger de Coverley. See “Spectator” for originally a song from The Princess (IV, l.34). subsequent references. “a good man and one who did good things” Aegripan (261) — Presumably indicating a Bacchic (648) — Inaccurate version of the final line offollower, the word does not occur in the standard Thomas Hardy’s The Woodlanders, spoken by English or Classical dictionaries. Marty (sic) South. Aeschylus (9) — Greek tragic dramatist of the “a great mystery” (39) — Possibly an echo ofsixth century BC, best known for his surviving Ephesians 5:32. trilogy, the Oresteia. à outrance (175) — Translated (from the French) African negroes (455) — This is an early in the text. manifestation of JCP’s belief, prominent in Porius “A parrot to an eagle came ...” (313) — From “The and discussed in Obstinate Cymric (8–9), that the Parrot and the Eagle” (Poems [55]). Welsh were non-Aryan descendants of “a savour of poisonous brass and metal sick” (470; inhabitants from Atlantis originating (like the cf. 380) — From Keats’sHyperion (I 189), also Druids) in North Africa. quoted in After My Fashion (178) and “after the Great Companions” (542) — From Psychoanalysis and Morality (15). Whitman’s “Song of the Open Road” (12., l.1), ... a story, that is to say, the struggle of a soul ... also quoted in The Pleasures of Literature (441), (46) — Jeremy Hooker John( Cowper Powys [6]) where the phrase is interpreted as “the souls of notes that this is an accurate account of all the dead.” Autobiography itself. Agag (401) — The King of the Amalekites spared “a stream of tendency” (295) — See “stream of by Saul but slain by Samuel; see 1 Samuel 15. For tendency.” “deliberately,” see v.32, also quoted in Owen Glendower (327). “A woman’s face ... treasure” (347) — From Shakespeare’s Sonnet 20, ll.1–2, 13–14. Agape (339–40) — Christian love as discussed by St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 13 (“the famous list of Abraham (469) — The Hebrew patriarch who led attributes”). In the King James (Authorized) his people out of Ur of the Chaldees to the “Holy Version of the Bible (“our proper old version”) it Land.” See Genesis 12. is translated as “charity,” though later translations abysm of time (291) — From Shakespeare’sThe tend to substitute “love.” For JCP’s further Tempest (I ii 50), also quoted in Morwyn (200), discussions of agape, see The Pleasures of Suspended Judgments (56), The Complex Vision Literature (216, 219, 232–3), Dostoievsky (156–8), (38), In Defence of Sensuality (22, 59), The Art of and Letters to Miller (39–40). Growing Old (109); cf. The Meaning of Culture Agawamuk (135) — A river close to JCP’s home, (29), Obstinate Cymric (162). Phudd Bottom, in Hillsdale, New York State. “accept” the cosmos (374) — One of Walt“age cannot wither him nor custom stale” Whitman’s basic attitudes; see Song of Myself 23 (261) — Adapted from Shakespeare’s Antony and (l.7). Also alluded to in In Defence of Sensuality Cleopatra (II ii 241), also quoted in the 1955 (126). introduction to A Glastonbury Romance. Cf. Achilles (106) — The leading Greek warrior inWood and Stone (21). Homer’s Iliad, known for his speed and energy aged relative (18, 42) — JCP’s paternal on the battlefield. See also “Podas okus” and grandmother, Amelia (Emily) Powys (1830–1902). “Zanthus and Balius.” So, “Achillean” (153). The phrase is apparently used to avoid revealing her as a woman, following the original principle A Reader’s Companion 5 of Autobiography—but the later pronoun (18) sense of “demon” in his Letters (64). reveals it. Alice (24, 25; cf. 268, 354) — Alice’s Adventures in “Agrippa. Cos. Fecit” (402) — Somewhat obscure, Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking but probably meaning “Agrippa, while consul, Glass (1872) by Lewis Carroll, pseudonym of made [this].” Charles Dodgson (1832–98). Ailinon! (128) — A favourite exclamation of JCP’s, “alive-o” (239) — Presumably from the traditional meaning “Alas!” (Greek), from Aeschylus’s song “In Dublin’s Fair City,” also quoted in Agamemnon. See also Wolf Solent (176), The Ducdame (435), Wolf Solent (589, 596), and Letters Pleasures of Literature (154), and frequently in the to Ross (7), where it is glossed as one of diaries. Llewelyn’s phrases. Ainsworth, Harrison (125) — English writer of“all life is war” (624) — From Heraclitus but not historical romances (1805–82), including The identified. A similar Heraclitean statement is Tower of London (1840) and The Lancashire quoted by Rabelais (Author’s Prologue to Book 3). Witches (1848). Herne the Hunter is a character “all the same for that” (138, 239, 388, 534) — From appearing in Windsor Castle (1843). the close of Book 19 of Homer’s Iliad. One of Ajax (571) — A Greek hero in the Trojan War, JCP’s favourite quotations, found in Weymouth considered second only to Achilles. For the Sands (303; cf. 418), Porius (729), The Brazen Head exchange of gifts with Hector after their (330), Up and Out (122), In Spite Of (162, 242), indecisive fight, see Homer’s Iliad (Book 7). Homer and the Aether (52, 238), Jack and Frances Aladdin’s Cave (547) — From the story inThe (II 185), and Powys to Sea-Eagle (226). In Letters to Arabian Nights Entertainments. Ross (18), JCP notes that the book later published as Mortal Strife was inspired by this phrase. alarums and excursions (104) — Standard stage- directions in Shakespearean battle-scenes. “alla kai empes” (388) — The Greek original of Referred to extensively in JCPs’s novels (e.g., Wolf “all the same for that,” also quoted in Porius (729), Solent [259]), and in In Spite Of (194), “Thomas Up and Out (122), In Spite Of (15, 35, 266), and Hardy and His Times” (129), etc.