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FICTION/67 esting stage direction-clearly re- cussion of his major films on God, ration of love for life." And, par- flected in the film itself. As the death, mortality, and the human ticularly since it doesn't make me bishop's pathetic, bedridden aunt condition. When he left God for laugh much, and is filled with such lifts her hand with great effort and Freud and psychology it did not preachy and mawkish speeches, I lays it on the hot paraffin lamp, an seem relevant. But now that he has am inclined to think that this is action which leads to her horrible changed sides and gone over to what Bergman feels the film really death, Bergman writes as follows: "love," hedonism, and all that, and is. Which compels me, for my part, There is no counsel for the de- decided there is a real enemy again to state that I do not for one sec- fense, who, orally or in writing, (curiously enough, the same God- ond believe in this joyful, loving has a mind to plead Elsa Bergius's ridden people he once professed to Ekdahl family. I do not believe cause. She is repulsive, she is rot- admire), I find myself thinking Uncle Gustav Adolf's wife is de- ting, a parasite, a monster. Her again of the freely confessed polit- lightfully amused at his persistent part will soon be played out. She ical enthusiasms of Bergman's adultery. I don't believe the lame is a loaf that hasn't risen in the youth. There were at that time servant-mistress is generously em- world's batch and it is no use many young men in Germany who braced by the family. I don't believe wasting pity on such an utter thought "parasites" and "failures" Helena Ekdahl's late husband be- failure. were totally unworthy of human came lifelong friends with her Jew- So amid all the loving, and car- pity, and these young men wore ish lover. I don't believe in the ing, and joyful hedonism, a poor death's heads on their caps and Jewish lover. I want to know what invalid burns to death. But we marched to the orders of Heinrich he ate at Christmas. I don't believe must '"waste no pity" on such a Himmler. Think on't. one word of this "love" glup that repulsive creature because she hasn't runs from one end of the film to risen in the world's batch, because AN intelligent critic, David Brud- the other. When Ingmar Bergman her part is played out, because she noy, has made a respectable case talked to me of God and death I is a failure. that Fanny and Alexander is a respected him despite his past Now the reader will have noticed comedy. And I certainly agree with political sympathies. But now that that, having mentioned Bergman's him to the extent that if you are he's prattling on about love, and youthful fascination with Hitler's to enjoy the film at all you must gentle smiles, and fruit trees in Germany at the beginning of this find it comic. But Bergman himself bloom, I think something in him essay, I dropped it during my dis- tells us that the movie is a "decla- has snapped. Fiction Cozzens Repossessed Joseph Epstein I N WHAT century did he live?" tory of modern American literary Various are the reasons a novelist asked the graduate student reputations, James Gould Cozzens's can fall out of fashion and favor. in literature to whom I mentioned has provided one of the fastest dis- First among them is that he was that I had been reading the novels appearing acts of the past fifty overrated in the first place, and of James Gould Cozzens. "In what years. In a few decades Cozzens has that the natural readjustment of century do you?" I was tempted gone from a Book-of-the-Month initial enthusiasm has a dampen- to reply, but I didn't. I didn't, be- Club main selection and Time cov- ing, even deadly, effect. Then again cause to do so, along with being er subject to the misty never-never it may be that his work speaks mean-spirited, would also have land-never in print, never taught only to the time in which he wrote been unfair. After all, in the his- in universities-of such faded liter- it-such, for example, seems to me ary figures as James Branch Cabell, the case with Sinclair Lewis. Or Zona Gale, and Joseph Herges- our author may write altogether JOSEPH EPSTEIN, the editor of the Amer- too plainly, providing few of those ican Scholar, is COMMENTARY'S regular heimer. It has happened before, fiction critic. A new book of his essays, but never, I think, quite so quickly enticing difficulties in interpreta- The Middle of My Tether, will be as in the case of James Gould tion and opportunities for class- published later this year by Norton. Cozzens. room demonstration that seem to 68/COMMENTARY SEPTEMBER 1983 set flowing the salivary glands of book entitled Just Representations: The second reason an exemplary certain academics. Or he may have A James Gould Cozzens Reader, biography was required, at least if no powerful champions among the but his biography is no more likely it were to succeed in helping to re- critical establishment. Or, as with to alter Cozzens's reputation than suscitate Cozzens's reputation, is the later John Dos Passos, his pol- his anthology did. Although often that Cozzens himself presents an itics may go against the grain of just in its judgments, and sympa- enormous biographical problem. his age. Or, for a combination of thetic to its subject, Bruccoli's book This is that he apparently was not the above reasons (excluding the sorely wants artfulness. Jeffrey a lovely man. Certainly he offers a first), he may not capture the fancy Hart, reviewing it in the National distinct difficulty for the eulogist. of the intellectual class, which may Review, suggests that Bruccoli, be- Of the love of the laughter of chil- hold his very popularity against cause he combines criticism and dren, of ardor for good causes, of him; this for a great many years biography, resembles Samuel John- kindness toward contemporaries, to was a serious problem for Charles son; he does so, I fear, to the extent reverse the old eulogistic pattern, Dickens. The more one adduces that I resemble Magic Johnson. James Gould Cozzens showed none. reasons for the fall in literary repu- Bruccoli works all too quickly, is For a simple Cozzensian sentiment, tation, the more does it seem extra- too slapdash. In mid-career he has allow me to quote Professor Bruc- ordinary that any literary reputa- already written and edited more coli, who writes: "Dogs, he com- tations below that of Tolstoy en- than thirty books. Like that dopey mented, were a satisfactory sub- dure at all. joke about how do you feed a nine- stitute for children, providing am- But with James Gould Cozzens, hundred-pound gorilla, to which ple cause for worry without promis- even though a number of the rea- the answer is, very carefully, so to ing filial ingratitude." But such sons I have noted apply, the chief the question of how Professor Bruc- misanthropy, in Professor Bruc- cause of the fall of his literary rep- coli produces so many books, the coli's pages, isn't understood-it is utation can be found with real pre- answer is, not very carefully. Which merely reported. cision. Like an eclipse of the moon, is a roundabout way of saying that it can even be dated. It occurred James Gould Cozzens: A Life "I WOULD like to be able to boast in January 1958, when COMMEN- Apart is very far from being the that this biography is a labor of TARY published an essay by Dwight exemplary work of the literary bi- friendship," Bruccoli begins his bi- Macdonald entitled "By Cozzens ographer's art that was needed in ography. "But James Gould Coz- Possessed." To say that this essay this case. zens claimed he had no friends. I was an attack is not to begin to It was needed for two reasons. honored him, and he endured me." catch the flavor of it. It was a toast- First, Cozzens was a born writer His father died when he was six- ing, a roasting, a pasting, a lam- who published his first novel at teen, and the two great figures basting, a drawing and quartering the age of twenty and who, as is in Cozzens's life were his mother, -well, you have to imagine a death true of nearly all born writers, can who in a doting way was devoted to by broad-ax and tweezers. Not since hardly be said to have had a real him, and his wife, Bernice Baum- the St. Valentine's Day Massacre life away from his desk. To be sure, garten, an important literary agent has there been so efficient a piece of he had parents, went to schools,- with the firm of Brandt &cBrandt work. I for one was put off by it had love affairs, married, served in and the one critic whose advice he from reading Cozzens for a full the army; but his writing, and how valued. Otherwise he was by and quarter of a century. he came to write the books he did, large friendless, and only small ex- Since Dwight Macdonald's at- are the essential things.

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