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The Gissing Newsletter THE GISSING NEWSLETTER “More than most men am I dependent on sympathy to bring out the best that is in me.” – George Gissing’s Commonplace Book. ********************************** Volume IX, Number 2 April, 1973 ********************************** -- 1 -- The Hero as Politician Stanley P. Kurman [The present contribution is ch. V of Mr. Kurman’s dissertation, “George Gissing’s Heroes,” submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts at New York University in 1953.] Although he never personally involved himself in politics after his abortive youthful dabblings in socialism, George Gissing retained throughout his life a keen interest in the political forces of English society and in legislative reform movements. While this interest is subordinated in most of his novels to relatively narrow personal themes, it would be wrong to overlook the social criticism *************************************************** Editorial Board Pierre Coustillas, Editor, University of Lille Shigeru Koike, Tokyo Metropolitan University Jacob Korg, University of Washington, Seattle Editorial correspondence should be sent to the editor: 10, rue Gay-Lussac, 59110-La Madeleine, France, and all other correspondence to: C. C. KOHLER, 141 High Street, Dorking, Surrey, England. Subscriptions Private Subscribers: £1.00 per annum Libraries: £1.50 per annum *************************************************** -- 2 -- and commentary which Gissing injected into so much of his fiction. Through Golding, Kirkwood and Waymark, for example, Gissing expressed his anger with a society which permitted the existence of poverty in the midst of plenty. He went further by involving Egremont in a plan which had as its goal the intellectual and cultural awakening of the working class. He used Otway to express extended arguments for pacifism and bitter polemics against imperialism. It is fully logical, therefore, that at least a portion of Gissing’s fiction should use the political scene as a backdrop to plot developments. Considering the preoccupation of the author with such problems as financial security, marital happiness and artistic recognition, it is just as logical that only three of his protagonists are intimately concerned with politics. Another factor that perhaps accounts for this limited attention devoted to political matters was the conviction Gissing held that the people most concerned with legislative reform were fundamentally incapable of acting wisely. It can be inferred from such a conviction that political activity among the lower classes is futile: You have read about the critical state of the German Crown Prince. What a noteworthy fact that, just because he happens to be a man of common sense who would govern reasonably, all Europe is in tremors lest he should die! It shows how rare such a man is among governors; it shows too what unspeakable fools are the masses of mankind, who confess that they cannot do other than be led into quagmires by any ruler who happens to find a pleasure in seeing them there. (Letters to His Family, p. 200) With a social philosophy that combined a strong sense of the need for social reform with deprecation of the political wisdom of the common people, Gissing resolved the problem by advocating through Wilfrid Athel and Denzil Quarrier that men of wealth and intellect serve as legislators to help those who cannot and will not help themselves. His third politically oriented protagonist, Dyce Lashmar, was intended as a satirical warning against the intellectual impostors who substitute superficial gloss and an eclectic smattering of education for sincerity, profound social understanding and integrity. -- 3 -- Wilfrid Athel, hero of A Life’s Morning, is the perfect example of the kind of training and background which Gissing felt was essential to the able liberal legislator. A man who has never experienced “one day of grave suffering” (New York, n.d., p. 211) in his life, Athel is a man of leisure who feels an acute need for social activity. Concerned primarily and at great length with the romance between Emily Hood and Athel, A Life’s Morning does not examine extensively the development of the hero as a politician. We find him installed as a member of Parliament before we are well aware that he has decided on a political career. What we do see of his motives, however, is revealing: One part of his nature revelled in the joy of this foretaste of distinction; he had looked forward to it, had laboured for it, its sweetness was beyond all telling. Triumph had been his aim as a schoolboy; he held it fitting that as a man he should become prominent amongst his fellows. This of politics was the easiest way. To be sure, he told himself that it was a way he would once have sneered at, that it was to rub shoulders with men altogether his inferiors in culture, that, had he held to the ideals of his youth, a longer, a wearier course would have been his, and the chance of a simpler, nobler crown. (p. 274). Conservative in taste and inclination, Athel is liberal in his political views, though he finds it difficult to ally himself with any disciplined group: “To be sure, if names could be taken as sufficient, he was a Liberal, a Radical; but how different his interpretation of such titles from that they bore to men of affairs! Respect for the masses he had none; interest in their affairs he had none either. On the other hand, the tone of uninstructed Conservatism … he altogether despised.” (p. 280). In sharp contrast to Ryecroft and Rolfe, Athel is curious about every phase of human society and is deeply desirous of expressing himself in a socially creative way. There is no phase of knowledge that he scorns or holds in low regard: “My despair is the universality of my interests... My subject is the history of humanity; I would know everything that man has done or thought or felt.” (p. 14) -- 4 -- His liberalism is demonstrated forcefully when he pierces the rigid class barriers of nineteenth-century England to become engaged to Emily Hood, a simple working-class girl cast out of the mould from which Emma Vine and Jane Snowdon were fashioned. Having seen her lover stand firm against the snobbish opposition of his family, Emily nonetheless feels that she must break the engagement after her father commits suicide following his exposure as a thief. Partly out of embarrassment and partly out of pride, Emily cannot bring herself to explain the situation to Athel, whom she dismisses summarily. After a trip to the Continent, Athel returns to England, where he makes a successful bid for Parliament after a group of Liberals convince him that men of his progressive stamp are needed to represent the best interests of the nation. He is about to marry a woman of his own class when he is suddenly re-united with Emily. According to Morley Roberts, the contrived romantic ending of the novel was forced on Gissing by his publisher. Certainly, the contrivance of having Athel marry Emily does not emerge out of the plot in a manner that satisfies the reader. If Gissing did bow to popular taste in refurbishing A Life’s Morning from tragedy into romance, it was unquestionably a rare instance of departure from realism. The kind of grim tragedy he developed in Denzil Quarrier is more in keeping with the way Gissing looked at life. Quarrier is another man of leisure of superior capability who weathers great personal adversity in fashioning a successful political career. At the beginning of the novel, Quarrier is living an empty existence very similar to that of Harvey Rolfe. A graduate attorney who has never practised law, Quarrier is living on the proceeds of a comfortable legacy and is occupied with no problems more serious than those growing out of his desultory research on the life and customs of the Vikings. He is living with a woman who has long been separated from her husband. Rigid divorce laws prevent her from obtaining the freedom to marry Quarrier, who, in the deepest spirit of ethics, is her husband in every sense of the word except the legal. -- 5 -- When approached to stand for Parliament, Quarrier is unable to refuse an opportunity to put his energy and talents into the attractive channel of politics, although he realizes that his mode of living with this “wife” Lillian would, if exposed, cause damaging scandal. Although she has deep misgivings about the venture, Lillian does not communicate her deep sense of impending danger to his political career and to their lives because she realizes that his ambitions have been given new tone and perspective by the thrill of political combat. Once Quarrier becomes involved in his election campaign, Lillian assumes secondary importance to a sense of dedication. His love for her is still vivid and intense, but now it is surpassed by his desire to enter Parliament. Seeking election as a Liberal, his creed is actually non-partisan: What sensible man swears by a party? There’s more foolery than enough on both sides ... but as for the broad principles concerned, why, Radicalism of course means justice. I put it in this way: If I were a poor devil, half-starved and overworked, I should be a savage Radical; so I’ll go in for helping the poor devils. (New York, 1892, p. 29) Quarrier stresses the need for providing basic economic security for working people: Every man is justified in claiming food and shelter and repose. As things are, many thousands of people in every English county either lack these necessaries altogether, or get them only in return for the accursed badge of pauperdom ... I sympathize with the men who think that nothing can go right until the fundamental injustice is done away with.
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