Open Research Online The Open University’s repository of research publications and other research outputs The achievement of Ford Madox Ford as editor Thesis How to cite: Tomlinson, Nora (1996). The achievement of Ford Madox Ford as editor. PhD thesis The Open University. For guidance on citations see FAQs. c 1996 The Author Version: Version of Record Link(s) to article on publisher’s website: http://dx.doi.org/doi:10.21954/ou.ro.00004a5e Copyright and Moral Rights for the articles on this site are retained by the individual authors and/or other copyright owners. For more information on Open Research Online’s data policy on reuse of materials please consult the policies page. oro.open.ac.uk Nora Tomlinson, BA Hons., MA. The Achievement of Ford Madox Ford as Editor A,thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Literature discipline of the Faculty of Arts of the Open University. 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ABSTRACT The Achievement of Ford Madox Fond as Editor This thesis challenges the conventional opinion that Ford Madox Ford was a great editor. ~ It establishes criteria by which an editor can be judged; these are the literary and cultural opinions on which a review operates, an awareness of the needs of readers of a review as revealed in its style and content, and the way in which a review is managed. These criteria are applied to three different, though overlapping fields of enquiry. Firstly, the thesis examines how far Ford’s editorial practice was consistent with his own literary and critical principles as expressed through a long and varied writing career. Secondly, it places the two reviews edited by Ford in the context of the society which produced them, English Review in London between 1908 and 1910, and The Transatlantic Review in Paris in 1924, and compares these two reviews with a wide range of contemporary cultural journals on the basis of the three criteria outlined above. Finally the study compares Ford’s achievement as editor of The English Review and The Transatlantic Review. It concludes that while Ford was a good editor in some respects, he was not the great editor which is so often claimed for him. .. 11 Acknowledgements My grateful thanks to my two supervisors, Dr. Robert Green and Professor Graham Martin, for their rigorous criticism combined with constant kindliness and support. Thanks also to Dr. Max Saunders for his generosity in sharing his knowledge of Ford with me. My greatest thanks go to my husband, whose encouragement has meant more to me than I can adequately express, and whose help with word processing has been invaluable. ... 111 The Achievement of Ford Madox F01d as Editor Contents Introduction 1 Chapter 1 Ford Madox Ford: Literary and Critical Principles 8 Chapter 2 The Background to The English Review 28 Chapter 3 Late Victorian and Edwardian Cultural Journals 42 Chapter 4 The Career of The English Review 72 Chapter 5 The Failure of The English Review 86 Chapter 6 . The English Review Editorial Policy 102 Chapter 7 The Literary Contents of The English Review 116 Chapter 8 The Paris Scene in the 1920s 140 Chapter 9 Cultural Journals of the Post War Period 151 Chapter 10 The Career and Failure of The Transatlantic Review 183 Chapter 11 The Transatlantic Review Editorial Policy 21 1 Chapter 12 The Cultural Contents of The Transatlantic Review 227 Conclusion 247 Bibliography 25 1 1v ~~ Introduction Many criticisms are voiced aboui Ford Madox Ford as a writer; he rambled, he exaggerated or was economical with the truth and the quality of his work was inconsistent. Everyone, however, seems agreed on one thing, namely that he was a great editor. Many of his contemporaries, including those who were associated with him as he edited his two reviews, believed this. Douglas Goldring, who was Ford's assistant editor on The English Review referred to his "genius as an editor - no other word than genius is adequate, for there has been nothing like it before or since, in England or, so far as I am aware, in any other country"' while Nathan AscR, who wrote for Ford on The Transatlantic Review claimed that "he was a great editor, the greatest I have ever known."2 When Ford was forced to give up the editorship of The English Review, Arnold Bennett wrote of his achievement; "In fifteen months Mr. Hueffer managed to publish more genuine literature than was ever, I think, got into fifteen numbers of a monthly review bef~re."~Wyndham Lewis, who didn't care for Ford personally, acknowledged that Ford "was probably as good an editor as could be found for an English literary review. He had by birth artistic associations and could write himself better than most editor^."^ Even those who had fallen out with Ford, such as Violet Hunt, who felt that Ford had betrayed her, believed that he was "the greatest editor, qua editor, that has ever been."5 Several obituaries refer to his genius as an editor. Pound, for example, acknowledging his ' Douglas Goldring, South Lodge (London;1943), p.54. Cited in Bernard Poli, Ford Madox Ford and The Transatlantic Review (Syracuse: 1967), p.141. Arnold Bennett, The New Age, Jan.27, 1910, 305. Wyndham Lewis, Rude Assignment (London: 1928), p122. Violet Hunt, The Flurried Years (London: 1926), p.45 1 own debt as a writer to Ford, added that "he founded the greatest Little Review or pre- Little Review of our time."' Graham Greene's tribute called him "the best literary editor England has ever had."2 All Ford's biographers - Frank McShane, Alan Judd, Arthur Mizener, the most grudging, and Max Saunders, the latest - declare this genius. In the years since his death, despite reservations and debates about his status as a writer, scholars seem to have had no difficulty in accepting and admiring his editorial skills. In one of the earliest studies of The English Review, Malcolm Bradbury wrote that Ford's achievement lay in "taking literature seriously when no one else really did ... Certainly he should serve as a model for editors of literary periodical^."^ More than a decade later, Edward Krickel's assertion that "by now, Ford's editorial brilliance is acknowledged without a cavil"4 is representative of critical opinion of Ford's achievement as an editor. In view of this uniform volume of praise, it is perhaps surprising that so little work has been devoted to scrutinising Ford as an editor. There are two full length studies, both by American scholars, one on each revied, but there has been no overall assessment of his achievement as an editor based on a detailed scrutiny of both the reviews which Ford edited. The present study began as such a comparative venture, intending to compare his editorial achievement in The English Review with that in The Transatlantic Review, but it quickly became apparent that most commentators on Ford's editorial achievement, including Ruedy and Poli, valued it largely for his discovery of new writers who later 1 Ezra Pound, 'Ford Madox Ford: Obit', Nineteenth Centurv and After, cxxvi, Aug. 1939, 180. 2 Graham Greene, 'Ford Madox Ford', The Spectator, cxliii, July 7, 1939, 11 3 Malcolm Bradbury, 'The English Review', The London Magazine,. v., Aug. 1958, 46. 4 Edward Krickel, 'Lord Plushbottom in the Service of the Kingdom: Ford as Editor', in The Presence of Ford Madox Ford, ed. Sondra J. Stang (Philadelphia:1981), p.107. 5 Ralph Hermann Ruedy, Ford Madox Ford and the English Review, (unpublished doctoral dissertation, Duke University,l976) and Poli, Ford Madox Ford and the Transatlantic Review. 2 became part of the literary canon. None of them actually spelled out criteria for assessing editorial achievement, and there was little attempt to compare what Ford was doing in his two reviews with what was being achieved in other contemporary cultural journals.