~

11
Late at the British Library
Four specia l lat e eve nts ce lebrat ing th e op enin g of th e British
Libra ry's new ex hibition Brea ki ng th e Rul es: The Pri nte d Face
o f th e European Avan t Carde 1900 - 1937 (opens 9 Novemb er).
Enjoy live sonic a nd visual perf orm an ces, a lice nsed bar a nd a
uniqu e at mosphe re.
ILS
Telephone: 0207782 5000 Fax: 020 77824966 letters @the-tls.co.uk

Editor Peter Stothard (editor@ the- tls.co. uk)

Assistant to the Editor Maureen Alien (editor@the-tls.co.uk) 020 7782 4962
Deputy Editor Alan Jenkins (deputy@the-tls.co.uk)

Mary Beard Classics, Ancient History (mb I27@hermes.cam.ac.uk)

Michael Caines Bibli ograph y, Film, The atre, Referen ce (theatre@the-tls.co.uk)
J a mes Camphell American Literature, Scotland (scotus@the-tls.co.uk)
Luc y Dallas. Web site, In Brief (TLS_lnternet_Editor@newsint.co.uk)
Lindsay Duguid Fiction, English Literature (fiction@the-tls.co.uk)
Will E a ves Mu sic, Architecture, Art History (arts@the-tls.co.uk)
Dav id Horspool Histor y, South As ia, Sport (history@the-tls.co.uk)
Mick Imlah Poetry, Archae ology, Ireland , English Literatur e (mick.imlah@the-tls.co.uk)
Rohert Irwin Middl e East, Islam (alhambra2@gmail.com)
Alan Jenkins Co mmentary, English Literature (deputy@the-tls.co.uk)
Toby Lichtig Website, East As ia, English Literature (TLS_lnternet_Editor@newsint.co.uk)
David McKitterick Biblio graphy (dmckitterick@gmail.com)
Maren Meinhardt Science, Psychology, Medicine (maren. me inhard t@ the- tls.co. uk)
Redmond O'Hanlon Natural History (science@the-tls.co.uk)
Robert Potts Production , Australas ia (australasia @the-tls.co.uk)
John Ryle. Africa, Anthro pology (tls@ryle.net)
Rupert Shortt Religion , Latin America, Spain (rupert.shortt@the-tls.co.uk)
Martin Smith Pictur es (images@the-tls.co.uk)
Friday 9 November, 19.00 - 22.30
Peter Stothard Politics , Classics (editor@the-tls.co.uk)
THE FUTURE OF SOUND
(Performances start at 20.00) Ga len Strawson Philo soph y (tlsphilosophy@mac.com)
A sonic spectacular showcasing cutt ing edge artists in music and audio design , performing Adrian Tahourdin France, Italy, Lett ers to the Ed itor (adrian.tahourdin@the-tls.co.uk)
their innovations and discoveries in surround-sound in t he Entrance Hall of th e Library.
Anna Vaux. Biography, Soc ial Studies, Learned Journ als, Travel (anna.vaux@the-tls.co.uk)
Monday 12 November, 19.00 - 21.30 Elizaheth Winter Germa ny, Russia, Jewish Studies (elizabeth.winter@the-tls.co.uk)
'STRIKE' BY SERGEI EISENSTEIN WITH A NEW SCO RE BY EO HU GHE S
PERFOR MED BY THE NEW M USIC PLAYERS
(Screening starts at 20.00) Managlng Director James Muclvlanus (caro line.jo hnston@newsi nt.co. uk)
New Music Players perf orm British composer Ed Hughes' new score fo r Eisenst ein 's Disp lay Advertising Linsey Kenhard (Iinsey.kenhard@newsint.co.uk) 020 7782 4974
first silent feature film Strike (1925). Cla ssified Advertising Luc y Smart (Iucy.smart@newsint.co.uk) 020 7782 4975
Thursday 15 November19.00 - 22.30 Head of Marketing Jo Cogan (jo.coganO the-tls.co.uk]
WEIRD AND WONDERFUL EXPLORIN G AVA NT·G AR D E M USIC
PERFORMANCE PA ST A N D PRESENT
(Screening starts at 20.00) Correspondence and deliveries Time s House, I Pennin gton Street, Lond on E98 IBS
An evening of sound and visual experiments, by London Sinfon ietta musicians Subscriptions tls@subscription.co. uk 01858 438781; US/Ca nada custsvc _ times upl@f ulco inc.co m
and conte mporary electron ic artists. 1-800 370 9040 Suhscriher archive webmaster@the-t1s.co. uk
Commissioned by the British Library and Arrivals
Back issues 020 7740 0217 tls@ocsmedia.net
- celebrating the arrival of Eurostar to St Pancras.

Friday16 November, 18.30 - 22.30 guillotine . Patrice Higonnet

LOCOMOTION: ARTISTS' FILM AND THE RAILWAY
(Screening starts at 20.00)
An evening of Avant Garde fi lms and live performances of new and old
experimental works about the railway.
Commissioned by the British Library and Arrivals
- celebrating the arrival of Eurostar to St Pancras. C hainnan M ao cons ide red
that the first Emperor of
China had been too timid in
Price £5. These events are not seated.
Book Online www.bl.uk/breakingtherules T +44 (0)1937 546546 bu ryin g scholars alive - a
mere 460 of them compa red
to the 460,000 he had interr ed
hi mself. But in the bu ryin g of
Breaking the Rules pott ery scho lars for the after-
The Printed Face of th e European Avant Garde 1900 - 1937 life, alongs ide all the bett er
9 November - 30 March 2008 known wa rriors and mu si-
FREEEXHIBITION cian s on show in London thi s
Explore the creative revolution that took place in Europe at the beginning of the 20th sum me r, the first Emperor of
cent ury - encompassing visual art, design, photography, literature, t heatre, music and C hina reigned supreme .
architect ure. This exhibitio n includes a variety of artistic movement s - from Cubism to Acc ording to a new book
Surrealism, draw ing on th e Library's unrivalled collections and internatio nal loans. rev iewe d by our criti c John
Keay, a lesser-known fact
about thi s und erground terr a-
cott a court was that its mem-
ber s were dressed in bright est
hu es - including two tonnn es
of red cinnabar norm all y
rese rve d fo r the scho larly ink-
pen of the Empero r hi mself.
These days, a thinker who
offends th e imp eri al will of
Presid ent Putin can also find
Sy lvia, Lady Brooke, Ranee
ofSarawak,1930
him self buri ed away, deep in
Sib eri a, still alive but not too
easy to visit. lain Elliot
praises a new book by the
W ashin gton-based scho lar
Leon A ron, whic h dep lor es
the fat e of the di ssid ent
tycoon Mikhai l Khodor ko-
vs ky and points to oth er
mon archic al danger s ahea d.
A notabl e achieve men t of
the French Re volution was to
repla ce livin g buri al in the
kin g' s Ba stille with a quicker
departure und er the peopl e' s
reads a histo ry which gives a
more than usual em phas is
to the role of public debt in
thi s tran sform ation . In ea rly
twenti eth ce ntury Sarawak,
the natives chopp ed the head s
while the Eng lish Qu een ,
Syl via, was fixated on her
gin and crow n - as Lucy
Hughes-H allett find s out in an
imp erial biograph y of
"q uestionable ladi es and
ex treme ly rum chaps" .
T h is is the annual ed ition
of the TLS in w hich we look
at the lat est de velopments in
Learn ed Journals. T opics for
di scu ssion include Wom en' s
Studies in Tul sa, the theory
of Op er a in Oxford, old prob-
lem s in the life of Or John-
so n, a literary pap er on the
them e of sharing th e wo rld
with anima ls, and the compul-
sive beaut y of Baroque and
Ren aissanc e e mble ma tica,
the "speaking pictures" of
thei r age.
PS

TLS NOVE M BER 2 20 07


Bean counters
Vices of coffee trade and coffee hous e: exploiting the growers,
sleeping in Starbucks, quackery and gabbling
he film Black Gold beg ins with a
T horrible sound, a nasa l rasp like
pigs snor ting at a trou gh. This
sound is being made by a rare breed
of Ame rica n coffee taster s, slurp ing tiny
tastes of hun dred s of different espressos and
giving them very prec ise ratings - 89.51100,
for exa mp le. These experts, who are nerdish
and decadent all at once, are like the Rob ert
Parkers of coffee. They seem to labour under
the impression that their palates are brilli ant
co mp uters, capable of dis tinguis hing flavour
within a micropercentage. One of the tasters
stops slurp ing for a mo ment and turns to the
camera. "T here's one coffee here that is
pro bably the best coffee that I' ve ever tried .
Bea utiful!" Half way thro ugh the film, we
hea r a different so und . It is the anima l wa il of
a child in Sidamo, Ethiop ia. She has been
brought to a health clin ic to be treated for mal-
nouri shm ent. Her legs are like twigs. To her
mo ther's distress , the clini c refu ses her treat-
men t. Althou gh she is indeed malnouri shed,
there are others in a still worse state who
need more urgent care . This is a coffee-
growing region , and no one has enough to
eat, because the farmers ca nnot ge t anything
approach ing a dece nt price for their beans.
Th e con tras t is neith er clever nor ori gin al -
no Wes tern co nsumer can be en tirely igno-
ran t of the iniquities of the coffee trade - but
the fil m- makers, brot hers M arc and Nick
Francis, bring hom e the inj ustice of the en tire
economy of coffee with a forc e that makes it
seem fresh. There is none of the visual tricksi-
ness of Supersize M e , Mor ga n Spurlock 's
attac k on Mc Do nald 's, nor is it needed.
Thro ugho ut Black Gold, affl uent Wes tern
coffee drink ers are relentless ly ju xtaposed
with Afr ican coffee farmers, who rece ive less
than Ip of the nearl y £2 that is now the
standard price for a regul ar (ie, gigantic) cup
of coffee from the major chains in the United
Kingdom. We see a worker in New York idly
sipping a frappu ccino, which she will prob-
ably not manage to fini sh, so ove rsized is it;
and we see desperately poor African farmers
begging God to raise the coffee price. Beca use
of the collapse of the Interna tional Co ffee
Ag reement - which regulated prices until
1989 - coffee prices in Afri ca have reached
a thirt y-year low. Twen ty-two cents a kilo
is no w th e m ark et rate for unroas ted bean s.
"If we co uld get fift y-seven cen ts", says one
Ethiopian, "we co uld soa r far above the sky."
Yet it wo uld take twice that to pro vide a "good
life" for the far mers - which does not mean
a life with such luxuries as electricity, but
merely clean water, clean clothes and the
ability to send their children to schoo l.
Black Gold underl ines how particularly
gro tesq ue this poverty is, give n that coffee is
a more valuable co mmo dity than it has ever
been - both relative to other commodities
and in absolute term s. The esp resso revo lu-
tion of the twent ieth ce ntury turn ed coffee
SOCIAL STUDIES
B E E WILSO N
M ark m an E l lis, e di tor
E IGHTEENTH-CENTURY C O FFEE-
H OUSE CU L TURE
Four volumes, I,840pp. Pickering and Chatto.£350.
978 185 1968299
into a go urmet produ ct, which co uld co m-
mand high prices at the point of co nsumptio n.
Ernesto lil y, whose family firm dro ve the
post-wa r do mina nce of espresso over other
form s of coffee, is inter viewed in Black Gold,
talkin g about the pe rfec t es press o, made from
exac tly fif ty beans or seven grams of coffee:
" You have chocolate, yo u have flo wers, yo u
have hon ey, yo u have toast" . And yo u also
have big buck s.
Two billion cups of coffee are drun k
every day, glo bally. Co ffee is now the seco nd
mo st wide ly traded co mmo dity, after oil (the
or iginal black gold) . The total va lue of all
coffee traded last year has been estima ted at
$ 140 bill ion. The farmers harvesting their
-,
",1'/
25.10.07 Vatican City
Um be r to E co 's line that you ca n tell if
someone is mad "by the fact that sooner
or later h e brings up the T emplars" h as
h een giv e added weight hy Da Vinci
Code m ania. According to Dan Brown's
nov el, th e T emplars ' su pp r ession in
1308 wa s the result of connivance
b etw een th e Pope, Cleme nt V, and th e
King of France, Philip IV . Last week,
facsimiles of do cuments r elating to that
process, r ediscovere d in 2001 in the
Vatican Secret Archives, went on sh ow,
and on sal e. They contain the Chinon
parchment, a t r anscription of a secre t
trial of th e O rd er in whi ch a team of
papal inquisitors in fa ct a bsolved the
TL S NOVE M BER 2 2007
Mocha beans in Sidamo are sitting on a go ld
mine , but one whose va lue they are power-
less to rea lize .
The film lays much of the blame for thi s
with the New York Tra ding market, a
"destructive mec ha nism" for the coffee pro-
ducers, since the market price of coffee is
somet imes now set belo w the am ount it cost
to pro d uce . The wor ld eco nomy in coffee is
co ntrolled by four big multina tionals - Kraft,
Nes tle, Proc ter & Ga mble and Sara Lee -
who are largely able to determin e the price of
coffee to their own adva ntage . The farm ers -
most of who m have tin y famil y far ms -
ca nnot se ll dir ect to thi s ma rket, but mu st
go throu gh middl em en - ex porters who
themselves take another sizea ble chun k.
This is where Fairtrade com es in. By
payin g the farmer s a guara ntee d price set
above the flu ctu ating va lues of the inter-
nation al commodities exc hange, the Fa ir-
trade syste m ca n slow ly pump mo des t qu anti-
ties of mon ey back into the farmin g co mmuni-
ties, allow ing them to buil d such " luxuries"
as schoo ls, health cen tres and clean- water
knights, a ccepting their explanation
that rituals such as spitt ing on th e
C r oss were en acted as prepar ation for
potential capture hy Muslim en emi es
(th ou gh th e T emplar s had left Sy ri a
and Palestine in 1291) . The facsimiles
ca n onl y reinforce the impression that,
as repo rted in th e TL S in 2004, "the
T emplar s were destroyed not be cause
th ey held a ny special secrets or treasure
hut bec ause th ey were r ich , inflexible,
naiv ely led and vulnerable". A limited
ed ition of 799 copies is published hy the
Venetian press Scrinium, priced at
€5,990 (an 800th copy has been
re serv ed fo r th e curre nt Pope).
3
pipes. The hero of Black Gold is Ta desse
Meskela, an amiable ma n, the Ge nera l Man -
age r of the Oro mia Coffee Far me rs Coo pera-
tive Union. Meskel a' s job is to fly ro und the
wo rld sec uring bett er prices for the 74,000
Ethiopian farmers he rep resent s. No n-Fa ir-
trade coffee reaches the co nsume r after six
cha ins, eac h of which red uces the cha nces
of the farmer ge tti ng a reasonabl e price.
Work ing throu gh coo pera tives ca n red uce the
cha ins by 60 per cent.
For two-and- a-h alf years, the fil m-m akers
fo llowe d Meskel a on his journ eys. "Our hope
is that one day the consum ers will und erstand
what they are drinki ng" , he says, but not
much that he sees indi cates that they will.
We share Mes kela' s baffl em ent an d dis tress
at ho w hard it is to make Ethiopian coffee
pay, despit e the fact that Ethiopia is the birth-
place of coffee, and still regarded by go ur-
mets as producing some of the wo rld's best
beans. Meskela is show n in a branch of Wa it-
rose in Lon don , in the coffee aisle, star ing
mise rably at all the cho ice . Many of us have
stoo d in ju st such a pose, vacantly pon derin g
whic h of the ma ny pre ttily design ed packets
we will take home and decant into our cafet-
ieres. Meskela' s pro blem is different. He
observes the co nsume rs with their baskets,
and sees how few of them both er to bu y Fa ir-
trade coffee . Then he find s some Fa irtrade
coffee on the shelves - but it co mes from
Latin Ame rica , not Africa. Fina lly, he ru m-
mages, and finds a tin of Moch a Sida mo cof-
fee hidd en away where no one wo uld see it.
Man y of the farm ers he represen ts are
now swi tch ing from coffee cro ps to chat , a
narcotic plant which is banned in the United
States and muc h of Europe. Several bemu sed
Ethiop ian farmers are interv iewed abo ut it.
They don't like chat , they say. They know
that the peopl e who chew it are addicts . But
they need cas h, and chat pays far better than
coffee. Wh at ca n they do? The ec ono mics of
coffee simply make no sense for them. The
con cluding sec tion of the film shows footage
fro m the 2003 trade talks of the WT O in Can -
ciin, Mexico, which co llapsed, amid pro tes ts
fro m Thi rd World co un tries abo ut the refu sal
of the US and European Union to drop subs i-
dies for their own farmers, whe n Africa was
forced by the IMF to drop its own subsi dies .
In thi s contex t, it is virtually im possihl e for
Afr ican trad e to co mpe te. If Afr ica co uld
increase its share of world trade by ju st I per
cen t, it could generate $70 billi on - five
times mo re than the entire co ntinen t now
receives in aid. There are no signs ofthis hap-
penin g, however. The Ethio pian coffee farm-
ers co ntinue to go hun gry; and we continue to
line our bell ies with en dless milk y lattes. If
we should have a mome nt's worry about the
ethics of what we are drinking, we ca n
appease it wi th the bro mid es wh ich issue
fro m the Starbucks inform at ion machi ne.
Continued on page 4
4

Continued f rom page 3

SO CIAL ST UDI ES 3 Bee Wilson Markman Ellis, editor Eightee nth-Ce ntury Co ffee -House C ulture The perk y ma nage ress of the ori gin al Sea ttle
branch tell s the camera that coffee is not the
LETT ERS TO TH E ED ITOR 6 Japane se allies into enemies, Ma x Perutz, Th e Ar von Fo unda tion, etc main busin ess of Starbucks, anyway. "We' re
in the peopl e business, selling coffee" , she
LIT ERATUR E 7 Francis Robinson Zahir ai-Din Babur Journal of Emperor Babur excla ims, before goin g off to sell another
giant mu g of foam.
ART HISTORY 8 John K eay Jane Portal, editor Th e First Empero r - China's Terr acott a Army Th e makers of Black Gold see k to depict
John Man Th e Te rracotta Arm y the mindl ess coff ee-drinking of the We st as
Frances Wood Th e Fir st Empe ror of China a fundament all y anti-de mocratic activity.
Jonathan Fenby, editor Th e Seve nty Wond er s of China Th e twent y-fi rst-c entury coffee hou se has
Yi-Fu Tuan Co ming Hom e To C hina become the symbo l of selfish, so lips istic,
Victor H. Mair, translator The Art Of War blinkered consumerism . We are a lon g way
from the coffee culture of the eightee nth
POLITICS 10 lain Elliot Archie Brown Seven Years Th at Changed the World
century, which, we are suppose d to believe,
Leon Aron Ru ssia ' s Re volution - Essays 1989-2006
wa s a mod el for beni gn demo cratic activity.
HIS TORY 11 Patrice Higonnet Michael Sonenscher Before the Delu ge By 1750 , there were probabl y mor e than
Rosemary Ashton Peter Ackroyd Th ames - Sacr ed river 2,000 coffee hou ses in London, plac es where
men we nt to read newspapers, smoke
PO EMS 12 Bernard O'Donoghue Tinkers tob acc o, conduct bu siness, see friend s and
26 Glyn Maxwell The Tin sel M an drink a murky brown liquid which we nt
31 Carrie Etter Da vid Smith, "Wagon 11" (1964) under the nam e of coffee. Now that cultural
history of the eighteenth century is domi-
COMMENTAR Y 14 Dan Jacobson Bord er cro ssin gs - From eg otism to epic: How Wordsworth' s inspir ed nated by the influ enc e of Jur gen Hab ermas,
"breathings" cont ain the world that surrounds him the institution of the coffee hou se is generally
John Bowen Act s of translation - An Elle n Ternan discov er y treated as a prime exa mple of the "public
Hugo WilIiams Freela nce sphere" in acti on , wh at Hab erm as call ed "a
Then and Now TLS Jun e 16, 1950 - William Wordsworth rea lm of our social life in which something
approaching public opinio n can be form ed".
ARTS 17 Andrew Porter Reinhard Keiser Croes us (Gr and Thea tre, Leeds) Hab ermas him self categoriz ed coffee
Claudio Monteverdi Th e Coro nation of Poppea (Coli seum ) hou ses as institution s offerin g " social
Stefano Landi 11 Sant' Alessio (B arbican Hall) intercourse" of a non- ari stocratic, non-
Judith Flanders La Bayad ere (Co vent Garden). Ca rlos Ac osta - With gue sts from hierarchical kind , free and open deb ate and
Ballet Nac ional de C uba (Sadler 's Well s) the inclu sion of all-corners (ass uming that
Katharine Hibbert David Mamet Glen gar ry Glen Ro ss (Ap ollo The atre) they were men ). As the cultural histori an
Markman Ellis writes, in Eighteenth- Century
FICTION 19 Lucy Dallas Clemence Boulouque Nuit ou vert e Coffee -House Culture, the Briti sh coffee
Vincent Delecroix La Cha uss ure sur le toit hou se, a "heady combination of news, litera-
Louise Desbrusses Co uro nnes , boucliers, armures ture, debate and writing ", was "the
Eric Reinhardt Ce ndrillon cent ral locu s of newly egalitarian practices of
OIivia Rosenthal On nest pa s la pour dispara itr e discu ssion and con versation , including form s
EmiIie Bickerton Irene Nemirovsky Fire in the Blood. Le Bal of structured discourse, such as lectures and
Nick Shepley Robin Jenkins Th e Pearl- Fisher s debate s, as well as unregulat ed discourse,
such as goss ip and chatter".
FICTION IN BRIEF 21 Justin Warshaw Qiu Xiaolong A Case of Two Cities
Ellis, who teach es eightee nth-century liter-
Matthew Beaumont Gilbert Adair A Mysterious Affair of Style
atur e and culture at Queen Mary, Univers ity
H. J. Jackson Minette Waiters The C hame leo n's Shadow
of London, has already writt en a "cultural
Heather Thompson Joan Smitb What Will Sur vive
history" of the coffee hou se. Now he has
LEAR N ED JOURNALS 22 Peter Davidson Emblematica - An interdi sciplinar y journal for emblem studies ga thered man y of the original source materi-
Christine Bold Tulsa Studies in Wom en ' s Literature als from that book into four sturdy vo lumes
Norma Clarke The Age of John son - A scho larly annual of prim ar y texts, in facsimile form. Th e
Fiona Stafford Archipelago fir st covers Restor ation satire; the seco nd,
John Tyrrell Opera Quarterl y eightee nth-century satire; the third , drama;
and the fourth , science and hi stor y writing.
RELI GIO N 27 John Polkinghorne John Cornwell Dar win ' s Ang el Th e read er can be left in no doubt that coffee
John Humpbrys In God We Doubt - Confess ions of a fail ed atheist hou ses were the obj ect of debat e, as we ll as
a venue for it. Volume One includes bro ad-
BIBLIOGRAPH Y 28 H. J. Jackson James Raven Th e Bu siness of Books sides and poem s for and aga inst the coffee
hou se, from the years whe n it was still a grea t
BIOGRAPHY 29 Joe Phelan Ricbard S. Kennedy and Donald S. Hair The Dramatic Imagin ation of novelty. It is wonderful to read the se texts at
Rob ert Brownin g fir st hand, in the ea rthy langua ge of the day,
Lucy Hughes-Hallett PhiIip Eade Sylvia, Qu een of the Headhunter s rather than filtered through the deadening
Frances Wilson Tracy Borman Henrietta Ho ward - Kin g' s mi stress, Qu een ' s serva nt lens of po st-H aberm asian theory.
Th e main arg ume nts in favour of coffee
MEDI CI N E 31 John Scarborough Anne McCabe A Byz antin e Encyclopaedia of Hor se Medi cin e hou ses, in the words of an anon ymoll s satire
IN BRIEF 32 Ricbard Sugg Murder Aft er Death. Christopher D'Addario Ex ile of 1661 , were that they were "free to all
and Journey in Sevent eenth-Century Literatur e. PbiIip Matyszak corn ers" , promoted intermingling of different
Ancient Rom e on Five Denarii a Day. Peter Cbapman Jun gle profession s, "eq uality", ed uca tion and free
Ca pitalis ts. AIistair Moffat Th e Rei vers. Alain Badiou Th e Ce ntury . discourse, and that coffee " makes no man
Katbleen McHugh Jane Campion. Vincent Wrigbt Les Prefets de drunk" , unlik e the drink s serve d in ale-
Gamb ett a. Claudia Mesch and Viola Micbely, editors Joseph Beu ys hou ses. Ho wever , in the view of this sa me
satire, eve ry one of these virtues had its corre-
35 This week 's contributors, Crossword sponding vice . The fre edom of spee ch led to
time-wastin g and "gabbling" ("Here men
NB 36 J. C. Eliot at Faber , Perambulator y books, Metafiction IV, etc carri ed by instinct sipp muddy water, and like
Cove r pic ture : © Glen Pitt -Pl add y/Alamy; p3 © Aless ia Giuliani/AF P/Ge ny Images; pS © Mary Eva ns Pictur e Library; p9 © Peter Macdiarmid/Gett y Images; Frogs confusedl y murmur Insignificant
plO © Cor bis ; p l l © Pascal Le Segre tain/Cor bis ; pi ? © Don ald Coo per; pi S © Dee Co nway; pl 9 © Arna ud Fev ier/Flammar ion; © Helie Ga llima rd; © P.O.L. ; No tes , which tickl e their own ea rs, and, to
© F. Manto vani ; © Hel ie Galli mar d; p28 © Th e Bridgem an Art Lib rary/Cit y of Edi nburg h Mu seum s and Art Ga ller ies , Sco tland their inharmoniou s sense , mak e Mu sic of

TLS NO VE M BE R 2 20 07
 SOCIAL STUDIES 5

jarrin g strings"). Th e education on offer was
"a schoo l ... witho ut a master". As for the
proposition that "coffee makes no man
drunk" , the author sugges ts coffee hou ses
enco urage d drunkenn ess, because the effec ts
of coffee "be ing mixt wi th the mor e dr yin g
smoa k of Tobac co makes too man y run to the
Tavern or Alehou se to qu ench their thir st,
which they cannot satisfy".
Th e same point was mad e in a mock-
petiti o n of 1674, The Women 's Petition
Against Coffee. Th e coffee hou se, in truth ,
was:
Only a Pimp to the Tavern, a relishing soop pre-
parative to a fresh debauch: For when people
have swil l' d themel ves with a mo rni ng draugh t
of more Ale than brewers horse can carry,
hither they come for a pennyworth of Settle-
brain . . . and after an hou rs imp ertin en t Chat,
begin to consider a bottle of Claret would do
exce llent we ll before Dinn er; where upon to the
Bush they all march together, till everyone of
the m is Drunk as a Drum , and then back agai n
to the Coffee-Ho use to drink them sel ves sober.
The Briti sh have used coffee as a sop for
drinking them selv es so ber eve r since .
Wh at of the oth er va unted cultural virtues
of the eightee nth-ce ntury coffee hou se ? In
man y cases, they are not so dissimilar to
tho se of the mod ern coffee chain s. The
eighteenth-century coffee hou se was undoubt-
edly a great vehicle for the readin g of news-
papers. A Continenta l ob ser ver in the late
eightee nth century noted that, whereas the
French coffee hou se was a place where games
were played, in Britain "you neither see
billi ard s nor back gammon tables" because
peopl e frequ ent coffee hou ses principally to
read "the PAP ERS " . Th ere was a close and
sometimes volatile relation ship between the
coffee-m en and the newspaper-m en , which
came to a head in 1728, when the coffee-m en
launched an aborti ve scheme for setting up
their own newspapers. Coffee shops had long
been used as places for readin g pap ers with-
out havin g to pay for them. Th e coffee- men
resent ed the high price of newspapers and the
fact that there we re so many of them. Th e
newspap er- men obje cted that coffee hou ses
relied o n newspapers to attract cu stom . There
is a comp arabl e symbiosis now between cafes
and information , whether in the form of news-
papers (Starbucks has an exclusive deal with
The Times, Costa with the Daily Telegraph)
or intern et conn ection. It is hard to see which
part y owes most to who m. As a pamphlete er
of 1729 wrote, "Papers mutu ally beget
co mpany, and Company pap ers" .
Lik e their early equivalents, modern
coffee shops are grea t vehicles and prom oters
of comm erc e. In 1699, a deal er and scho lar
of coffee, Joh n Hought on , rem arked that
"Co ffee has greatly incr eased the Trade of
Tob acco and Pipes, Earthen Dishes, Tin
wares , News -Papers, Co als, Ca ndles, Sugar,
Tea, Chocolate and what not" . By the same
token , Starbu cks, Costa et al have greatly
boo sted the trade in milk , mu gs, muffin s,
paper cup s, CDs, choco late and what not.
These are heady times for the manufacturers
of nutm eg-shakers. More significantly, the
coffee shops have enabl ed commercial
activity to happ en in a neutr al "third place"
between hom e and the office, ju st as the
eightee nth-ce ntury coffee hou se pro vid ed a
place for the stoc kbro king fraternity to set up
deal s and exc hange inform ation. In his ea rlier
book on the subje ct, M arkm an Ellis wrote
that coffee hou ses - both in Brit ain and Am er-
ica - "played a cent ral role in the institutional-
ization of fin anci al mark et s; coffee hou ses in
Boston and New York had ho sted auctions of
co mmodities and real estate - call ed vendues
- since the seve ntee nth century". In a way,
therefore, it was the coffee hou ses of these
earlier tim es which paved the way for the
New York com moditi es market , the nemesis
for Ethiopian coffee farm er s no w.
If we asked of the eightee nth-ce ntury
coffee sho p the kind of qu estion s of globa l
ethics which are posed by Black Gold, I sus-
pect they wo uld com e off eve n worse than
their mod ern equiva lents. Co ffee -shop soc ia-
bilit y was not at all the same as the kind of
global citizenship which the Fa irtrade mo ve-
"Dr Syntax Present at a Cofe e-House Brawl in Bath" (1820) by Thomas Rowlandson
ment aspires to. Th ere are num erou s refer-
ences in eightee nth-ce ntury pamphlets to
coffee as a "Turk' s" or "Arabian" berr y, but
thi s did not enta il much sympathy with the
T urkish or Ar ab wo rld. Tru e, wor ks of Natu-
ral Hi stor y may refer to the Turkish ways of
makin g coffee in an ibrik, and sometimes to
the habit of mi xin g in a few gra ins of c arda -
mom , an d using coff ee, as one treatise of
1685 put s it, as "an enterta inment and a pas t-
time, makin g the hours to slip away me rrily
in con ver sati on , interminglin g with their
drink seve ral pleasant and recreati ve dis-
co urses, which unawares brin gs up on their
mind [a] for getfulness of sorrows". On the
oth er hand , in The Coffee -house , a comedy
from 1664, M ahoon e, the Turkish coffee-
man is presented as an entire ly ridiculous
figur e, endless ly chasin g after "de hor e my
Vife" and procl aiming that "de Cho co let
and de Co ffee make a de ma n live for ever !"
In Exchange -Alley , anoth er coffee -ho use
co medy from 1720, a stockjo bber called
Africanus, who aspires to the pos ition of a
ge ntle ma n, is show n dr essed in a hoars skin
and wa lking on all four s.
Despit e the centr alit y of coffee to all of
these texts, there is littl e atte mpt to conside r
tho se who physicall y produced it. Perhaps
thi s is in part because the coffee itself tasted
so bad. Th ere are man y famili ar acco unts
here of the effec ts of coffee - while caffeine
was not isolated until 1819, coffee was
always regard ed as a "wakefull" drink or a
"hinderer of sleep" - but when it co mes to
tast e , many w riters d escribe it as " in sip id " o r
soo t-like, or as a difficult taste to acqui re.
Visitor s to England from the Co ntinen t
agr eed that the coffee was badl y transport ed ,
badl y kept , badl y roa sted and badl y brewed .
James Lightb od y' s recip e for coffee from
1695 recommend ed boiling the coff ee up
with wa ter for a qu arter of an hour, which
mu st have made it impo ssibl y bitt er, with
most of the volatile oils destroyed; such
advice rem ained typi cal for we ll over a
century. In 1789, the travell er Joh ann
Wilh elm von Archenholz complained that
the custom for drinking wea k coff ee was so
prevalent that "even the riches t peopl e will
not use it whe n stro ng; the most cont emptible
tradesman in all Ge rma ny drinks bett er cof-
fee than they do". The reason was partl y,
Arch enh olz said, that the import duti es on
Briti sh coff ee were so "exorbitant" .
Behind the cultural histor y of the coff ee
hou se is an ec ono mic story which strugg les
to com e to the surface in Markm an Ellis's
chosen text s. It is a lot less ro mantic than the
Hab erm asian tale of soc iability, but may be
more instru cti ve. Th rou ghout the eightee nth
ce ntury, Briti sh excise duti es on coffee we re
sw inge ing - muc h high er than those in
France , for exa mple.
Initi ally, this serve d as a tax on the foreign
merch ants of Moch a or "Arabia" . Fro m 1730
onward s, however, Briti sh coloni sts planted
coffee in the West Indies, and they co nsidered
it unju st that they should have to submit to the
same taxes, which made it hard for coffee to
co mpete with tea from the East India Co m-
pany. By 1774, with additional co mpetition
from Dutch planters in Suriname (on the north
coast of So uth America), and cheap French
imports from Mauritius, the West Indian plant-
ers were feelin g very sorry for them selves, as
John Ellis recounted in his Historical Account
of Coffee:
Our unh app y adve nturers in Co ffee, in the
Cede d Island s, begin as I am told , to lose all
hope of that reward for their labours, which
used to suppo rt them und er eve ry disapp oint-
ment , a prosperous retu rn to their famil y and
friends. Their credit is totally stopt by the diffi-
culties of the time s, and the ir produ ce onl y
yields them half of what it did in 1770 . .. .
their affa irs are at suc h a cr isis that, unl ess they
have immediate relief, fro m the wis dom and
j ustice of Par lia ment; it is scarce po ssible but
they must sink under their mis fortunes .
The compl aint of the Jamaican planters
was the same as the Ethiopian far mers now :
give us a level playing field and a fair pric e
for our coffee and we will mak e a livin g for
ourse lves . The differenc e was, of cou rse, that
the planters did not do their own farming, but
had others do it for them. Ellis in 1774 saw
tho se who actually farm ed the coffee plant s
as mere appe ndages to the col oni sts; the
coffee-wo rkers ' sufferings were only to
be lament ed insofar as they affec ted their
m ast er s ' purse :
Their losses in Negroes, and mul es, ha ve been
imme nse fro m the difficult ies attendi ng the
cultiva tion of islan d overgrown with woods,
consequently damp and unhealthy; from the
wa nt to provisio n, and of prop er she lter for
thei r Negroes and ca ttle.
The sacrifice of hum an life for the sake of a
cup of coffee is nothin g new.
What is new, and new to the past two
decades, is the hu ge rise in the qu alit y of
A nglo-Ame rica n coffee repr esent ed by
Starbucks et ai, after dec ades of ersa tz,
instant and stewe d coffee. For most of the
twenti eth century, Briti sh coffee was n' t
black gold; it was black dishwater. Coffee
had been bad for a long tim e. Th e chunk of
histor y which usuall y ge ts mi ssed out from
the story of coffee is the nin eteenth century,
the century par exce lle nce of free trad e and
ad ulteration, which laid the gro undw or k for
the willing ness of the publi c to accept a
prett y unpl easant bever age und er the name of
coffee. For cultural histori ans of coffee, such
as Markman Ellis, the nineteenth century
isn 't very interestin g, becau se it repr esent s
the end of "the great age of the Briti sh coffee-
hou se" , as tea-drinking gathered pace. But it
didn't repr esent the end of coffee. The differ-
ence was ju st that coffee, alrea dy a prett y dis-
gusting drink in eightee nth-ce ntury Lo ndo n,
became still worse, as it was padded with
roasted bean s and peas, chicory and man gel-
wurze l. Again , the ex planation is not solely
cultura l - in theor y, coffee sho uld have been
ge tting much better, since the invention by
Co unt Rumford of a coffee pot which didn 't
stew it to death - but ec onomic and politi cal.
Politi cal, because most of the rulin g cla ss
did not think it much mattered whether
chicory was so ld unde r the name of coffee or
vice versa : cavea t emp tor was the unthinking
sloga n of the tim es. Econo mic, becau se it
was virtually imp ossible for the working -
class coffee- sell ers describ ed by Ma yh ew to
make any kind of livin g unl ess they so ld
coffee which was falsifi ed as well as highl y
dilute. Th e average Briti sh co nsume r of
coffee in 1850 was ge tting a terrible deal.
Now , we are still ge tting a terrible deal
(two pounds for something that costs next to
nothin g to produce) but no one can cl aim
they are bein g ripped off. If anything, the situ-
ation has becom e rever sed . Th e con sum er ,
ass uming he or she has two po unds to burn ,
can bu y them sel ves a cup of coffee which is
wo nderfully pur e, pr e- sel ect ed for taste hy
hundreds of nasal coffee-swill ers, and
brewed to perfection by a highl y train ed
bari sta. Th eir two pounds will also buy them
the use of a comfortable chair in a we ll-lit,
air-co nditioned room, for as lon g as they
wish. We have moved from a nin eteenth-
century mark et in which the con sum er was
sys tematica lly ripp ed off to one where the
co nsumer is kin g. If onl y the desires of thi s
co nsumer could fin all y be made to collid e
with the nee ds of the coffee pro ducers, we
wo uld be livin g in a kind of caffeinated
paradi se.

TLS NOVEM BER 2 20 07

6
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Max Perutz
Sir, - I was appa lled that in his
review of my book Max Perut;
and the Secret of Life (Oct ob er 19)
Druin Burch sho uld compare
Mi chael Rossrnann ' s role in the
solution of the haem oglobin struc -
ture with Ro salind Fra nklin 's in that
of DNA.
Rossmann was a rece nt addition
to the team set up by Perut z to crac k
the probl em . Mo st of the data had
been collect ed before he arrived :
Rossmann helped Perut z to see what
that data meant. Prot ein crystallo gra-
ph y is always a team effort, and it ' s
a fact of life that credit goes to the
team leader once the thin g is fin ally
done. Rossmann was give n full
credit as a co- author on the pap er.
In cont rast, James Watson and
Francis Cr ick used DNA data
(incl udin g Franklin' s) fro m anoth er
institution , without the knowled ge
or co nse nt of the ow ners.
To sugges t that Rossmann's situa-
tion was in any way comparabl e to
Franklin's is a casual slur on the
integrit y of Perutz, whose persever-
ance and perf ect ioni sm helped to
lay the foundation s of mo dern
molecul ar biology.
GEO RG INA FER RY
47 Plantation Road, Oxford.
----~---
The Union
Japanese allies into enemies
Sir, In Felipe Fernandez -
Arm esto ' s review (Oc tober 12) of
Peter Clarke ' s book o n the fall of
the Briti sh Emp ire (w hich make s it
clear that there was no pre ceding
decl ine), he exp resses surpr ise that
Clarke does not tackl e the cruc ial
qu esti on of how we ca me in the
Second Worl d War to be enemies of
our First World War allies, the
Jap anese - so similarly situated as
an offsho re island and not a natu ral
ally of raciali st Ge rmany . Th e
answer wo uld appear to be in ou r
alliance of necessit y, with the USA,
o ne of whose rea lized wa r aims (in
sharp contrast to Hitl er' s des ire to
preserve it) was the destructi on of
the Briti sh Imp erium . I we ll remem-
ber an ex-a mbassador to Japan (was
it Knatchbull-Hugessen ?) giving a
talk to us at schoo l in which he
ex plained how our repudiating of
our treaty with Japan in the 1920 s
---------------~----------------
1707: Why and how (Saltir e), which 'ru nning o n the spot' . .."
Kidd does not appea r to have see n.
PAUL HEN DE RSO N SCO TT
clo Saltire Socie ty, 22 High Stree t, co mmo nly used where we wo uld
Edinburgh.
----~---
Spinoza's 'Ethics'
letters @the-t1s.co .uk
on Am eric an insistence (we owed
them a lot of mo ney which we
couldn 't affor d to rep ay) had mor-
tally offe nded that cou ntry 's ruler s,
who had also co me to our aid with-
out ex pec ting or ge tting a quid pro
oth er than a few Pacifi c island s.
Wh at if, instead of the fift y out-
of-d ate destro yers for which we
exc hanged o ur dwindling cash
from the celebrity-thickened fund- who admittedly was not adverse to
I see that the book was publi shed raising dinn ers that eve n Arvon lightin g up from time to time -
in New York. In the United States, feels obliged to use for its continuing mu st be spinning in his grave.
the phr ase "ru nning in place" is survival.
say "ru nning on the spo t" . The
tran slator is not at fault here.
CHRIST INE SHUT TLEWO RTH
blind nostalgia for the heyday of
Vict or ian military imp eri ali sm ,
presum abl y.
reser ves, the Japanese navy had JAM ES RAMSAY
com e to our assis tance in the Battl e St Barnabas Churc h, Manor Park,
of the Atl ant ic rather than attacked Browning Road, Lond on E 12.
us in the rear? It was the asce nda ncy
----~,--­
of their Pruss ian -trained army at the
ex pense of their humiliated Briti sh
model navy that cau sed them to
Smoking
chan ge sides at a time when the Sir, - Prodi giou s sophistry is
Germa ns threat ened to take ove rex pected from ap olog ists for
Siberi a once they had conqu ered tob acc o, but Howar d Kamin sky' s
European Russia - so mething that it
argume nt (Lette rs, Octob er 19)
was in Japan ' s lon g-t er m interest to
that the early death of smoke rs is
cou nter. My broth er, who spent the
fin anciall y benefi cial to soc iety
war fighting the Japanese in Burm a,
sure ly takes so me beating. I would
once sa id that he mu ch preferr ed
have thou ght that a lifetim e of
them as men to his Chinese and makin g paym ents in nation al insur-
Am erican allies. Wh at they were ance co ntributions amounted to an
fightin g for was the oil supplies - so
entitleme nt to a reason abl y lon g
necessary for their indu stri ali zation
and happ y retirement.
- which the Americ an s had cut off. The jury is out as to whe ther life
sho uld be eterna l, but few wo uld
JOH N A. DAVIS choose cance r or any other
1 Cambridge Road, Grea t Shelford , smoking-related disease as the
Cambri dge . means for lea vin g it. As for
the notion of smoking as an "exis-
tential need" , Jean-P aul Sartre -
BERNARD BESSE RGLIK
ADA M TH OR PE 2 1 rue Eugene et ML Corne t,
1 Grand 'R ue, 30 000 Nlmes. Panti n, 93500 France .
----~--­ ----~--­

Sir, - In his review of Spinoza 's

Sir , - Co lin Kidd , in his review of
three boo ks abo ut the Union of
170 7 (October 12), co ncl udes with
a reference to "the hard bargain that
the Sco ts dro ve in 1701". In fact ,
there is stro ng ev ide nce that it was
not a bargain sought by the Sco ts
but an impo siti on obtained by Eng -
land by ingenious and ex tensive
brib er y and by the threat of inva-
sion. The Scotti sh team sent to
Lon don for the negoti ati on s in 1706
were not chosen by the Scotti sh
Parli ament but by the Queen , that is,
by the Eng lish Govern ment.
Thi s was a co nsequence of a con-
trivan ce in the Sco ttish Parli ament
by the leader of the oppos ition, the
Duk e of Hamilton, alm ost cert ainl y
becau se he too had succ umbed to
brib er y. There was therefore no
possibility of a ge nuine negoti ation .
Two of the leadin g me mbers of the
Scotti sh team report ed that they
were in no position to bargain . The
Secretary of State, the Earl of Mar ,
reported to Edinburgh : "W hat we
are to treat of is not in our choice";
and John Clerk of Peni cuick said :
"you cannot force yo ur will on
those stronge r than yo urse lf'.
Th e Eq uiva lent was a decept ion .
It was not large enough to cover all
its decl ared purposes and only abo ut
a third of it was deli vered in cash.
Th e ev idence for all ofthis is sum-
marized in my book , The Union of
"Ethics" by Steve n Na dler (Oc tober
19), Don Garre tt rem arks on the dif-
ficulti es of grap pling with the Ethics
itself. Th ey are indeed for mid able,
despit e the ex istence of Edw in Cur-
leys supe rbly acc ura te and helpful
translation (Prince ton Universi ty
Press). Readers might like to know
that a ve rsion of the work can be
found at www .ear lymode rntexts.
corn . I mad e this version as an aid to
stude nts and perhaps others. Whil e
keeping to Spin oza' s order of presen-
tation , and without blunting the
sharp edges by simplify ing doc-
trines or short-cutting arguments,
the version hop es to make the
cont ent mor e access ible.
JONATH AN BENNETT
RR 1, S- 16, Bow en Island,
British Co lumbia.
----~,--­
Running in place
Sir , - In his review of Boy, a collec-
tion of three stor ies by Ta keshi
Kitano, tran slated by David James
Karashim a (October 26), Michael
Ca ines writes : "There is an aw k-
war dness to all the children here,
which the tran slation by David
Jam es Karashi ma enha nces. 'We
both ran in place to keep warm '
wo uld mor e idiomatic ally involve
Flat 1, 25 St Stephen' s Aven ue,
London W12.
----~,----
Arvon Foundation
Sir, - Hugo Williams (Free lance ,
October 19) describ es the Ar von
Foundation as "a kind of ge ntee l
holid ay scheme for tired writers",
arising from "an ori gin al idea" by
Ted Hugh es to give said writers a
break while "disciples [did] the
cookin g": eve n for the sake of a dry
lau gh , this is too off-b eam not to
need correc ting.
The Arvon was found ed by John
Mo at and John Fairfax , not Ted
Hughes. (His initial reac tion was dis-
tinctly lukewarm , but he was
famou sly open and became a firm
supporter.) Th eir idea, as outlined in
Moat' s brilli ant and instru ctive The
Foundation of A rvon (2005) was to
pro vid e a non- selecti ve "s pa ce"
where, for five days, fifteen students
would be apprenticed to two ex peri-
enced writers in the belief that, in
Moat' s words, "imagination prac tice
and its trainin g were at the heart of
genuine educa tion" .
Far from bein g a gentee l holid ay,
tutorin g on an Arvon course is
intense and exhausting, and always
has been. It remains very different
from a selective and often caree r-
bound university crea tive writing
course, and , indeed, a world away
Hugh Trevor-Roper
Sir , - I am writing an author ized
biograph y of the late Hugh Trevor-
Roper (Lord Dacre), and I should
be gra teful to hear from anyo ne
possessin g letters of his, or with
reminiscen ce s to sha re . P lease wr ite
to me at the address belo w, or email
to as@ adams isman.com.
ADA M SISMA N
Lipyeate Hou se, Holco mbe , Bath.
----~,---
Warlike hymns
Sir , - J. C. writes without qu alif ica-
tion of "the war like natur e of reli-
gious songs" , and Rob ert Bridges' s
hymn "Rej oice, 0 land , in God thy
might " is offered as an exa mp le, a
"Victor ian procl am ation of imp erial
streng th" (N B, Oct ober 12). Yet the
title line of that hymn attrihutes
might to God rather than "imperial
streng th" . The sec ond line rea ds :
"his [God ' s] will obey, him serve
aright". The last coupl et urges:
"walk in his way, his word adore, f
and keep his truth for eve rmore " .
No t grea t poetr y, but a servicea ble
hymn. Brid ges tran slated a numb er
of hymn s (including "Jesu, joy of
man ' s desirin g" and "P hos hilaron ",
"0 gladsome light , 0 grace . . ." )
that , along with "Rej oice, 0 land " ,
continu e to be sung tod ay . . . in
Tunnock's
Sir, - Mi chael Kerri gan (Oc tober
19) and M ark Va lentine (Lette rs,
Octob er 26) both sugges t that John
Tunnock, the centr al concern of
Ala sdair Gray 's new novel Old
M en in Lo ve, is named after the
Tunnock 's teacake. Ho wever, the
Uddings ton-base d co mpany are
also pur veyor s of the Tun nock ' s
caramel wafer ("m ore that
4,000 ,000 of these biscuits are
mad e and sold eve ry wee k", their
wra pper claim s), not to menti on
their cara mel log, wa fe r cream,
snow ba ll and Florida or ange . It
seems that Gray and Tunn ock ' s
are both Sco ttish pol ym aths.
NElL WIL KIN
4 Spital, Aberdee n.
----~,---
Masterclass
Sir, - In his review of the Briti sh
film indu stry (Se pte mber 28),
Cl ive Jam es displ ayed both maj-
esty and humility. Th ese not
antithetica l qu aliti es we re used to
marshal knowled ge, hum our , and
det ail to deli ghtful effec t. It was a
mastercl ass for us all.
SEBAS TIAN BARKE R
London Magazine, 70 Wargrave
Ave nue, Lon don N 15.

TLS N O V E M B E R 2 20 07

Uses for grass
"B ut wha t happiness to have known
Bab ur!" wro te E. M. Forster in
reviewing Annette Susa nna h Bev-
eridges translation of the Babur Nama in
1921. " He had all that one seeks in a fri end .
His energy and amb ition were touc hed with
sensitiven ess; he co uld act, feel , observe, and
rem emb er ; though not critica l of his sense s,
he was aware of thei r wor kings , thu s fulfill-
ing the whole natur e of ma n." And what a
man Babu r was ! Thirteen th in line of descent
from Ge nghis Khan through his matern al
gra ndfather , Yunus Khan of Tas hken t, Great
Khan of the Mo ngo ls, and eighth in line of
descent fro m Ta merlaine through his patern al
gra ndfather, Abu Sai d of Herat, Babur was
powerfull y awa re of his glitter ing ances tors
and of the tradi tion s of co nq uest they
repr esent ed. Th rou ghout his life he strove to
em ula te them .
Babur found himself catapult ed into the
co mpetition for powe r in Transoxiana, partly
with his ow n relatives, but increasingly with
the Uzbek Turks , after his father died in 1494,
when he was only twelve . Babur aimed to
recaptu re Ta merlai ne's capital of Sa marqand,
which "for nearly 140 years . . . had been in
our famil y". In his first ten yea rs of cam paign -
ing he besieged it three times and conquered it
twice. But in this period he was little more
than a "political vagabo nd", as he describ ed it,
subje ct to the fluid alliances of clan factional-
ism . At one mom ent he might be master of a
great city ; at another, fightin g for his life with
a few follo wers. Cruc ial adv isers at this time
were his mother and gra ndmother.
From 1504, after Babur cap tured Kabul
and turn ed it into a perm anent base, his po si-
tion began to change . He soo n found him self
figh ting Afgh ans, who he noted surre ndered
by go ing "before their foe with gras s bet ween
their teeth , that is to say ' I am yo ur cow '". By
1507, he had streng the ned his kingdo m in the
south by the conquest of the rich tradi ng city
of Kand ahar. Most of his energ ies, however ,
were devoted to fightin g the Uzbeks to the
north and wes t. Thi s invol ved the conqu est of
Herat and of Bukh ara , for a tim e, an d in 1511
his third conques t of Samarqa nd. But in the
upshot the Uzbek s were able to brin g grea ter
power to bear in the lands of Transoxiana. In
1512, he was forc ed out of Sa marqa nd for
the last time, and had little furth er success in
the region .
Failure in hi s family' s traditi on al po wer
centre meant that Babur increasingly looked
east toward s Hindu stan, which T amerla ine
had invaded with co nspicuous success in
1398. For years Babur was held back by the
op position of his office rs, hut hy 1519 he
succee ded in engag ing them in the first of
five probing raid s into the region . Then, in
1523, he received a form al invitati on to
invade from the governor of the Punj ab ; there
was grow ing oppos ition to the Afghan Lod i
regim e which ruled much of Nor th Indi a.
Babur prepare d for the invasion by trainin g
his me n thorou ghl y and by acq uiring the
latest gunpowde r tech nology.
The futur e of Indi a was deci ded in two
grea t battl es. On Apr il 20, 1526, on the plain
of Panip at, north of Delhi , Babu r' s ar my of
12,000 men fac ed Ibrahi m Lodi ' s 100,000
LI T ER ATUR E
F RA NC I S ROBI NSO N
Za hi r a I - Di n B abur
JO UR N AL O F EMPERO R B AB U R
Tra nslated by Annette Susannah Bcvcr idge:
abridged and edited by Dilip Hiro
424pp. Penguin. Paperback, £ 12.
978 0 14400149 I
supp orted by 1,000 elephants. Babur strength-
ened his ow n po sit ion by using the town of
Panip at to guar d his right flank, and a sys tem
of ditches to the left ; across the centre of the
battl efield he had 700 carts tied together in
the "Anatolian man ner" , matchlockmen
bein g placed behind the carts, and ca nnon in
front. In the eve nt Babur used his Mongol cav -
alry on the wings to dri ve the Afgh an forc es
into the funn el he had created in front of his
centre, where they we re pound ed into submis-
sion by arrows and gunfire. In the seco nd bat-
tle, of Ma rch 1527, at Kanwah, wes t of Agra,
Babur used the same tactics to defeat an ar my
of 200,000 fielded by a coa litio n of Rajputs
an d Afghans. Th ere is debate as to the ro le of
gunpow der in these victories . Babur, how-
eve r, tho ught it crucia l at Kan wah : "fro m the
centre" , he wrote, "M ustafa Rumi brought for-
wa rd the ca isso ns and with matchl ock s and
mor tars bro ke not only the rank s of the infi-
del army but their hearts as we ll".
Babur was one of four wa rrior s of Turkic-
speaki ng stock who , in a period of less than
a ce ntury , founded a majo r state in the heart
of the Euras ian reg ion reachin g from the
Balkan s to Ben gal. The oth ers we re Mehm et
Il , the Conq uero r (1432-8 1), who took Con -
stantinople in 1453 and fou nded the Ott om an
Em pire; Shah Ismail Safav i (1487-1 524 ),
who fou nded the Safav id Empire on the Iran-
ian plateau, in the early sixtee nth century;
and Sha iban i Khan (1451-1510), who in the
sa me period drove Babur out of Tra nsox iana
and established Uzbek power in Samarqa nd.
Wh en Babur died in 1530, he had laid the
basis of the Mu gh al Emp ire which was to last
until 1858, and which to the end of the seven-
teenth century was the grea tes t of these states
in wea lth and power. Whil e remaining reli-
giously inclu sive for mu ch of its ex istence ,
thi s Empire, neverth eless, continued to sus-
tain the Mu slim political frame, established
by the Delhi Sultans , which led to the sub-
co ntinen t becoming ho me to one -third of the
wor ld's Mu slim s, a fact of major geo political
significa nce .
Suc h is Babur' s ico nic status tod ay that he
is reviled by India ' s Hindu nation ali sts, who
se nt shoc k waves throu gh th e suhcontine nt
when, in 1992, they tore down his mo squ e at
Ayodh ya (Uttar Pradesh), which they claimed
had been built on the ruin s of a Vai shn avite
templ e dedic ated to Ram a. O n the other hand ,
he is ce lebrated in the newl y-minted state
of Uzbek istan, where Tam erl aine and his
descend ant s are amo ng the building blocks of
nationh ood, and in whose eas tern mos t city of
Andijan, Babur' s birthpl ace, it is he who
sym bo lizes past greatness.
Babur is also rightl y famed for his autobio-
graphy , the Babur Nama . Th rou ghout his life
he kept a journal, which in his last yea rs he
TLS NO VE M BE R 2 2007
wor ked into autobiogra phica l form . Th ere is
a charm ing mom ent when on May 25, 1528,
he rec ords a sudde n bur st of monsoo n wi nd
and rain bringin g down the porch of his tent
before he co uld ga ther up the sec tions of his
book on which he was working :
God preserved me! No harm befell me!
Sec tions of the book were drenc hed und er
water . . . . We laid them down in the folds of a
woo llen throne carpe t, put it on the throne and
piled blankets on it.
He was producing a conside rable work -
600 pages in the latest print ed text in Turki,
even though the sec tions cove ring fift een
yea rs of his life (1508-1 9, 1520- 25) have
been lost. Th e autobiography reveals that sen-
sitive, observa nt, cultivated, highl y intelli gent
Turco -Mo ngo l warri or prince whom Fors ter
wo uld have liked to have befr iended. Babur
tell s us when he wee ps, which as a yo ung man
was quit e often: " I found such adversity hard
to bear" , he declares after losing Sa marqa nd
as a teenager, " I could not help crying a good
deal". He tell s us of his first disco very of
love, of unreasonin g passi on: " In those days I
disco vered in myself a strange inclin ation -
no, a mad infatuation - for a boy in the
ca mp's bazaar, his name Baburi .. .". He
fou nd him self speec hless and overc om e with
confusion wheneve r he met the boy:
In that maelstrom of desire and passion. and
under the stress of youthful folly, [u sed to wan-
der, bareheaded and barefoot, through streets
and lanes, orc hards and vineyards. I showe d
civ ility neither to frie nds nor to stra nger s, took
no care of myself or others.
Babu r was a sharp j udge of character and
ability . Th e autobiog raphy is full of vignettes
of men and wome n, artists, poets, ruler s and
retainer s. " Hasan Yaqoub was a sma ll-
mind ed but goo d-tempere d and active man" ,
he wro te of one of his father' s follo wers. "He
was brave, a goo d arche r and po lo player, and
leapt we ll at leap-frog co mpe titions . . .. But
he lacked sense, was narrow-minded and
somewhat qu arrel some." Close obse rva tion
of natur e run s all the way throu gh Babu r ' s
wor k, whether he is comme nting on the qual-
ity of the melon s pro duced in thi s or that dis-
trict or o n the thirty-th ree different varieties
of tulip to be found in the mo unta ins aro und
Kabul. He laid out several ga rdens and, for
instance, in his mu ch-l oved Ga rde n of Fide l-
ity out side Kabul , observed the perfo rmance
of different plants. Moreover, he co uld be
awe d by nature's magnificence:
Within two miles of the Ab-e Istada Lake we
saw a wonderful sight. Something red like the
ro se of the dawn kept appear ing and vanishing
be tween the sky and the wat er. On ge tting
close we learned this was ca used by flocks of
geese, not 10,000 or 20,000 in a flock, but
co untless.
A sys te matizing mind also worked wi th
Babu rs talent for obse rva tion. Th e auto-
biogr aph y cont ain s three surveys or gaze t-
teers - of his Ce ntral Asian hom e pro vince of
Fergana, of Kabul an d of Hindustan. Th e last
tell s of his cont empt for his co nq uest, as
exe mplified by the follo win g, which Fors ter
tell s us the British in Ind ia liked to repeat:
Hindu stan is a co untry of few charms . Its
peo ple have no good look s; of socia l inter-
7
course, pay ing and rece iving visits, there is
none; of genius and capacity non e; of manners
no ne; in handicraft and work, there is no form
or symmetry, met hod or quality. There are no
good horses, no good dogs . .
A ny cultiva ted man of Babur' s tim e wo uld
have pressed hom e his point s with verse , and
so did Babur. One of the ma ny achieve me nts
of an outsta nding recent study of Babur and
his world by Stephen Dale, The Garden oj
the Eight Paradises: Babur and the culture oj
empire in Central Asia, Afg hanistan and
India ( / 483- 1530) (2004), has been to relate
the co llected verse of Babur in Turki and
Per sian, which was published for the first
time in the Latin script in 1995, to the autobio-
graphy . He shows us how a study of Babur's
poetry enables us to be privy to tho se thin gs
he felt mos t dee ply.
Babur, as we might ex pec t, cared about the
use of language. He req uired his son, Huma-
yun, to write letters to him . Hum ayun , like
many a young man of the pen, tried to impress
with elaborate, decorat ed prose. Babur repli ed
with words echoe d by George Orwe ll's "Poli-
tic s and the Eng lish Lan guage" :
Though your letter can be read after much
effort, it canno t be und erstood because of the
obsc ure wor di ng of yo urs . . . . In future, wr ite
wi tho ut elaboration. Use plain clea r word s.
That will lessen yo ur trou ble and yo ur reader' s.
On ce Ba bur's autobiog raphy was merely
enjoyed for its charm and plundered for
what it co uld tell us abo ut the late-Ti murid
wo rld. But rece ntly, Dale has sens itized us to
the artfulness in its co nstruct ion and in the
way in which Babur per suades us to take his
point of view . Ali Anoos hahr, moreover, in a
brill iant intertextu al readin g, has arg ued that
it be con sidered ghazi (warrior for the faith )
literatur e, noting the interpl ay in the text
between Utbi's Yamin i, a popul ar histor y
of M ah mud of Ghaz ni, who invaded Indi a
in the early eleve nth cen tury , and the Gaza -
vat-i Sultan Murad , the ho ly wa rs of the
fift eenth-c entury Ott om an Sultan Murad II.
Furthermore, Babur' s engagemen t with
J. Trithemiu5,
Comp endium
stve brevtarum
Mainz 15 15.
Esti ma te; £3.000
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8 LITERATURE & ART HISTORY
alcoh ol run s through the book like a them e
throu gh a sonata. There are the ea rly intim a-
tions of the theme; his comm ent s on the drink-
ing habit s of others and his early resistance
to wine. It is develop ed whe n at last, age d
twent y-nin e, discipli ne is surrende red to se n-
sua l app etite. Th e theme is furth er develop ed
in many descripti on s of dr inkin g part ies and
of the stupid thin gs said and don e und er the
influ ence of drink. The them e is brought to
its clim ax in the da ys before the fateful Battl e
of Kanwah, when he publicly em brace d the
role of ghar i and renoun ced wine . The them e
dies away with notes of regret: "Through
ren ouncing of wine bewild ered am I; How to
work know I not, so distracted am I; Whil e
oth ers repent and vow to abstain, I have
vowe d to abstain, and repent ant am 1" .
As a wor k of autobiogra phy the Babu r
Nama stands alone in the pre-c olon ial
Mu slim wor ld. Cer ta inly autobiog raphy was
part of the Islamic traditi on , and grea t men
such as the scholar-mystic al-G haza li (d
1111) and the philosopher-states man Ibn
Khaldun (d 1406) produced notable examples.
But nothin g match es Babur' s work for its vital
first-perso n narrative, its evo cation of emo-
tions we all share, its elements of self-dra mati-
zation, indeed, its apparen tly "modern" sensi-
bilit y. As a work of wo rld literatur e it has
been rated a worthy comp anion of the
confess ions of St Augu stine and Rou sseau,
and the autobi ograph y of Gibbon. Dale quit e
rightl y comp ared it with that other most
revealin g autobiograp hy of the sixtee nth
century, The Life of Benvenuto Cellini, the
Re naissa nce sculptor and go ldsmith. In doing
so he goes on to make a furth er point that
Fors ter also made, which is to note the
similarities between the late-Timurid wor lds
of Samarqand and Herat and those of
Ren aissance Flore nce and Siena. In both there
flouri shed ego tism and brut ality alongs ide
aesthetic sensitivity and high cultivation.
Babur wrote his autobiog rap hy in Cha-
gha tay Tur ki, the langu age of most of his
poe try and of the Tur co-M ongol elite which
surro unded him . By the end of the sixtee nth
ce ntury, ho wever, few in the Mu ghal world
knew Tur ki and it was translat ed into Per sian
and illu str ated in the Mugha l wo rkshops ,
bein g one of seve ral gre at book s proclaiming
the glorious histor y of the dyn asty. It was
first brou ght to the attention of the ang lo-
pho ne wor ld by a translation of the Persian
text by Will iam Erskine an d John Leyden in
the early nineteenth ce ntury , and then onc e
more by Ann ette Beve ridge's translation of
the Turki text in the ear ly twenti eth century.
Th e mos t recent tran slation into Engl ish is
the fine edition of the di stingui shed Harvard
scho lar Wh eeler M. Thac kston (1996), who
notes that Beveridge ' s tran slati on read s "like
a stude nt's effort".
This makes it a pity that Dilip Him has
chose n the Beverid ge text as the basis of his
edition of the Journal of Emperor Babur.
Fo llow ing Pen guin ' s current poli cy of redu c-
ing grea t wor ks for popul ar con sumption ,
Ann ette Beverid ge ' s ori gin al 300,000 words
have been cut down to 100,000 . Th ere are
so me helpful maps, not es and appe ndices,
but the introduction is inn ocent of any know -
led ge of Stephen Dale' s imp ort ant wor k, and
there is no bibli ograph y. With luck Dilip
Hire ' s edition will draw a new audience to
the rem arkable Babu r. But for the real thing
the reader will have to go elsewhere.
Tonnes of red
lmost the last figur e on display in the
A
Briti sh Mu seu m' s magni ficent ex hibi-
tion Th e First Emperor: China 's Ter-
racotta Army is rather easy to miss. An
archer, minus his bo w, kneel s in a showcase
that faces the ex it. A similar figur e front s the
entrance , makin g a bold statemen t about
what lies ahead . But , for thi s parti ng archer
yo u need to turn around . It' s as if the organiz-
ers we re unsur e what to do with him ; for
unlik e his fell ows, he is neith er very or ienta l
nor ob vio usly terr acott a. In fact , he has been
rece ntly paint ed. His armo ure d j erkin has the
gloss of patent leather , with white rivets and
scar let lacin g, while above ro uge d lips he
spo rts a crisp black mou stache. It co uld be
Lord Lucan in a pastiche of Cossack dress.
Wh en fir st buri ed as part of the Em peror's
pos thumo us en tourage, thi s archer was in no
way exce ption a!. "One distin ctive ori gin al
charac teristic of the sculptures that can no
lon ger be immedi ately perceived by modern
viewe rs", writes Lukas Nickel, a contributor
to the ex hibition catalo gue, "is that all the
soldiers we re entirely paint ed with bright and
colourful pigm ent s." Th e unrem arkable
undergarment s peekin g from beneath skirted
ro bes have revealed traces of turqu oise and
lavend er , an d the ro bes them sel ves of red,
blu e, or white. Leggin gs see m ofte n to have
been sea gree n, nec kerchi efs (they prevent ed
armour rub ) sky blue. The hor ses, too, were
pa inted , usually chestnut or black with white
hooves. When interr ed near the First
Emperor's subterranea n ma uso leum out side
modern Xian (Shaanx i pro vin ce) in c2 l 0 BC,
the rou ghl y 7,000 life-size terracotta warriors
not o nly bristled with bron ze wea ponry but
dazzl ed wi th co lours.
In The Terracotta A rmy: Ch ina's Firs t
Emperor and the birth of a nat ion , John M an
bru shes past the rank s of d un wa rriors in
X ians parent mu seu m to rum m age through
the workshops of the res tore rs and repli ca-
makers who have turn ed the Te rraco tta Arm y
into an indu stry. Hi s purp ose is to find out
how it was all don e in the fir st place. That the
mass-production techniques used to produce
toda y' s curios mirror those used to produce
the or iginals is no surprise . Limb s, heads and
tor sos are kno wn to have been cas t from a
few sta nda rd moulds; likewise ears and
hand s. Assembl y was also standa rdized, with
arti stry an d indi vidu ali zati on bein g rese rve d
for the fini shin g of faci al featur es and hair-
styles . Most of the figur es ca me off a produc-
tion line in the third ce ntury BC. Th e skills
requi red we re those of the jo bbing potter;
drainpipe maker s, for instanc e, turn ed out the
hollo w legs. John Man concludes that the
decisi ve factor was therefo re neither clay,
kiln s nor sculptors but "the drive to appl y
colour " . He ca lculates that the three prep-
arator y coats of lacqu er wo uld have required
the sap from aro und 200,000 trees, thereb y
"adding 3,000 [craft smen] to the wa rriors '
wor kforce and qu adrupling the production
tim e to a month per statue". As for the
pigment s them selves, rare or not , they were
lavishl y bestowed. Two tonn es of cinnabar, a
scarce min eral norm all y reser ved for the
Emperor's ink , wo uld have been needed ju st
for the red s. A long with the wea po nry , it was
TLS N O V E M B E R 2 20 07
JOH N K EAY
J an e P ort al , e d i to r
T H E F IRS T EMP E ROR
China's Terracotta Army
240pp. British Museum Press. Paperback, £25 .
978 07 14124476
J ohn M an
THE TE R RAC OTTA ARMY
China's First Emperorand the birthof a nation
288pp. Bautam Press. £20 .
978 0 593 05929 6
F ranc e s W o od
T H E F I RS T EMPE RO R OF CH INA
209pp. Profile. £ 15.99.
978 1 846680328
J on athan F enb y , e di to r
T HE SEV ENT Y W ONDERS OF
C H INA
304pp. Thames aud Hudsou. £24.95.
978 0 500 25 137 9
Y i- Fu T u a n
COM I NG H O ME T O C H INA
178pp. Uuiversity of Miuuesota Press. $ 18.50.
978 08 1664992 I
V i ct or H . M ai r , tran sl at or
THE A RT OF W AR
Sun Zi's mil itary method s
186pp. Columbia Uuiversity Press. £ 19.95.
978 023 1 13382 I
lacqu er and paint that co nstituted the major
extravagance .
Qin Shihuangdi ("Q in" being the dyn asty,
"shi" "first" , and "huangdi" usually rend ered
as " Emperor") was fam ou sly obsessed with
"m aking everything the sa me ", according to
Frances Wo od in The First Emperor of
China. He introduced China 's fir st standa rd
coi nage, fir st standa rd we ights and measur es,
first standa rd ax le gauge , and - most impor-
tantl y - first uni versal script. His po litica l
integrati on of much of what is China tod ay
lasted littl e more than a dec ade (it wo uld be
repeat ed and ex tended by the subse quent Han
dyn asty), but the script, with later revision s,
rem ain s the mos t tan gibl e ev ide nce of
China's shared ci vili zation. It is indeed what
"has held the country togeth er for ove r 2,000
yea rs" . Wr y, concise and author itative,
Wood' s book endorses the idea that the
Empero r also sough t to " standardize the
mind s of his peopl e" . Critics we re perse-
cuted, all te xts save tho se of a practi cal
natur e were burn ed , and forced labour and
military service we re made universal.
How then to ex plain the Empero r's once
co lourful but hopelessly im practi cal regim ent
of cat walk warriors? Why wo uld an autoc rat
so keen on uniformity have chosen an army
of indi vidual s for his afterwo rld esco rt?
Wood notes "a stunning var iety" of hair styles
and hats as we ll as colour schemes - to which
one might add whiske rs and mou staches. Th e
differentiation was clearl y deliberate; but the
figur es we re no t mo delled from life and their
apparel is not ind icative of rank. Man y
ancient sculptures whose chas te classici sm
we so ad mire were originally paint ed. The
Greeks are thou ght to have preferred their
Apollo s to be as fleshy as pigm ent permitted;
Buddhas and Boddhisa ttvas , outside mu se-
ums, have usuall y been ca ked in go ld leaf or
paint ; and in South Indi a whole templ e
facades of chubby de vtas are now bein g acryl-
icall y restored. If authe nticity is to be
favour ed over antiq ue effec t and aes thetic
prej udice, polych rom e statuary o ught to
please . Yet it is still the clay archer who
look s like the work of ar t, while his paint ed
cou nterpart see ms to have straye d fro m the
fairground.
Around 1890 , Dowager Empress Cixi had
a bo at of stone built in the Imp eri al pleasur e
gro unds attached to the Summe r Pal ace in
Beijin g. In her co ntribution to The Seventy
Wonders of China, ed ited by Jon athan Fenb y,
Wood dismi sses thi s so-ca lled "M arble Boat"
as "a ga udy stone recreati on of a Mi ssissippi
paddle ste amer" . So it is; the last Empress
was no more troubl ed by the con cept of
kitsch than the First Empero r had been. The
boat fares littl e bett er in an engag ing book by
Yi-Fu Tu an ca lled Coming Home to China.
Acc eptin g the theor y that its con struction
was paid for with loan s intend ed for the crea-
tion of a gen uine navy, Pro fessor Tu an sees it
as a fo lie de gra ndeur "for the amuse me nt of
esse ntially one person". "On it she took tea" ,
says Tuan. Lik e the limestone suits of armo ur
(with hel met s) found in one of the First
Em peror's mortu ary pits, the boat was both
symbo l and pla ythin g. "As hum ani sts" ,
writes Tuan, "we should attend to the ways
we toy with natur e for no other purpose than
to indul ge our dark fantasies of total power
and co ntro !." This, he impli es, was what lay
behind the last Emp ress 's unsink abl e boat,
and it may pro vid e a clue to the First
Em peror's unu sabl e army.
Accordin g to Victor H. Mair, in a fine intro-
d uction to his new translation of the cl assic
wor k Sun Zi (also known as The Art of War ),
the three thin gs that mad e warfare in the third
ce ntury so deadl y were the cross bow , the use
of hor ses for cav alry, instead of for chariot-
pulling, and the mass production of iron
wea po nry. Many ex amples of the cross bow's
ingenious trigger mech anism have been
found in the pit s that hou sed the Ter racotta
Arm y, as have a few saddled ter racotta
hor ses. These are led rath er than ridd en,
perha ps because a life-size horse-a nd-r ider
wo uld have tested the potters. But they are
vastly outnu mbered by dr au ght hor ses, both
terracott a o nes and the skeletal rem ain s of
real o nes, man y of w hic h o nce were - and in
some cases still are - attac hed to chariots. As
for iron , so far there is alm ost no sign of it.
Mair beli eves that China 's " Iro n Revolution"
took place in the fifth to third centu ries BC,
and that the techn olo gy cam e from Ce ntra l
Asia. It was Ma ir who, in the 1980s, fir st
drew interna tional attenti on to the so-ca lled
"Tarirn Mummies" - desiccated corpses
preser ved for up to three mill enni a in the
sa line sa nds of X inj iang - man y of whom had
Euro po id featur es, dressed in Ce ltic-like
plaid s, and we re thought to have spoken an
Indo- European langua ge. Victor Mair co n-
 ART HISTORY 9

tributes an essay abo ut them to The Seventy
Wonders . Elsew here, he has es tablished that
these Xinjiang peopl e were famili ar with fer-
rou s technol ogy before it reach ed China
prop er , and that it spread into China from the
north- west. Thi s would make the state of Qin
one of the firs t beneficiaries. No t impl au si-
bly, it was iro n tool s and wea po nry that gave
Qin a cutting edge ove r the other "Warring
States" and so prom oted the First Emperor's
success on the battl efield. Th at bein g so, the
abse nce of such state-of-the-art wea po nry
amo ng his terr acotta warriors can best be
ex plained by ass uming that they we re no
more for real than the limestone armour. Lik e
Beefeaters with battl e-axes, or bearskinn ed
Guards men, the Terracotta Army see ms to
have been a co lourful archaicism, rich in sym-
boli sm but unr ep resent ative of the state of
co ntemp orar y wa rfare .
The Ar t of War deals mainly wi th strategy,
or rather stratage ms . Its pithy aphor isms on
how to influence and out wit an adve rsary
often res urface in self-help book s. The most
popul ar is prob abl y "he who knows his oppo-
nent and knows himself will not be imp er-
illed in a hundred battl es" . Cha irman Mao
was particul arl y fon d of it and eleva ted it
to the ca nonica l status of "a scie ntific truth " .
It was Ma o, too , who was respon sible for
rehabilitatin g the First Em pero r. Until the
mid-t wenti eth ce ntury, nearly all of C hina's
histori ans had di smi ssed Qin Shihuangdi as
a mon ster. His conquests we re see n as milit a-
ristic adve ntures , and his standa rdizations
as co unter-Co nfucian imposit ion s, both of
which might we ll have discredit ed the who le
idea of a unit ed China. In no way co uld they
exc use rank ex ploitation and opp ression by a
megalomanic and eventually dera nged des-
pot. Tho ugh allowa nce was sometimes made
for histori ogr aphi cal prejudi ce - all histori-
ans belonged to the literary elite whose ances -
tor s had been buri ed alive, and wor ks burn ed,
by the Empero r - it made little differenc e to
the general ve rdic t.
But, in 1958 , foll owing a ruthl ess suppres -
The First Emperor: China 's TerracottaArmy runs at the British Mus eum
until A pril6 , 2008
sion of intell ectu als misled by the "hundred
flowers" initiative, Mao signalled a rev ision.
The First Empero r had reputedly "buried 460
scholars alive", he decl ared ; "we have buri ed
460 ,000 .. . . We have surpassed him a
hun dredfold ". Bad maths apart, it is not
clear whether thi s was intend ed as bomb ast
or se lf-criticism. Th e relationship between
the Emperor and the Cha irma n was still
complica ted and seldo m ex plicit. As so me-
one who had him self reunited China, savaged
its intellectu al elite and impo sed an oppres-
sive uniformity, Mao mu st have reminded
many of Q in Shihuangd i. On the other hand ,
thi s was not a comparison that co uld safely
be made until the Empero r him self was
endorsed. This ca me abo ut in the ear ly 1970 s,
co urtesy of book s and articles that awarded
him a pivotal positi on in M arxist-L enini st
historic al theor y. Ju st as Mao had presided
over the tran sit ion from capita lism to
soc ialism, so the First Emperor managed the
change from slave ry to feu dali sm. Criticism
of him was now therefore the wo rk of
"swindlers" and reac tionaries who wou ld
deny "the adva nce of histor y".
Then, as if by way of benediction , in 1974
there ca me reports of the discovery of a Qin
period terracotta figure near the suppose d site
of the First Emperor's mausoleum. It was
found to orginate in a vast pit co ntaining
many other figures, all smashed but number-
ing thousands. Further pits were quickl y
located and opened. In Chinese history, chance
discoveries from some revered era in antiquity
have invariably been interpreted as favo urable
ome ns signifying Heaven' s approva l of the
incumb ent Emperor. The discovery seemed to
vindicate both the reh abilit ation of the First
Empero r and the dispensation under which
the discovery had been made. Mao 's declining
yea rs were marked by a surge of First Emperor
scholarship that drew all the obvio us parallels
and ens hrined Qin Shihuangdi as the founding
father of the Chinese state.
The tomb co mplex spraw ls ove r an area of
56 sq km ; more di sco veries are cer tain, and
much revision will follo w. At the cent re of
the co mplex, beneath a man-m ade hill , the
Emperor's bu rial cham ber has yet to be
ope ned . According to Sima Q ian, writing
abo ut a century after the interm ent , it con-
tained wo nde rs ga lore - cho ice artefacts and
utensils, a hu ndr ed offi cials, tower s and
palaces, seas and rivers of merc ury, a rep re-
sentation of the heaven s and a repli ca of the
ear th. Give n the reve lations so far, there is no
reason to doubt thi s description. Prob es and
sca ns have co nfirmed the ex istence of a large
cha mber , and unu sually high co ncent rati on s
of mercur y have been record ed. According to
the audio-visual present ation for the Lond on
ex hibition, the chamber will " not be opened
in our tim e". Var ious reasons are offe red, the
co mmo nest bein g the challenge pose d by its
co nserva tion. Wh en it is opened, tho se luck y
enough to be aro und sho uld be prep ared for
archaicisms , toys, anythin g indi cative of
"total power an d co ntro l", and nothin g that
is no t "for the amusement of esse ntially one
person".

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10
ussia is preparing for elections to
R the State Duma this Decemb er, and
for the presidenti al elec tions in March
next yea r. These elec tions will pro bably be
fairl y "free" as rega rds voting on the day, but
cer tainly not fair in ter ms of medi a coverage
and ca mpaigning conditions permitted to
op posi tio n parti es and ca ndida tes. Wh ile
den yin g that he wo uld change the co nstitu-
tion to allow himself to sta nd for a th ird term ,
President Putin has ame nded the elec tion
legislation , sacke d Alexande r Ves hnya kov ,
the respected Ce ntral Elec tora l Commission
chairma n who had criticize d the domin ance
of the pro -Krem lin party United Russ ia , and
appo inted in his place Vlad im ir Churov, a
tru sted colleag ue from Putin ' s St Petersburg
days. Nex t he appointed as Premier and poten-
tial subse rvient President Viktor Zubkov ; he
too had serve d with Put in in St Petersbu rg.
The n Putin an no unced his willing ness to
head the United Russ ia part y list and in du e
course take ove r as Premi er.
The elect ions are still more mea ningful in
pro mo ting dem ocratic institution s than in
Soviet days, and it mu st also be an impro ve-
ment that leaders now ex pec t to relinquish
the top post witho ut fir st dying. But with
the mu rder in Lond on last year of A lexan der
Litvinenk o, sup pressio n of the domes tic
media and the BBC Ru ssian Service , and
Ru ssian bo mber s aga in probing Brit ain' s
defen ces, some headlin es are raising the spec -
tre of a return to the Co ld War. Is this ju st
media sensa tion, or does the negative aga in
swa mp the positi ve in assessing Russia' s
progress? How does Putin ' s record as a demo-
crat an d refor mer co mp are with his pre deces -
sors in the Kremlin, Mi kh ail Gor bac hev and
Boris Ye ltsin?
Archie Brown is best known for his study
The Gorhac hev Factor, Leon Aron for his
biograph y of Bori s Yelt sin, and their latest
vo lumes are largely composed of articles
previou sly published on the sa me themes. In
Seven Years That Changed the World, Brow n
focuses on Gorbac hev 's perestroika, und er-
stood as ra dica l re for m or " re vo lution fro m
above" in the yea rs from 1985 to 1991. He
emp has izes the contemporary relevance of
hi s materi al for curre nt deb ates on the
di sintegration of the USS R, the en d of the
Cold War, and in parti cul ar , how to bring
about change in an authori tarian sys tem.
Brown makes quit e ex plicit what was wr itte n
while the changes we re under way , and what
was written with the benefit of hind sight. The
exciteme nt of finally ga ining access to the
transcript s of Politbu ro discussion s - unthink-
able at the tim e - co mes across clearl y. Inter-
views with me n who worked closely with
Gorb achev were also valuable. His admira-
tion for Gorbac hev as the man who changed
the wo rld in seve n ye ars is ev ide nt through-
•-
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POLITICS
More dissident
l AI N E L LI OT
Ar c h ie B r o wn
SEVEN YEARS THAT CHANGED
T HE W ORL D
Perestroika in perspec tive
350pp. Oxford University Press. £25 (US $45) .
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L e o n Ar o n
RUSS IA 'S REV OLUTI ON
Essays 1989- 2006
374pp . Amer ican Enterprise Institute Press. $25.
978 0 8447 4242 7
out, and, of co urse, affects his attitude to
Yeltsin, who m he var iously describ es as a
"maverick populist" or as "radicalised and
unpr ed ictable", acting out of "personal pique" .
He is eq ually forth right in ap plying his red
pencil to Am erican politi cians and aca de mic
collea gues who disagree with him .
Aron takes a much broader app roach to ana-
lysing Russ ia 's "epic ex periment in dem o-
cracy and mod ern capital ism ", inclu din g in
Russia 's Revolution hi s resear ch o n popul ar
novel s and Russian cuisine. Hi s essays and
articles cover the years from 1989 to 2006,
resulti ng, he sugges ts, in a "diary kept by a
fairly we ll-informe d and analytica lly inclin ed
spec tator at a great histori c drama". The
seco nd cha pter is actually his Mo sco w dia ry
for Janu ary 12-17 , 1991, recalli ng with tragic
immedi acy the reacti ons to the stor ming of
the television station in the Lithu ani an capi-
tal, Vilnius, by troop s from the Mini stry of
the Interior. Aron , now Director of Ru ssian
Studies at the A mer ica n En terp rise Institute,
Washington, is bili ngual ; he was born in Mos-
cow and moved to the United States in 1978
at the age of twent y-f our. He participated in
Ye lts ins pr e ss co nfe re nce o n the Vilnius
eve nts, and found him very im pressive: a
stro ng leader who co mmanded the undi vid ed
atte ntion, eve n adoration, of his audience .
Aron was less impressed by Gor bachev' s
respon se to Yelt sin ' s support for the Balti c
states in their striving for ind epend enc e: "The
speec h was trul y hysterical. Red in the face,
the Soviet president ranted and raved, shoo k
his fist, beat his ches t, stomped his feet" . At
the Bogo molov Institut e to mee t Igor Klyam-
kin ("by far the most insightful, ori gin al , and
obje ctive obse rve r of the Sov iet polit ical
sce ne") , Aron fou nd the researchers denounc-
ing Gorbac hev, but also accepting that the
blo od shed in the Baltic dem and ed action
from democrats that wo uld demonstrate how
far they had come since the cowa rdly failure
of most Sov iet intell ectual s to con demn the
invasion of Czechos lova kia in 1968.
Clearly far apa rt o n which President
playe d the grea ter role in bringin g Russ ia to
democracy or in ending the Co ld War, Brow n
and Aro n neverth eless ag ree that the role of
the intelli gentsia, and of the grea t research
institut es, is cru cial. Leader s need politi cal
adv ice and help wi th drafting their speec hes ;
soc iety as a who le needs guida nce. Dem on-
strating his meti cul ou s scholarshi p and pains-
takin g research, Bro wn ada pts to the Sov iet
sce ne the concept of " institutional amphibi-
TLS NOVE M BER 2 2007
ViInius, Lithuania, January 12, 1991
ou sness", by which so me parts of the state
sys tem can simultane ously work for fun c-
tion s and pu rposes co ntradic tory to those
of the state. He has long arg ued that "within-
sys tem refor mers" played a more important
role than di ssident s in cha nging Ru ssia. Yet
his ow n research sugges ts that the distinction
is somewhat artificial. Andrei Sakha rov
moved from "within-system refor mer" to
"dissident" . Gorbac hev him self "wo uld have
been a prime ca nd ida te for exp ulsion from
the Com munist Party as a deviationi st,
if not , ind eed , impri son ment as a di ssident".
Alexander Yakov lev, the true father of glas -
nost, admitted that the refor mers' views, if
ex pressed und er Brezhn ev, would have had
them labelled "diss ide nts". Before adopting
the Eng lish wor d, Ru ssian used a word that
tran slated as "one who think s differentl y" ,
and thi s certa inly meant a far higher propor-
tion of the popul ation than Brown ' s sugges -
tion s of a "few tho usand peopl e" or "minus-
cule and marginalise d" gro ups . Despit e strict
medi a co ntro l, dissident views were dissemi-
nated to milli on s of listener s by foreign
broadcasts in the main langu ages of Eas tern
Europe and the USSR .
Leon Aro n docum ent s we ll the birt h of a
new Ru ssia : the rapi d devel opm ent of Rus-
sia n ca p ita lis m ; the fir st mo ve s to pri vati ze
land ; the beginning of a shift "fro m state-
owned j ustice to a law-b ased state" . His opti-
mi sm see ms to wa ne, ho wever, as he mo ves
furth er into the Putin era. Since 2003, he
ob ser ves, "many a preciou s opportunity has
been was ted and many a potential dan ger
made mor e acute". He shows how the Krem-
lin abuse d the law fo r politi cal reason s to
impri son Mi kh ail Khod ork ovsky, one of the
most successful and charitable new business-
men ; his priva te oil co mpa ny YUKO S passed
to the incomp etent and co rrupt state cont rol-
ler s. He po ints out the danger s which will
flo w from Putiu's deci sio n to have region al
governors appo inted by the Kremlin rather
than dir ectl y elected by their co nstituents,
arguin g that this ris ks destabili zation "and
perhaps eve n disint egrati on ". There are good
chapt ers on the milit ary an d the failur e to
move from a co nsc ripted to a pro fessi onal
army, on Ru ssia' s oil (" natural abunda nce
and politi cal sho rtages"), and on US-Russ ian
relations (A ron ex pects stormy seas , but
con sid ers a new Cold War unlik ely).
"Co ld War" is a vag ue term abo ut which
even ex perts disagree. For Bro wn, it began
with Stalin's impo siti on of his regim es in
Eas tern Europe and ended in 1989, "when the
cou ntri es of Eas tern Euro pe we re allowe d,
peacefull y, to ga in their independ ence" - so
all the cred it goes to Gorbachev, while
"Ye ltsin played no part in its en ding". Others
wo uld qu estion thi s, pointing, fo r instance, to
the Baltic states , still threatened by Sov iet
tank s in 1991, or the Bolshevik cru shin g of
Georgian independ ence in 192 1, not res tore d
till 199 1 - so at least some cred it should go to
Yelt sin. The put sch that was atte mpted in
A ugust 1991 by reacti on aries (Gorbac hev
app oint ees) failed - thanks to Yelt sin. Had it
succee ded, we wou ld have been back to
"Cold War" headlin es eve n before those
inspir ed by Putin. Aro n poi nts out that
Yelt sin vas tly redu ced the military bud get ,
makin g Russ ia much less of a threat.
Gor bachev was determin ed to the en d to
hold the USS R togeth er, but, to his credit,
tried to avo id blood shed. Brow n still beli eves
that a sma ller, voluntary Union (w ithout the
Ba ltic states) co uld, and ind eed sho uld, have
surv ived, especially if Gorbac hev had risked
standing for Presid ent in direc t, un iver sal
elections while he was popul ar in the poll s.
Aro n, by way of co ntras t, already in Janu ary
1991 saw Yelt sin as "the key to Ru ssian
dem ocracy and peaceful decoloni sati on of
the Sov iet empire" . Aron is co ncerned that
Putiu ' s move from democ racy now threatens
the Russian Fede ration. Accordin g to polls,
mos t cit izen s thou ght that gove rnors sho uld
be elected , rather than appointed by the Krem-
lino Fur ther diminishin g of local aut onom y
could pro vok e popul ar resistanc e with the
"horrifying pros pec t" that Mu slim Tatarstan
could becom e an other Chec hny a.
Som e of the benefit s of Aro n's broader but
disparate approac h eme rge fro m his sec tion
on "reinventing values and virtues" . He exam -
ines the expa nsion of the pri vate sector 's
share in the eco nomy and the developm ent of
middle-class attitudes, and ana lyses popul ar
reading habits as a relevant source for eva luat-
ing chan ges in attitudes. In the popul arit y of
Bori s Akunin' s detecti ve novel s he sees a
return to Che khov 's virtues of decen cy, dig-
nity, competenc e and hard wor k. The hero of
these novel s, Fandor in, is scru pulo usly law-
ah idi ng, refu ses hrihes, a nd va lues indi vidual
libert y; his patrioti sm lies not in blindl y serv-
ing the regim e, but in honou rabl y doin g what
he himself judges is in Ru ssia ' s best interests.
Poll s by the Ru ssian Aca de my of Sciences
indicate dram atic ch anges in attitudes since
1990: a grow ing majority prefer to wor k for
the pri vate sec tor , rely on themselves rather
than the state, and ch oose dem ocracy that
guarantees freedom ove r strict state cont rol
that guara ntees sec urity . Perh ap s there is
some hope that these positi ve trend s in Rus-
sian soc iety will prove mor e lastin g than
Putiu' s restorati on of author itarian rule.

Borrowed times
e now think of the French Revolu-
W
tion as a polit ical revoluti on that
had socia l effect, but "the eight-
ee nth cen tury 's conce rn" was of an "ex tan t
and ongoing social revoluti on that wo uld
soo n have polit ical consequence". This is the
ce ntral insig ht of Michael Sonen scher ' s new
book. The larger frame of this socia l Revolu-
tion was " modernity" , that is to say, the
decay of feud al and religious instituti ons,
with the countervailing rise of individu alism,
capit alism, sentimental marr iage , and so on.
But the originality of Before the Deluge is to
focu s these vag ue and at times shopwo rn
themes on to a novel and spec ific probl em,
namely, the rise of public debt. A nd that is an
important achieve me nt.
Living as we do in a warfare/we lfare state,
we acce pt public debt as the price we pay to
corr ect the vaga ries of fate (orp hanage s, pen-
sions, medical care, etc) and of co mpetitive
and globa lize d cap italism (rap id techn ologi-
cal change resulti ng in soc ial obsolescenc e,
etc). But in a simultaneo usly abso lutist and
enlig htened age, wha t was to be made of
publi c debt s that had heen who lly incurred
to fight wa rs and subsidize courtly extra-
vaga nce? Tru e, publi c debt and "doux co m-
merce" we nt hand in hand : much of the gap
between the "liberte des anci ens" and the
"liberte des modernes" , to use Benj amin
Co nsta nt's term s, was in the differenc e
between the outm oded , ancient citizen co n-
cern ed with the publi c life of a com munitar-
ian polis, and, on the other and better hand,
the modern , con stituti onalist and pri vatist
freedom of the bour geois, seriously con-
cern ed by his portfolio, much of it - like the
Rothschilds ' great wea lth - invested in gov -
ernme nt bond s. In that new and mod ern con-
text , public debt was a good thin g: "public
credit might well give rise to economic
pro sperit y and con stitut ion al governme nt".
(So nenscher could, incid entall y, have don e
more with the link between publi c debt and
the emerge nce of capit alism. ) But the great
probl em was , of course , that this selfsa me
"economic prosperit y and constitutio nal gov -
ernme nt could in turn give rise to new polit-
ical risks" . Indeed , "the very constitutional
and instituti onal arra nge me nts that help ed to
make publi c credit sec ure could begin to look
like obstacles to the wider sec urity of the
state as a whole . . .. Onc e public credit was
sec ure, it could give rise to conditions in
which constitutional gove rn ment might have
to go". A horribl e dilemm a, clearly.
Sonen scher ' s concern is to lay out the
ways in which this issue was resolved by
M ontesquieu , Rou sse au , the M arquis Victor
de Mir abeau (the physiocrat father of hi s
better-kn own son, Com te Honore - in turn,
publi cist, porno grapher, speculator and Revo-
lutionary politi cal hero ) and by many minor
or not so min or figur es (Pi erre-P aul Gudin de
la Brenelleri e, For bonnais, Roederer , Necker
and Tur got) , all of them eage r to under stand
the new mech ani sm s of fiscal relati ons
"among abso lute gove rnments, centralized
courts, capit al cities, and the rest of soc iety".
Sonen scher also treats, beyond these fiscal
probl em s, other and larger issues, such as the
ways in which ma nkind 's renewed "capacity
HISTORY
PATRI C E HIGON N ET
Mi cha el So ne nsc he r
BEF O RE T HE DELUG E
Public debt , inequality, and the intell ectu al origins
of the French Revo lution
4 28pp. Princeton U niversity Press. £23.95
(US $39.95).
978 069 1 12499 5
for comm erce" - in the broad , eightee nth-
century sense of the term - " might . . . be
anchored to a genuinely reciprocal set of
soc ial arra ngeme nts" .
This highl y interestin g book begins awk-
wa rdly with a lovingly detail ed exa mination
of the work of Sieyes (the author of What Is
the Third Estate ?) - a turgid and unreward-
ing wr iter on the who le, though lately back
in fashion . Sieyes' s ingeniou s instituti onal
manipulations aimed to separate hierarchi es
of wea lth (including those born of public
debt ) and merit from each other and from pop-
ular sove reignty, so as to neut er by isolati on
the effec t of any drastic cha nge in any one
branch of these varied endeavo urs . Brecht' s
so lution to Stalini st dysfunction was that
the gove rnment should change the peopl e.
Sieyes' s answer to Revolutionary uph eaval
was to crea te one complicated elec toral sys-
tem after another until the right answe r (ie,
Sieyes for President ) finall y popp ed up.
Mor e nobl y, by instituti onalizin g competin g
hierarchi es (soc ial, eco nomic, politi cal and
administrative - as was to be the point of
Napoleon 's Legion of Honour) Sieyess aim ,
like Metternich' s after him , if in a different
register , was to negate those innum erabl e
changes, which eve ryone knew were now
see ping into eve ry pore of modern life.
Historiographically, we might add in pass-
ing, Sieyes also matters for hi s cont emporary
ideolo gical interpretation of the French Revo-
lution, bec ause the man was both the commit-
ted defend er of all form s of prop ert y, includ-
ing those in 1790 of the discr edit ed Catholic
Church, and the adamant prop onent of a
totally sove reign State wh ich made no place
for any kind of plur alism or particul arism.
For that reason , Sieyes - however tiresome
he may have been - is exhibit # 1 for many his-
tori ans who see his proto-totalit arian ideol-
ogy as a key to the politic s of intol erance in
1789 and, after this, to the politic s of violence
during the Terror of 1793. Sieyes, as a prop er-
tied Rou sseaui st, is (absurdi st) proof po sitive
of Rousseau ' s pre-tot alitarian abilit y to
delud e eve n the most con servati ve and unim-
ag inative bourgeoi s minds into thinking that
sove reignty was indi visibl e and dissent
unacceptable. Thus, he is a prim e conn ectin g
link for those who insist not ju st on the Rous-
seauist origin s of the Revoluti on , but on the
ideol ogical continuity that makes the Te rror
of 1793 the necessary effect of the see mingly
libertari an politic s of 1789. Thi s interpr eta-
tion - as will be seen - is of critic al conc ern
to Sonen scher. Far more rewarding, how-
eve r, are his later pages on the expectations
of other Enlightenme nt figur es who were
also concerned with the internationall y
driven and warr ing expansion of public
TLS NOVEMBER 2 2 0 07
11
The Edwin Mellen Press
Publisher ofScholarly Books
credit. David Hum es solution was, surpris-
Households' Livelihoods and Survival
ingly, for the Briti sh State to decl are volun- Strategies Among Congolese Urban Poor
tary bankruptcy. Lin guet, in 1777, thought
that Europe 's two option s we re either commu- Guillaume Iyenda
nist redi stributi on or "a murd erou s and deceit- 978-0-7734-5269-5
ful" sys te m of gove rnment that would defend
prop ert y regardl ess of cost. Mabl y thou ght
that modern Europe was "nearer than one
The Humor ofHuldrych Zwingli
might think to the revolution that [had
brou ght] despoti sm and slavery" to that part Edited and Translated by
of the world . And for the Jansenists - tho se JimWest
Pascalian , Catholic neo-Calvini sts - "public Quartz Hill School ofT heology
credit had no po sitive value" at all. One of 978-0-7734-5482-8
them , Rob ert de Saint- Vincent, rea soned that
the best way to move for ward on this issue
was for the State to go bankrupt because ruin-
ing the rich who ow ned bond s was ob viously Architecture and Regional Identity in the
more desirable than ruinin g the poor who had San Francisco Bay Area, 1870-1970
paid taxes to enable the state to float the Lance V Bernard
bond s in the fir st place. Meanwhil e, the Abb e Corinthian Colleges, Inc
Guillaume Raynal look ed fo rward to Ca rib-
978-0-7737-5340-1
bean slave insurr ect ion s that would destro y
Europe 's bond-funded, col oni al empires .
And Edmund Burk e, of course , in 1790 held
out the pro spect not ju st of "fire and blood " African Economic Development
hut of the man on horseback as the likeliest
Omotunde Evan George Johnson
outc ome of the French Revolution.
Sonen scher is certainl y right to point to 978-0-7734-5409-5
these spec ulations on the natur e and effect of
modernity as a key to Enlightenment think-
ing, and he - like lstvan Hont - is strikingly William Montgomery Brown (1855-1937)
original also in his focu s on publi c debt as a
handl e to con sider that critical them e. But on Ronald M Carden
bal anc e, what strikes me about these suppos - 978-0-7734-54 71-2
edly lugubrious prophets is that most of them
were in actu al fact resolut ely optimistic. The
Marquis de Chas tellux, after the Seven Years
War , concluded that Britain' s overexten sion Diversity and Change in Institutions of
would enable Europe to close "the wo unds of Higher Learning
hum anit y". Sonen scher is very discreet about Adrienne S Chan
Condorcet - one of the two hero es of Emma University College of Fraser Valley
Roth schild ' s exce llent Economic Sentiments 978-0-7734-545 7-6
- who , like Adam Smith, thou ght of modern
economic life as, in her words, a "place of
warm and discursive emotions". And Dupont
de Nemours did indeed write from Delawar e, A Case Study in Thomistic
in 1800 , that France had ju st reverted to "an Environmental Ethics
absolut e monarch y, one more abso lute than Robert L Grant
its predecessor" ; and yet, in a passage not SI. Ambrose University
quoted here, Dup ont had also written to
978-0-7734-5416-3
Adam Smith, befor e 1789 , that "we are rap-
idly moving towards a good constitution [and
that] you have don e much to hasten this
useful revolution". A Cinematic Translation ofIonel
Sonen scher' s emphasis on public credit is Teodoreanu's Lorelei
novel and useful. But he ove rstates his case.
Doris Plantus-Runey
And so his title - Bef ore the Deluge - and the
Oakland University
conn ection he dra ws between his subje ct and
the desolati on of Revolutionary politic s is too 978-0-7734- 5608-2
lin ear. To be sure, cont emporaries did oft en
use natur alistic term s to describ e the Fre nch
Revolution, such as torrent , volca no and, We invite proposals for books that
indeed , "deluge" . Mor eover , Mir abeau pe re will make a contribution to
did certainl y use this very image to describ e scholarship .
the effect of gove rnment debt and annuiti es.
We reply promptly to all enquiries .
But the "deluge" he had in mind was the end
of traditionalist ec onomics and politic s (ie,
1789) and not at all some kind of socio- The Edwin Mellen Press
political and cultural breakd own (ie, the 16 College Street
Terror of 1793-4). To connect pre-Revolu- Lampeter SA48 7D Y
tion ary anxieties about gove rnment debt to Wales UK
Rob espierri sm is - in my view - fanciful. Tel: ++4 4 (0) 15 70423356
Necker, who is describ ed here as the author Fax: ++44 (0) 1570423775
cs @mellen.demon.co.uk
www.mellenpress.co.uk
 12 HISTORY

ce pooling a widely scattered collection of original medieval
a g from the 13th to the 16th centuries, sourced from libraries
pe
pe manuscript sources detailing the journeys of legendary travellers
o Prester John and Marco Polo to Sir John Mandeville and John
Capgrave.
• Translations and supporting materials (all of which are fully searchable).
• Interactive maps showing the routes of the travellers.
• Introductory essays by leading scholars.
of a "moderate endorse ment of public cred it"
(when he was in actua l fact the ma n who
more than anyo ne relied on gove rnme nt debt
to finan ce the senesce nt O ld Reg ime), did
also use the term "deluge" (in a text not cited
here) but he did so in a way that differed rad i-
ca lly fro m Mi rabeau' s. Nec ker made no con-
nect ion whatsoever bet ween pre-R evolution-
ary publ ic finance and what he had expe ri-
ence d politicall y since 1789 ; his co ncern in
1796 was for a "deluge moral qui men ace la
terre" and was the result of a "mo nstrous
union of philosoph ical ideas with the most
violent pass ions, a union which see ms to
reca ll the criminal pact of the Bible . . . the
marriage of angels with the da ughters of
men". We are a long way here from the dark
effects of government bond s.
Of course, to travel non- stop fro m the pre-
Revoluti on to some ens uing Te rror has for
ever been a temptin g solution for criti cs of
1789: thus, for Tocquevi lle, an instituti onalist,
the Frenc h were in the habit of moving inexo-
rably and repeatedly from monarchic centra l-
ized governme nt to Republic an anarchy and
internecin e strugg le born of gove rnmental
inexperience, and from there back to a healin g
centra lized and monarchic gove rnme nt. For
the Marxists, a rising bourgeo isie rose in 1789
to ove rthrow a vestigially feud al Old Regime,
and then, in 1793, ca lled in the terrori stic
sans-culottes to fini sh this self-same task.
Lik ewise, for Francois Furet, readings
from Rousseau pro vided the content of new
definiti on s of total sove reignty with its
impli ed ju stification of democ ratic violence,
first in 1789, and then , in agg rava ted for m, in
1793. Eac h of these antithetica l cont inuit ies
has its fans and critics . And it is this sa me
conce rn for ideas and continuity which
perhaps explains Keith Baker' s mildl y ambi g-
uous endorse ment of Sonen scher ' s boo k.
For him, Bef ore the Deluge "could be a
paradigm- shifting book for the hi story of
eightee nth-ce ntury thou ght" : "could be"
rather than "is", because So nensc her
approaches political theor y more fro m the
perspect ive of gove rn mental fundi ng than of
Rousseau ' s definiti on of sove reignty in the
Socia l Contract; but "paradigm shift", non e-
theless, because this book works (unwar rant-
edly in my view) to connect the Terro r to pre-
Revolutionary ideol ogical concerns.
A grea t deal of the probl em here has to
do with Sonenscher's curiously ahistoric al
approach to the ideol ogical stateme nts he has
chro nicle d. This is a wor k of classicalldeen-
gesc hichte, and much of it is a tapestry
woven from loving descripti ons of the influ-
ence of X on Y, without much regard to the
circum stances - cultu ral , social, or politica l -
of either X or Y. Revealin gly, for example,
the book does not end either in 1789 or 1793.
Its closing pages are about Jean- Bapti ste Say
after 1800 , followed by eight pages on
Co nrad Georg Friedrich Elias von Schmidt-
Phiseld eck, an utterl y unkno wn and insignifi-
cant director of Denmark' s national bank ,
who in 1820 wrote on publ ic credit. That
the French Revoluti on , with its successes and
its failur es, separates their speculations from
tho se of their predecessors see ms not to have
mattered . Nor does it see m to matter to
Mich ael Sonen scher' s arg ument of terrori st
continuity that Sieyess first conc ern during
the Te rror was to say and do as littl e as he
could: when asked if it was true that he had
spent tho se hea dy month s hid ing in a garre t,
the man repli ed cryptica lly , "J' ai vecu" (I
survive d). In brief , this book "is about
eightee nth-century concepti ons of the futu re
and, in particul ar, the futur e of a world made
up of sove reign states with public debt s" . As
such, it is a genuinely meanin gful contribu-
tion to the histor y of Enlightenmen t Europe .
All historians of this epo ch will want to rea d
it. But as a contribution to the history of
the French Revo lution and espec ially of the
Te rro r of the Yea r 11, its fate will be more
uncertain .

Tinkers

"A dog 's obeyed in office "

I feared them like I also feared the Guards

as wie lders of some undom estic power,
afra id that, if I didn 't ma ke out well,
I'd end up in a tent beside the road,
unable to get wa rm: that, when I'd gone,
This collection gives undergraduate students and independent researchers all I'd leave behind would be a patch
alike broad new possibilities within their taught courses and individual projects. of grey, wet ash where the gree n syca more
had offered little heat or light or swee tness.
• Unique manuscript material relating to the activities and observations of
In later years, of cour se, I ca me to know
British and American diplomats, missionaries, business people and tourists
that thei r authority was nothin g to be afra id of:
in China from 1793 to 1980, together with rare periodicals, colour paintings ,
that the wea k are always stigmatized
interactive maps, photographs and drawings .
to make thin gs eve n better for the strong.
• Completely new content , unavailable in any other digital collection.
• User-friendly with full-text searching and detailed meta-data along with And yet beware ! Rem emb er that young boy
interactive functionality. who quarrelled ove r butt er at ou r door
and took his vengea nce by nea rly winning over
the dog the famil y had tried to set on him.
The dog stood spellbound, listening, ea rs alert,
to the hoarse, alluring voice ca lling " Bran ! Bran !"

For a FREE four-week trial of either of these

B ER N ARD O 'DO NO GH U E
resources visit our webiste at:
www.amdigital.co.uk
TLS N OVE M BER 2 2 0 07

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R. T 11 "
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Th e Thames as medieval commercial highway; from the new edition ofTlze Times History ofLOlldon, edited by Hugh Clout (192pp. HarperCollins. £25 . 978 0 00 726643 2)
hames: Sacred River is a huge book
T which goes its ow n way , takes its tim e,
covers lon g period s of histor y, and
lovin gly disco ver s and displ ays fact s, opin-
ion s, myth s and ima gin ati ve rend erin gs of its
subject. Its short chapters roughly foll ow the
Th ames from its source in Glo uces tershire to
its issuin g forth into the sea near Southend. In
the cour se of the book, Peter Ack ro yd dips
and di ves back into the River Tha mes's
multiple pa sts, to prehi stor ic times, the
Rom an , An glo- Saxon and Norm an Occupa-
tion s and the centuries when it became
impo rtant as a tradin g river , an indu stri aliz ed
waterw ay and at different tim es a location for
pa stim es and plea sures: fishin g, boatin g,
ob ser vin g from the banks and brid ges, and -
though not too much, bec ause of its tidal
flow, cold temp eratur es and murkiness -
swimming.
Ackroyd reli shes the cont ra sts bet ween
th e " rusticity" of the narr ow river running
throu gh gree n countryside near its so urce, the
river of The win d ill the Willows and Three
Men ill a Boat, and the "urbanity" of the
broad river swee ping through London as the
cit y gre w and pro spered along its bank s.
Throughout his book he writes surprisingly,
but deliberately and unapologetic all y, about
the "sacredness" of the Thames . It is, he says
at the end of the first chapter ,
the river of dreams, but it is also the river of sui-
cide. It has been called liquid history because
within itself it dissolves and carries all epoc hs
and generations. They ebb and flow like water.
Thi s passage is repr esent ati ve. It is com-
ma nding, luc id, confident and confidence-
inspiring, yet impressioni stic, met aphorical,
c arry ing us alon g on a rh etoric a l surge , per -
hap s in the hop e that we won' t as k too curi -
ously who called the Tha mes "liquid hi story"
and what that might add to our knowled ge of
the river, or notic e that if the remarks about
dr eam s and suicide, ebb and flo w, are true of
the Thames, they are likely to be equally true
of any large river - the Nile or the Tib er, for
ex ample . We are to acco mpany Ackroyd on
hi s enthusias tic journey and are to believe,
with him , in the "sacredness" of a river which
ha s, in truth, as the book amply shows , man y
featur es belonging to its histor y and geo-
graphy which see m very far from spirituality.
HISTORY
II I r ,
HI\.KHt'PI
Sweet, sometimes
ROSEMARY ASHTON
P eter Ackro yd
TH AM E S
Sacred river
456pp. Chatto and Windus. £25.
978 0 70 I 17284 8
Th e fir st few chapter s are somewhat
burd ened by Ackroyd' s desire to cast the
Th am es as both repr esentati ve of the genu s
river , and a special and particu lar ex ample of
the ge nus. Until he reach es the age of Briti sh
greatness on the world stage , and the reign s
of kin gs and qu een s from Henry VlIl and
Elizabeth I to Victoria when he can glory in
the river ' s geop olitic al and historic al particu -
larities and the grand uses made of it by tho se
mon arch s, his efforts to give us a distinctive
river rel y partl y on ph ysica l detail s abo ut its
depth and bre adth at different points, the land -
scape of its banks, the flor a and fauna of its
meadows, creek s, island s and tributaries.
Such detail s have their interest and are
describ ed with gusto. Ackroyd is, how ever,
as his subtitle disclo ses, mor e deepl y
eng age d by the spiritual and ima gin ati ve uses
hum an bein gs have made of the river, its
mythic al qual itie s for early riverside dwell -
ers, whose wa ter rites and ceremonies can be
reconstru cted , or gue ssed at, from anc ient
bur ial mounds such as tho se discov ered at
Ahin gdon in Oxfordsh ire . Aerial phot ogra-
ph y, he point s out , ha s "produced ghost
images of ancient enclosures clo se to the
Th ame s, shadow lands of lines and rect angl es
and circles sca rce ly visible within the
mod ern terr ain ". For imaginative rend erings,
often full of mytho logical allusions, he
invok es the many Eng lish poet s who have
turn ed their atte ntion to the Thames, from
Ch auc er and Spen ser to Mi lton, Wordsworth
and T . S . Eliot.
Ackroyd' s pro se sustains its visionary
ton e throu gh man y a chapter, discu ssing,
with perv er se but equ al relish, matters such
TLS NOVE M BE R 2 20 0 7
as sewage , rubbi sh, corp ses, po vert y, the
back-breaking labour and free swearing of
tho se indu stri alized Th ame s-side inhabitants
and workers of the late eight eenth century
onward s. Th e sinister Thames of Dick ens' s
novel s, of suicides , murd er victims , and the
"resurrection men " who pillaged their bodi es
at night ; the stinking river of 1858, when raw
sewa ge flo win g into the Thames on a summer
da y cau sed Memb ers of Parliament to run
from the chamber clutching handk erchi efs to
their no ses, pu shed fin ally to dec ide that
something mu st be don e; and the busy scenes
of hundreds of ships plying up and down, and
the loadin g and un loading of good s in the
docks which caught the admi ring attention of
visitors like Enge ls - thi s Th ames is give n
full attention by Ackroyd , as we might ex pect
from the biographer of Dickens. He reminds
us of the forg otten origin of word s in current
use such as "toe-rag" (a worker in the grain
warehouses of Millwall Docks who wore
sacking over his boots) and "s teve dore" from
the Spani sh word for packer, "estibador" .
Ackroyd has the gift of rom anticizing the
everyday ; his writing is the lingui stic eq uiva-
lent of Turner ' s paint ing "Rain, Steam, and
Speed - the Great Western Rail way" , and he
shows how that painting itself (reproduced
here among man y beaut iful colour illustra-
tion s) celeb rates the confident geniu s of
Brunei as repr esent ed by the bridge at Maid-
enhead. Ackroyd' s sentences cel ebr ate and
e m ula te ho th the construct ive tal e nt of
Brunei and the de scripti ve talent of Turne r:
The bridge itself, constructed by Brunei, was a
miracle of engineer ing. It was the largest span
of brick building in Europe. It was believed by
many that it co uld not be fini shed or, once
erected, that it could never last. It was thro wn
across the river in two spans, the central arches
meetin g on an ey ot in the middl e of the
Thames. The original con tracto r, distraught at
the problems of the enterprise, had asked to be
relieved of his respon sibiliti es; it was feared
that once the wooden scaffolding had been
remo ved the arches would collapse. Brunei
13
stayed true to his original vision. Those small
red bricks have, in the last 170 years, been
subjec t to a pressure that must approach the
extreme limit of sustainability; yet they have
survive d.
Thi s is what is best about Ackroyd ' s book ,
its combination of height ened pro se and
instructive detai l. A lthou gh Thames: Sac red
river abounds in such moments, it is, at
nearl y 450 pages, a litt le bloated . Th e author
does not often resist the temptation to fini sh
off a chapter, section, or eve n para graph with
a sounding but unnecessary flouri sh . Aft er
qu otin g a pa ssage about suicides from Wat er-
loo Bridge, in Dick en s' s essay " Night
Walks" (1860) , Ackroyd offers the redundant
conclu sion : "For Dicken s the river was inex-
tric ably bound up with the con sciou sne ss of
death". And is it necessar y to spell out that
tho se, like Turner and Milton, who are born
by the river "cl aim an especial affinity with
it" ? More seriously , th e c o nne cting phrase
"that is wh y" is empl oyed far too often in
ord er to per suad e the read er of a logica l rela-
tion which doe s not ex ist. Thu s he fo llows
a passage of quotation from John Evelyn
describing Charles II' s great river pageant
in 1662, cel ebr atin g his Restoration and
marriage to Cath erin e of Bra ganz a with the
puzz ling rem ark "That is wh y, at the tim e of
the Plagu e and the Fire, in 1665 and 1666
respecti vely, [the Th ames] became the
instinctive plac e of refuge" . Surel y, says the
no-n on sense reader, people turn ed to the
Thames because it wa s their neare st es cape
rout e from plagu e and fir e, not becau se their
King had cho sen to revive Tudor pag eantr y
in order to con solidate his position after the
recent period of Republicani sm .
Thames is the product of prodi giou s
research , more than cou ld have been under-
taken by one person ; indeed , Ackroyd duly
ackno wled ges his two researchers, Thomas
Wtight and Murrough O 'Bri en, at the end of
the book. Scho lars and students will, how ever,
fee l frustrated by the lack of footnotes giving
detail s of the widely scattered sources , and
will also perhaps feel cheated by the numer-
ou s occa sion s where no particular source is
even hint ed at, Ackroyd preferring a general
" It has often been thought" . Nonetheless, the
book is a rich offering by a masterly wr iter.
14
From egotism to epic : how Words worth' s inspired "b reathings" contain the world that surrounds him
ordsworth ' s poems are
W adm ired for man y reaso ns.
Some readers are bou nd to
think of him chi efly as a natur e
poet, or as a narrati ve poet , or a philosophical
and reflec tive po et, or a poe t of ru ral life and
cu stom ; oth ers might ca re for him mor e as a
lyrici st or sonneteer, or eve n as a writer on
po litica l and patri otic them es. These ca te-
gor ies are obv iously not excl usive of one
anoth er ; man y of his poems ca n be classified
in seve ra l ways at once , or ca n be seen to
move from one mode to anoth er as they
proc eed.
Early in his caree r he also becam e known
as a striking ly "egotistical" and self-absorbed
po et - the first of these adjec tives bein g
appli ed to him most famously, thou gh not
ex clusive ly, by the yo ung John Keats. (In a
letter to his fr iend Richard Woodho use ,
Keats distin gui shed bet ween his own chara c-
ter as a poet - "u npoetica l" he ca lled it - and
the "wordsworthian or ego tistica l sublime" .)
Word sworth him self came close to acknow l-
edg ing that something of thi s sort could be
fairly said of him . Referrin g to the lon g,
unfini shed po em that became kno wn after
his death as The Prelude, he wro te that it
was "unparalleled in literar y histor y that a
man sho uld talk so much abo ut him self' - a
remark suggesting that in hi s case self-
knowled ge and se lf-satisfaction managed
quit e eas ily to coh abit with one anoth er.
As a qu alit y of mind and character ,
Word sworth' s "egotism" was ce ntral to his
natur e ; it is therefore bo und to lie at the heart
of his grea tes t ve rse . It is present eve n when
he writes abo ut mood s or states of bein g that
in fact appe ar so ge ne ra lize d as to be
strange ly at odds with o ur usual notions of
indi vidu alit y and self-co nsciousness . At his
best he was a peculi arl y ph ysiol ogical poet -
by whi ch I mean that he managed to articu-
late the anony mo us, humble, non- volitional
bodil y proc esses that precede all thou ght , and
without which thinking cannot take place. In
additi on to all the other mod es in which he
wrote , he was in effec t a poet of the auto-
nomic ner vou s sys tem , the spinal cord , the
digesti ve tract, the circulation of the blood ;
he was also preoccupied to an exceptional
degree with the capacit y of peopl e to notic e
thin gs without bein g con sciou s of havin g
done so, and to retain an unreco gnized
memory of them until some later circum-
sta nce should stir it int o lif e .
At one point in The Prelude he writes that
his "theme has been I Wh at passed within
me" , as if his "me", his con sciou s, reflective,
compo sing self, were not the initiator of what
he is doing, but merely the site or arena within
which certain activiti es - mem ories, moods,
appetites - mayor may not reveal them selves
to him . In the same passage he says that this
them e is "far hidden from the reach of words",
which impli es that in his writing he has to do
much more than find an approximate
verbal mode of repr esentin g his ex perience .
Rather, he goes on to say, his task is to "make I
Border crossings
DANJA COBSO N
Breathin gs for incommunicable powers" .
His use here of that eerie, estrang ing,
plur al term "b rea things" is typi cal of the
lan guage Wordsworth employs when ex plor-
ing sublimina l areas of ex perience such as
these. (My two-volume Sho rter Oxfo rd Eng -
lish Dic tiona ry gives not a single exa mple of
the word bein g used, whether by Wordsworth
or anyone else , in thi s particular form .)
Breathing is an acti vity we ordinarily carry
out witho ut noticing that we are doin g so,
thou gh any interruption of it will remind us
sharply that our lives depend on it. But
"breathings"? Wh at are they? Wh ere do they
ori ginate? Something similar might be asked
of the use he mak es of the word "drinking" ,
"Ambleside" (cl835-40, detail) by Peter DeWint; from Peter DeWint 1784-1849: " For
the common observer oflife and na ture" (208pp. Lund Humphries. £55 . 978 0 853319375)
which he app lies not ju st to the slaking of
thir st, but to the inducing of such states as
pleasur e, ca lm and "visionary po wer" .
"Feeding" and "flowing" also recur (the
latter bein g used to ev oke, among oth er
thing s, both the mo vement and the " suspen-
sion" of blood in the veins) . "Trance" and
"trances" recur too, figu ring in each ca se not
as a door way to the supernatura l but , on the
contrar y , as a description of moods of hei ght-
ened recepti vity to "the very wor ld which is
the wor ld I Of all of us" . This po et hears not
onl y his ow n vo ice , but , mor e significantly
still, the " internal echo of the imp erfect
so und" - the suggestion plainl y bein g that
that echoing, internal voice is the mor e per-
fect of the two. Lik e his own C umberland
Beggar ("seeing still I And never kno win g
that he sees"), or the suckling infant at the
breast "drinking passion from his moth er ' s
eye", he see ms to be most eng age d with
whateve r is around him preci sely when his
con sciou sness is apparently in abeya nce .
TLS N O V E M B E R 2 20 07
This applies even to his vocation as a
poet. In Book I of The Prelude, he describ es
ho w he arrived at the subje ct of his greates t
poem unkn owin gly, without meaning to do
so : in fact , at the very tim e he was bitt erly
reproachin g him self for havin g got no where
with his ambition to write the kind of epic
poem that had been his aim for man y years,
and for thu s failin g to live up to the pro mi se
of his childhood and early yo uth. A single
disappointed yet ecs tatic recoll ection of
that earlier tim e ("was it for thi s I The one,
the fair est of all rivers . .. I . . . se nt a voice
that flo wed along my dreams" ) is follo wed
rapid ly by a success ion of oth er such memo-
ries, all of them brin gin g him to realize
that the epic theme he has been sea rching
for will not be the tale of the foundin g of
a nation or empire, the topi c to which all
traditional epics had hith erto been devoted ,
but the story of his ow n Bildung, "the grow th
of a poet ' s mind ". Thereafter "the road lies
plain " before him .
Willi am Hazlitt , who had been amo ng
the first to take notic e of the "egotism" of
Wordsworth both as a per son alit y and a poet ,
wro te that he was so meone who "contem-
plate s th e pa ssion s and habits of man not in
their ex tremes but in the first elements" . To
try to schema tize Word sworth' s mode of deal-
ing w ith these "first elements" is to falsify it;
neverth eless, it is useful to think of him
evoking in verse three di stinct levels of
hum an awa reness . Th e mo st basic consists of
instincts and impulses that are the same for
all men and wo men, thou gh they manifest
them selves differentl y within each indi vid-
ual. Of such eleme nts Word sworth says that
they lie hidden "beyond the reach of word s" .
It follow s, then , that they cannot be articu-
lated by dir ect assa ult, as it we re; they can
be brou ght into the light of day onl y by the
depiction of places, incidents, emotions ,
per son s (the poet him self, often enoug h)
which will rend er access ible the deeper
"fluxes and reflu xes of the mind" . The over-
all effe ct is to interfu se such movem ent s of
mind - which by their natur e are involuntar y
and virtua lly anon ymous - with proc esses
that can be recalled and worked over by the
poet.
Onc e thi s effort of con sciou sness is acco m-
pli shed , Wordsworth relaxes into what can
be call ed a kind of mor al hydraulics: he
tries to dra w his verse toward s a third , yet
"higher" level of meanin g, and it is then that
he is inclin ed to fall into dida ctici sm , into
tryin g to present to his reader s a con sidered,
establis hed, and uni ver sall y applica ble
wor ld-view . In his an xiety to "rectify men ' s
feelin gs" (as he wro te of his aim s in another
lett er), he com es unco mfortabl y clo se to
formu latin g rules for livin g: an am bitio n
which is dir ectl y at odd s with the passion
and tent ativ eness that mark his writing about
the two mo re primitive level s of ex perience
outlined abo ve.
Associ ated with these preoccupations is
his brooding over boundaries and margin s of
all kind s: a feature of his verse that many
criti cs have comment ed on. Knowin g from
experi ence (som etimes to the point of
despair) ju st how un yielding boundaries
within the mind can see m to be, he knows
also that the more clo sely they are looked at,
the mor e fluid and decepti ve they will turn
out to be. Within him self he find s that a myr-
iad of cro ssin g points lie between sleep and
wa kefulness; memory and for getfulness;
compa ssion and in difference ; e ne rgy and
sloth ; thou ght and emo tio n (and whateve r is
belo w them both ); the past as it was whe n it
was present and as it is now in memory; the
futur e in which the mom ent he is currently
livin g throu gh mayor may not be rem em-
bered, in circumstanc es that are now unimagi-
nabl e to him. And beyond ? There, too, from
moment to m om ent, c o untless di stinction s
are for ever bein g mad e and unm ade: bet ween
him self and other humans, for example;
bet ween all hum an s as a cla ss and innum era-
ble oth er, speec hless form s of life - some
see ming ly insenti ent (tre es, rock s, lesser
celandines), others unmi stakabl y sentient
(dogs, shee p, bird s); bet ween all that lives
and dies and that which has never been alive ;
between hi s ow n spe cies, c onsc io us of it s
mortality, and the countless creatur es spared
that fate.
Henc e, on thi s last point, the fascin ation
that outc ast figures like tramp s, discharged
so ldiers, "old men tra vellin g" , leech-
gatherers and suchlike peopl e have for
him. About Wordsworth ' s attitude to peopl e
of thi s kind ther e is little or nothing Oxfam-
like. Preci sely bec ause he cann ot take his
eyes off them , he wa nts them to remain ju st
as they are, and he find s vario us spec ious
rea son s why bu sybodi es and do -good ers
should leave them alone in their wea kness

and incomprehension. Why? So that he
ca n con tinue to ma rvel at their tottering,
hovering ex istence between the two in-
com mensurate worlds they sim ulta neously
appear to inhabit.
And from mome nt to moment their case
ca n become his too. What relation , he is
driven to ask, do these lakes and mountains,
these trees and mo nume nts of the hum an pas t
have with me - and I with them? Am I not in
danger of bein g crus hed by them? By their
ignorance of and indiffe rence to me? How
ca n I be so aw are of them , so exhilarated and
frightened by the ir variety and solidity, their
change and dur abilit y, while they, who have
such an effec t on me, do not eve n know that I
exis t? Am I nothin g to them, then ? If so, why
am I so drawn to them , why does their
presence or the mere thought of them affec t
me so grea tly? Wh y can they not respond in
kind? Don' t they owe me something - an
acknow ledgement at least, eve n perh aps a
little gratitude? How is it that natural phenom-
ena appea r to have so viv id a life - when
clouds move togeth er in the sky or wa ter is
ruffl ed or trees sway, or, perhaps most com-
pellin gly of all, when they stan d motionless ,
as if in tranquil self-co ntemplation - and
yet also remain mute, unco mprehend ing and
--------------------------~.--------------------------
he publi cation of The Invisible
T Woman, Claire Tom alin' s accla imed
biograph y of Ellen Tern an, in 1990,
mark ed some thing of an epoch in Dicken s
studies, both for its convincing sense of how
deepl y enta ngled Char les Dickens' s and
Te rnan's lives we re between 1857 and 1870,
and for the teasing enigma that it left as far as
the exac t nature of their rel ationship was con-
cern ed. To ma lin's wor k summarized and
enlarge d on more than a century of spec ula-
tion and scho larship about Ellen' s life and its
significa nce for Dicken s' s in an adm irably
lucid and convinci ng way. It may have
seeme d that with its publication and the
complet ion of the grea t Pilgrim ed ition of
D ickens's letters, there was no w littl e more
to discover. Yet, from a lucky discovery in a
provincial auctioneer's catalog ue, we now
know that Elle n Te rna n also publi shed a
book , hith erto unkn own to scho larship and
almos t lost to knowledge.
In 1894, there appea red from F. Thevoz &
Co of Ge neva and J. R. Gotz of London a
beautiful quarto volume by Emile Yung, a
distin gui shed Sw iss scientist. Originally
publi shed in French, it was a copi ously
illustrated guide to Zer ma tt and the surro und-
ing area , with a numb er of stunningly beauti-
ful images of the valley. The English transla-
tion is a hard book to find: I have manage d to
trace only one cop y in a publi c collection in
the United Kingdom (in the National Library
of Sco tland), and a handful overseas. But it is
not the apparen t rarit y of the book or the
beauty of its illu strations that makes this so
exceptional a publi cation , but the ident ity of
its translator, proudl y procl aim ed on the title
page: "Translated fro m the French by Mr s
Wh arton Robinso n of London".
After the death of Dicken s and the end of
their thirteen- year clandestin e re lationship,
Ellen Tern an effected a remark able self-
tra nsform ation . Redu cing her age by some
ten yea rs or so, she met a young clergyman ,
George Wharton Ro binso n, whom she
marri ed in 1876, and bega n life with him
COMM ENTARY
incomprehen sibl e, forever beyond my reach ?
Or does the truth of the matt er not lie the
other way around: is it not they who would
forever remain in "disconnection dead and
spiritless" if I we re not here to wo nder at
them ? In which case , is it not they who
depend on me to give them life and awa re-
ness, to speak to them and for them ? More
than that: surely I am not decei ving myse lf at
those dizzying mom ents when I feel I can
take them into myself and transform them,
make them me ? I eat them, drink them ,
breathe them ; they flow within me; they hear
with my ea rs and see with my eyes; I refl ect
them as a lake reflects whateve r is above
and aro und it, myself includ ed , and like a
lake I have depth enough to contain all that
surrounds me.
If this is so - the hidd en " argument" of the
verse see ms to continue - and if I use to the
utmost the capacities I have had the good for-
tu ne to be endowe d with, then in spea king for
myself I do so not merely for the inanim ate,
speechless wor ld around me, but also for all
other men and wo me n who are not endowe d
as I am, and to whom I am therefore indi spen-
sable. For it is prec isely through the ca pac i-
ties that mark me out as excep tional, different
from other men and wo men, a true poet, that
Acts of translation
in Margate. It was, as To malin puts it, a
"phoenix-like renewal from the ashes of one
life to becom e an entirely new person". The
Wh arton Robin son s bec ame respect ed
member s of the Margate community , where
Geor ge ra n a schoo l and his wife was a pillar
of local soc iety, giving highl y accla imed
readin gs from Dicken s' s wor ks. After 1886,
however, George suffered so me kind of
breakdo wn , whereupon the Wharton Robin-
sons and their two children move d to London
and , in To malin' s wor ds, "sank into o bsc u-
rity". Mr s Wharton Robin son maint ained
her literary connection s, however, continuing
to see member s of the Dick en s famil y as
well as, natur all y, her elder sister Fa nny, the
novelist Fra nces E. Trollop e.
After some time, Ge orge made some thing
of a recove ry and the Wh arton Ro binso ns
rent ed a large house in Sutherland Avenue,
Maida Vale, and opene d another schoo l. It
was mainl y for day boys, but also enro lled
foreign boarders to learn English, who gave it
the "air of a lingui stic aca demy". Times may
have been hard for the Wharton Ro binso ns at
this period: Ellens letters from Dickens are
reported to have been offered for sale to a
collec tor in 1893. At some point in the
mid-I 890s, the school was given up, hut we
know for certain that the Wharton Robin son s
we re still at Sutherla nd Avenue in 1894, as
Fa nny staye d there for Christmas that yea r.
Geor ge had no broth er s and so, unless there
was another Mr s Wharton Robinso n living
in London in 1894 , who spoke French, had
literar y conn ections and needed the income
or prestige that ca me from publi shin g such a
translation, we must count Zerma tt and the
Valley of the viege as a uniqu e and hitherto
unkn own publica tion by Elle n Te rna n.
We know fro m Ellen's few surviving let-
ters that she was a fluent and spirited writer,
TLS NOVE M BE R 2 20 07
they will be able to discover eve rything that
ultim ately makes me represent ative of them
(of them as they sho uld be, anyway) . If I can
manage that, then I will have pro ved myse lf
equal in stature to the epic heroes of the past,
whose lives inspir ed milli on s to follow them,
and in so doin g have enabled the popul ace at
large to see yet another kind of retl ection of
itself in its heroes' lives and achievements.
After all which it may seem anticlim actic
(though I do ubt Word sworth him self wo uld
have thou ght it so) to add that though he
wrote some rhyming poem s that will be read
as long as English poetry is read by anybody
- lyrics such as the Lucy poem s, narrati ve
poem s such as "Resolution and Ind epend-
ence", so nnets such as "On Westminster
Brid ge" and " Surprised by Joy" - he is in my
view at hi s grea test in his blank verse . I am
thinking here of much of The Prelude, above
all, but also of tales such as "Mi chae l" or
the story of Margaret from ano ther long,
unfinished poem, The Recluse, as well as of
vignettes such as "O ld Ma n Travelling" and
"The Old Cumberla nd Beggar " , and poem s
of recoll ect ion and reaffirm ation such as
"T intern Abb ey" .
It wo uld see m that the esse ntially fram e-
like natur e of rhyme, its manner of creating
and many of the same qualiti es are present in
her ass ured translation , which moves eas ily
between Y ung 's more descripti ve and more
se ntentious mod es:
These wome n are certainly not handsome; they
are robust and we ll-se t; their honest, goo d-
humoured pleasant faces are pleasant to look
upon; they move with an active step and "live
laborious days". The children wear a droll
costume, and look like little old men and
wome n in their long skirts, and caps fitting
tightly to the head. But what cheeks they have !
How vigorously the blood circulates in these
young bodies, brought up in the open air and
sunshine!
It is, of course, only a translatio n, but
translation fro m French into English was
near the heart of Ellen Ternan ' s relationship
with Dickens. He only once attempted to por-
tray her physical appearan ce in fiction, and
did so in the character of a bilin gual French-
wo man, in "the short, slight, pretty figur e, a
quantity of golden hair, a pair of blue eyes
that met his ow n with an enquiring look" of
the seve nteen-yea r-old Lucie Manette in A
Tale of Two Cities, the first novel he wro te
after they met. Although Luci e is French,
she comes to England as a sma ll child and
is fluent in hoth languages, her whole life a
matter of tran slation between the two cities of
the book' s title and the cultures, nations and
languages that they represent. Ellen was not
French but had a gift for languages, spoke
French well and taught it for many years.
Far fro m prying eyes, she and Dickens
tra velled together in France (and were injured
returning from it in the Stap lehurst railway
acc iden t), and in all probability lived there
together; and if, as seems possible, they had a
child, then in all likeliho od he or she was
born there.
There is some thing curi ously fragmented
15
expec tations and fulfilling them at appro pri-
ate moments, cuts across the ex pression of
some of Wordsworth ' s deepest gifts and com-
pul sions. Rhyme is a source of pleasure for
poets and reader s alike; but not to this parti-
cular poet, when he see ks both to es tablish
and to dissol ve his own selfhoo d at its deep-
est levels. Not when his thought s have to
move by way of a co ntinua l probi ng forward
into the dark , with all the ca ution and exci te-
ment of a speleo logist who never knows
whethe r or not he might suddenly find him-
self hanging ove r shee r space . No t whe n his
"labo ur", as Word sworth put s it (in a passage
that is not merely physiol ogical in its reac h
but posi tively uterin e), is to "trace .. . the
strea m I Fro m darkness, and the very place of
birth I In its blind cave rn whence is faintl y
heard I The sound of wa ters " - and then to
follo w it "to light I And open day" .
This essay will appear shor tly in Literary
Ge nius, a collection of essays edited by
Joseph Epstein and published in the United
States by Paul Dry Books. Among the British
contributors are Tom Shippey, Elizabeth
Lowry, John Gross , Hilary Mantel, A. N.
Wilson, Freder ic Raphael and David
Womers ley.
about Ellen Ternan' s life: Tomalin comp ares
her to "a heroin e cull ed from the pages of
Thomas Hardy" in her secret past, her grasp-
ing of respectabilit y and, perhaps also, indomi-
tabilit y. Like so much else in her life, Zerma tt
and the Valley of the v iege disappeared from
view shortly after its appearan ce and was
never reprinted or, as far as I know, ever
referred to in print. Desp ite the combings of
generations of scholars, eage r to lift the veil
of secrecy which surro unds her life, despite
the three books devo ted to her, and endless
speculation about her relationship with Dick-
ens, her only book has rema ined undetect ed .
Like the inked-out passages about her in Dick-
ens's letters, it has been there and not there,
visible and invisible all along. It is not, of
course , the book that Mr s Wharton Robin son
could have written in the I 890s , one that
would have told , with unp aralleled intim acy,
the story of the last thirteen years of
Dicken s' s life. But when so much of the
evidence of her life has been lost or delib er-
ately destroyed , it is heart enin g to be able to
recover her only significant publication and
the clues that it gives us to one of the more
remarkable lives of the nineteenth centu ry
and the courage ous self-inventiveness that is
one of its most distincti ve hallm arks.
JOH N BOW E N
Anthony Hecht Poetry Prize
The Waywiser Press is now accepting
submissions for the third Anthony Hecht Poetry
Prize, which is open to poets who have published
no more than one previous collection.
Prize: £1 ,750 or $3 ,000
and publication by Waywiser in UK & USA
Deadline: December 1st 2007
Entry Fee: £15 or $25
For rules and entry form, go to:
www.waywiser-press.com/hechtprize2007.htm
or send an SAEto Waywiser at
14 LyncroftGardens, Ewell, Surrey KT17 1UR,
or P.D. Box 6205 , Baltimore, MA 21206, USA
Inquiries to: wayw lserpresseeaol.com
16
s the name suggests the Tipofyour-
A Tongue Festival in Penzance is pr ima-
rily a pe rformance gig, but the organ-
izers wa nted to model it on the Internation al
Poe try Fes tiva l at Genoa, whe re Claudio
Pozzani " manages to ma ke it rea lly coo l, but
erudi te at the sa me time" . I sus pec t that Elvis
McGo nagall may be the coo l elemen t this
year, wh ich leaves me wi th eru dite : ie, I read
fro m a book. I'd rather be cool, but we " page
poe ts", looking up ove r our readi ng glasses
every now and then , have ha d it our ow n way
too long.
I'm always happy to be goi ng south-
wes twa rd, where so many memories lin ger.
T he West means holi days to me, the Eas t
term time . It always seems eas ier to drift wes t
in Eng land , as if ther e we re trade winds blow-
ing across the co untry out of Eas t Anglia,
which yo u wo uld have to tack into to resist.
For ty yea rs ago to the wee k, I was booked by
Eric Wa iter W hite as the suppor t act to Ve r-
non W atkin s on an Ar ts Co unc il tour of the
So uth-west. It was my fir st pub lic outing . I
took my wife and three-m on th- ol d da ughter
with me in a hir e ca r, perhaps at Waiter' s sug-
ges tio n, for wi tho ut the ca r I doubt if Verno n
wo uld have ma de man y of his engagemen ts. I
picked him up at New to n Abbo t station,
whe re he had been wa iting seve ral hou rs in
the rai n, having ca ught an ea rlier train "in
case of flood s" . He was bu ckl ed tight ly into a
mac kintos h, prot ective trilb y sla nted over his
beaked face, in his hand a soggy paper bag of
shrimps wh ich he imme d iate ly held out to
me. He said he ' d ca ug ht them that mo rni ng
near his hou se in Swansea and I pictured him
with rolled trou sers, putti ng in an hour or
two' s shr imping before setting out. I collected
him eac h morni ng and we wou ld meand er
th rou gh autum n Devon in the vag ue directi on
of our nex t rea ding . T he mos t unassuming of
men, he ass umed him self to be of interest to
me, in end less hilariou s passen ger- seat mono -
logues, so lely for his fri end ship with the ever-
IN NEXT WEEK'S
Dinah Birch
Late love for
Sherlock Holme s
William Whyte
Victorian life with Druids
Stephen Brown
When Coltrane
dro ve an E-Type
Paul Levy
Toasted cheese in Wales
COMMENTARY
FREELANCE
H UGO WILLI AMS
present " Dylan" , who m I was barely awa re of
at the tim e.
The last city in Eng land, Penza nce is a
place to which many wo uld-be refugees fro m
the rat race have drifte d on the preva iling
tides and wou nd up in its unpress urize d atmos -
phere, which is forever 1967, if not ear lie r. It
rem ind s me of Laugh arne, in Wa les, Dy lan
Tho mas 's last haunt , so it co mes as no sur-
prise that he sho uld have been marr ied in the
registry office here. I am stay ing nearb y in
the slig htly decadent Pen zance Arts C lub,
once the Portu guese Co ns ulate, no w strongly
re miniscent of ano ther outpost of the I960s,
the Che lsea Arts C lub, with pa intings every-
where, mo stly of nud es. It is nice to kno w that
if you need to yo u can travel back in tim e, as I
may need to myse lf one day.
Unfortunately, modern life ca tches up with
my ow n readi ng in the shape of the Ru gb y
Worl d C up Final. I feel I know ho w the girl
ge tting marri ed to a ru gb y fan must feel who
has agree d to let her gues ts wa tch the second
half of the match at her receptio n, although
I' m not sure how go od the result will be for
her sy mbolica lly , or me for that matter. As at
my ow n wedd ing , I rem emb er very littl e of
my readin g, exce pt that , having anno unce d
that I wo uld read a poem abo ut ge tting o lder,
I then pe rformed the nea t co nce ptua l trick
of bein g un abl e to fi nd it. One lin e by Elv is
McGon agall from his poem about the lead
singe r of T he Polic e sticks in my mind , " 0
Sting, whe re is thy death ?"
Th e last ac t of the night is perform anc e star
Tim Tu rnbull , who has embraced music hall
since I last saw hi m. Unlike the rest of us, he
doesn' t touch a dro p bef ore go ing on and
insists on a dressing roo m, whe re he wa its all
TLS June 16 1950
William Wordsworth
The centenary of Wordsworth 's death was
marked by severa l publications, reviewed in
the T LS of Jun e 16, 1950, by Philip Tomlin-
son. These included The Poet Word sworth by
Helen Darbishire; extracts from this review
are printed below as a fo llow-up to Dan
Jacobson 's article 0/1 pages 14-15. To read
the review in f ull, go to www.the -tls.co.uk
f all ce lebrants of thi s ce ntenary
O yea r non e is so sure of atte ntion and
none so deserving of it as M iss
Helen Darbi sh ire, who but a few months
ago co mp leted the lab our s of Ernes t de
Se linco urt o n the Ox for d var ioru m text of
Wordsworth ' s poem s. Her slim vo lume,
co ntai ning the C lark Lectures of 1949, is
amo ng the most sensi ble ap pra ise me nts of
the poe t since his death . It is modes t, un sen-
sationa l, cha rm ing and lithe in writing , di s-
crim ina ting in criticism, and it indul ges in
none of the eq uivocal psyc ho logical fant a-
sies which cla im to be the " realistic
approach." The inv itatio n to deli ver the lee-
TLS NOVE M BER 2 2007
evening until it is his tu rn to come o n, in full
cos tume and make-up. He is wor th wa iting
for , kitt ed out as a yo unge r Archie Rice, in
brown bo wler , ca ne , tap shoes and loud
chec k suit whic h he swears he got from Dak s
in Jerm yn Stree t qu ite rece ntly. He is not a
pro ficient mover in the field of tap, but at
least he is out there. He shows up our
shor tco mings with a wa tcha ble ro utine . He is
a soc ial satirist in the Don Ju an mould, wit-
ness his eye -ro lling ex coriation of Bl air-I and,
"Caligula o n Ice". Effor ts at va udev ille come
as a relief among the shuffle d paper s and
stammered intros . I' d go perf orm ance myself
if I co uld learn my lin es.
Nex t morning, Gre ta Stoddar t introduces
her " Hidden History" poe ts by invokin g a
qu estio n an d answe r session we did togeth er
at the Arvon . Asked " Do yo u always write
abo ut yo urse lf?", I appare ntly replied , "W hat
else is there ?" T his tim e I attempt to ju stif y
eg oce ntricity with some wa ffle abo ut po litics
beginnin g at hom e . An othe r questio n co n-
ce rns my "obsessio n" with the pas t, to which
my answe r is the sa me . Thi s tim e I man age
to invo ke a cer tai n "tribal" people who (I' m
tol d) conside r the past to be ahead of them ,
becau se they ca n see it, whe reas the future,
bein g invisibl e, mu st be behi nd their ba cks.
T his more or less ge ts me off the hook. If I
am so back ward-facin g, so meo ne asks , do I
think N oah's Ark was predictive of glo bal
wa rm ing? A ball of tumbleweed ro lls silently
across the roo m in the for m of the Club 's
black and white ca t, let in th rou gh a wind ow
by a man in a wiza rd 's outfit.
It is time for the poe try fete at the Acorn
Ce ntre : children , costumes, tea cak es, frid ge
magn ets, a co nfess io na l rant olo gy booth and
a gypsy fortune-t ell er who mak es no pretence
at insight of any kin d. " I like your j acket ",
tur es, she says , reach ed her at Gras me re,
where she had spen t the best part of thr ee
yea rs readi ng Wordsworth's ma nusc ripts in
Do ve Co ttage and, thou gh she had thought
never aga in to talk or wr ite about the sub-
ject , pro videntiall y the invitation gave her
the stimulus to gathe r togeth er in that
infecti ve env iro nme nt so me of her findings
and reflec tions on the poet.
Miss Dar bishire ma kes no attem pt to di s-
sec t the poetr y of the lon g de cline, but
d irec ts her examinatio n only to the grea t
creative decade , 1798 to 180 8, o n which
rests Wordsworth ' s titl e of grea t poet.
Flue ncy , co ns ta nt and unkind, ne ver left
him , but the o ld maj esty and the g lea m
vibra ted rarely. Tidin gs of invisibl e thin gs
lost authen ticity and grew in dullness as
they becam e more an d mo re depend ent on
Churc h doctri ne and less and less on poetic
vis io n. So me critics fi nd it mor e exc iting to
disco ver reasons for thi s than to give than ks
for the 10 yea rs of full command and
resou rce. M iss Darbi shir e is co nce rne d with
Wordsworth the ma n only in so far as know-
led ge of his life and character deepe ns
und er standi ng of his poetr y. She will have
nothing to d o with the Man and the M ask
she tell s me . "Do yo u kno w wha t it's mad e
of?" " Leather?" "No, it 's oilskin. You put
vase line on it." Sudde nly it is time for our
tour of anc ient sites, fir st the pre- Chri stian
hol y spring at San creed. Steps lead down to a
cave where the water g lows with a flu ores-
cent light and the moss is a bri ght luminou s
gree n. Ab ove it, a "clouty tree" is deck ed
with prayers o n scraps of col our ed rag. The
ruin s of a tin y ope n-roo fed M eth odist chape l
fails to Christianize the twi sted, ove rgrow n
dell. Sun from behind black clo uds makes a
Ce ltic twili ght as we sta nd looking out ac ross
untamp ered field s to a sun-pa tche d sea . Ove r
there is St Bu ryan , where Sa m Pec kinpah
ma de Straw Dogs. It was o n the steps of St
Bu ryan ' s churc h whe re, so we we re told ,
Robert Graves 's granddaughter burn ed her self
to dea th. An other long wa lk to the obscu re
stone circle of Boscawen-U n, the hedged,
unrul y preser ve of Druids, where we perform
photographi c self-sac rifices on our shadows .
Last sto p is Zen nor village, where W. S.
Gr ah am lived and dr ank in the Tinner 's Arm s
with seasona l visi tors suc h as Geo rge Bark er,
David Wri ght and John Heath- Stubbs.
Nea rby is the cott age out of which D. H. Law-
re nce was hounded for havin g a Ge rma n
wife . We en ter the churc h to see the Merm aid
Cha ir, whose legen d tell s how a beautiful
yo ung woman in a long dress used to sit at
the back of the churc h listenin g to the sing ing
of chor ister Matth ew T rew he lla, until one
evening she succeeded in lurin g him down to
the sea at Merm aid ' s Cove. In "T he Mer-
mai d" , Heath- Stubbs in vokes his ow n sense
of un welc om e :
This is a hideous and a wicked country,
Sloping to hateful sunsets and the end of time,
Hollo w with mine-shafts, naked with gra nite,
fanatic
With sorrow. Abortions of the past
Hop through the bogs; black-faced, the
villagers
Reme mber burnings by the hewn stones .
theory, and dismi sses the Anne tte Vallon
love affa ir as an unproved an d unpro vabl e
exp lan ation of declen sio n. Psychologi cal
exp lan ations, espe cially when a sec re t onl y
partly revealed is invol ved, are seldom
satisfac tory. Science has no more ex plained
the conn exion between arti stic crea tion and
the ph ysical an d ment al state of the artist
than it has explaine d co nsci ous ness. Mi ss
Darbi shires answer to the obstinate qu es-
tioning abo ut the later Wor dsworth is
sim ply:
The spirit bloweth where it listeth. When it
ceases to blow, or blows but feebly and fit-
fully, what is a poet to do? Like Coleridge,
plunge into metaphys ics? Wordsworth too k
the way that was inevitable for him: he dog-
ged ly pursued his vocatio n, pursued it as a
man with a moral purpose and as a self-
respec ting crafts man.
If noth ing had surv ived but the wor k that
the crafts man with a mission prod uced
before and after the grea t decade we sho uld
ra nk him as a distingui shed but unequ al
minor poet who promised to be something
better. Th er e were two Word sworths, who
me t but we re never one: the inspired yo ung
man of the happ y days wi th Co leridge, and
the stro ng -w illed man who labo ured in his
voca tion the more ass iduously as the inspira-
tion dwin dled to death .. ..

Here comes Everything
einhard Kei ser (1674-1 739), who
R cl aim ed to have co mpose d we ll
over a hundred operas, has not
lack ed ch ampi on s. Bach conducted
his Mark Passion . Bach ' s son Carl Philipp
Ema nuel decl ared that "in the beauty, ex pres -
sion, and pleas ing qu aliti es of his melody" he
had nothin g to fear fro m comparison with
Hand el. Yo ung Hand el composed his first
op era s for Kei ser ' s Hamburg co mpa ny, and
throu ghout a long career co ntinued to lift
ideas melodic , struc tura l and dr amatic from
Keiser - repayin g the loans with interest.
(Kei ser ' s acta via was publi shed as a supple-
ment to the Hand el co mplete edition.) Mos t
of the sco res have not survived. Twentieth-
century scho lars sca nning those that did
made high claims, ex tolling his variety, his
vivaci ty, his mu sical res po nsive ness to stage
situation, his instrument al inventi veness, his
" Shake spe area n" readine ss to min gl e j ostling
ge nres in a sing le work. Hugo Leichtentritt
ranged him beside Hand el and Mo zart .
Edw ard J. Dent likened him to Purc ell. Win-
ton Dean was one of the few who discern ed
not only Kei ser' s high merit s, to which he
paid high tribute, but also structura l wea k-
nesses that became apparent when, after
centuries of neglect , his operas return ed to
the stage: "the urge to sq ueeze in eve ry thing
. . . the abse nce of any serious attem pt at
arti stic synthes is . . . a we ird jumble of
comi cal-tragical-hi stori cal-p astor al".
Th e Berlin Staat sop er stage d Kei ser' s
Masan iello in 196 7, to mark the fifti eth
anni ver sary of the October Revolution . The
libr etto was tweaked and tidi ed to give promi-
nen ce to an in ve nted " W om an of th e Pe opl e" ,
but it was a lively show . So was Sheffield
Unive rsity's mor e scrupulous 1973 stag ing,
in splendid Velazqu ez cos tumes . In a thrill-
ing mad sce ne the fisherman-protagoni st,
like Peter Grim es, stumbles on crying "Packt
ein! zur See!" in wild accompagnato recit a-
tive, leadi ng to an aria as king "W hat har bour
shelters peace?" . A pedal-point, like the recur-
rent E flat fogh orn of Grimes , anchors the
mu sic. The vo ice sinks to a fin al "0 Himmel ,
ich fahr e zur Tiefe" , cut short by the ass as-
sins ' shots. Kei ser at his best is indeed a great
mu sic al dr amati st. He returned to the Berlin
Staat soper in 1999 with Croesus , condu cted
by Rene Jacob s and ad mirably cast. It was
recorded by Harm onia Mundi . The Briti sh
dir ect or Tim Alb ery heard the record s and
was captiva ted by "exuberant lyricism " and
"apparently ch aotic abunda nce : poignant
lament s, co mic diatrib es, ecs tatic love songs ,
militar istic tirad es . .. an incr edibl y ge ner-
ous, almost out- of-c ontrol fertility" . For
seve n years he urged the piec e on manage-
ment s, and at last Op era North responded .
Croesus opened in Leed s last month , Brit-
ain ' s fir st profession al present ation of a
Keiser opera.
A True Story about the Inconstancy of
worldly Glory and Wealth, of the pro ud,
depose d, and reinstated Croesus , with mu sic
Reinhard Keiser' s "profligate" wealth of invention
AN DR EW PORT ER
R einha rd K ei s e r
C R O ESUS
Grand Theatre, Leeds
Cl audi o Mont ev erdi
TH E C OR ONAT ION O F PO PP E A
Coliseum
St efano Landi
IL S ANT' A LES S I O
Barbican Hall
by J. P. Forsch, app eared at Hamburg' s
Goose market Thea tre in 1684. Kei ser' s first
setting of it app eared in 1711 , and a revised
ver sion in 1730. Th e opera begin s with the
grand part y thro wn hy Cro esus for his distin-
guished guest, the phil osoph er Sol on , and
Sol on ' s famou s, un welc om e pron ounc em ent
"Call no man happ y unt il he dies" . Three
hours of mu sic later , a conquerin g Cy rus is
about to immolate Croes us. In Herodotus,
Croes us rec all s Solon ' s maxim. In the opera,
Solon him self reapp ears, Cy rus is mo ved to
magnanimity, and all ends happily. Bet ween
tho se high points the opera' s fifteen soloists
are involved in love tangles, street sce nes,
milit ary endeav our, rustic revelr y. Croes us '
two sons in Herodotus, the unfortunate At ys
and his deaf-mute broth er who sudde nly
gains speec h when he sees his fath er' s life
threatened, are fu sed . Mute (at the start) At ys
and Elmira, the Medi an princess whom he
lo ve s, are p rima uomo and prima donna . The
action is intric ate . At ys disgui ses him self as a
peasant , present s him self to Elmira in that
guise, then pretend s to be that pea sant
imp ersonating his own royal se lf.
Alb er y sought to clarify thin gs by cutt ing
about a third of the opera and shuffl ing a
number or two . He made his own Englis h
translation (a few peopl e laughed as he
rhym ed "tuberculosis" with "ha litos is"). But
it was hard to kno w who wa s who. Paul
Nilon sa ng Croes us ' fin e "Bach Passion "
arias gravely. Atys brou ght the Briti sh debut
of the Am eric an soprano Michael Mani aci ,
not a countert enor, whose voice didn't break
at pub erty but ju st go t stro nge r and full er,
ena bling him to tackl e mu sic that Mozart
w rote fo r Rauzzini and M eyerb eer for Vel-
luti. Gilli an Keith , for no apparent reason
dressed as a youth in breech es and boot s, was
a pleasing Elmira. Alb er ys production,
designed by Leslie Tr avers but und erlit by
Tho mas Hu se - Geor ge Corson's gra nd audi-
torium dull ed into cin em a darkness - reca lled
the basic-b lack German shows of fift y yea rs
ago. Donning and doffin g of ga rments, chuck-
ing about of chairs, toy aeroplanes , a cra shed
aeroplane spanning the Act Two set sug-
ges ted a mord ant parod y of Co vent Garden ' s
current Ring. The costum es, a merr y med ley,
we re drawn in large part from Opera North
TLS N O V E M B E R 2 2 0 07
stoc k. Croes us was Mu ssolini . Harr y Bicket
was a careful, rath er staid conductor. Th e
Jacob s recording is liveli er and full er. Th e
confid ent , ex uberant Leeds stag ing communi-
cated , in a slightly coar se way , Alb er y' s
eage r appreciation of Keiser' s profli gate
invent iveness.
Kei ser' s source libr etto was a Creso by the
Veneti an theatre poet Nico lo Minato. It was
salutary to hear, the next day , a grea t Vene-
tian opera, Mont everdi ' s The Coro nation of
Popp ea . In lyric al , pa ssion ate declamation of
a drama, simply acco mpanied, Mont everdi
laid the foundation s on which op era was
built. But the Eng lish Nation al Opera ' s new
Popp ea, its third stag ing, cont inu ed the
singe r-slig hting line of the Carmen that
opened the season. Onc e aga in a danc e
troup e - the Orange Blo ssom Danc e Com -
pan y - was pro minently add ed to the cast.
Henry Waddington (Cyrus, top)
and Paul Nilon (Croesus)
Poppea was confined to a divin g bo ard high
above the stage , Oct avia to a perch aboa rd a
giant white pumpkin trundled about by the
danc er s. The women minc ed in very high
heel s and very short skirts of shiny pla stic .
Mi ss Fortune, Mi ss Virtu e and Mi ss Love
opened the proc eedin gs in a beaut y cont est.
In its way it was a slick, smart, snappy show ,
stage d by Che n Shi-Ze ng (perp etr ator of last
yea r's EN O Orf eo ) and designed by WaIt
Span gler. As a decent account of Mon-
teverdi ' s op era it was a non- start er. Th e
slighted singers were Kate Royal in the title
role, not always in tun e; Anna Greviliu s as a
brat Ne ro; Tim Mead a countertenor Otho
who deli vered the clo sin g line of the first act,
"Drusilla' s name on my lip s, but in my heart
Poppea" , in movin g, mem orabl e ton es: a
17
high point of the eve ning. Seneca cut his
wrist and ex pired in a giant bath within
which the Page (William Berger, the mo st
vivid performer of the eve ning) and the
Lad y-in- waitin g, ignoring the corpse, then
mad e love . Lawrence Cummings was a care-
ful , unth eatrical conductor. Veterans Robert
Llo yd, the Senec a, and Diana Mont ague, the
Venu s, rec alled bett er days whe n Janet
Baker , then Alic e Coote, we re Poppea in
sens ible ENO productions.
They ord er thi s matter better in France , at
any rate when William Christie doe s the
ord ering. At the Barbic an his Art s Flor issa nts
account of Stefano Landi ' s Sant' Aless io
(16 31 , twelve yea rs before Poppea ) inhab-
ited a different, wo nder ful wo rld of ex ce l-
lenc e: a flaw less mo de rn presentation of an
early opera. The libretto, by the future Clem-
ent IX, takes off from Christ's words in Mat-
thew 19.29: "Everyone that hath for saken
father, or moth er, or wife for my name' s sake
. .. sha ll inherit everlas ting life" . Alexis on
his wedding night skedaddles off to the Hol y
Land, in se arch of sanctity . Sevent een yea rs
later he returns to the paternal palace and
lurk s bean eth the sta irs, unrecognized , as a
beggar. Father, mother, and wife sing heart-
breakin g lament s for the lost youth. A dem on
with ex ce llent argu ment s tempts him to end
their gr ief by revealin g his identit y - a word
from him could end much ang uish, and
Alexi s is troubled - but an angel urge s him to
per sist. Seventeen years later he embraces
death , lea vin g a lett er that reveals his ident-
ity. An ange lic choru s enjo ins tho se who
loved him not to mourn but to rejoice , for
Al exi s ha s been rec ei ved into hea ven w ith
accla im. The moral may be unattr acti ve, but
Landi ' s mu sic is ever engag ing, probing the
emotions of all conc ern ed.
Sant 'Aless io was played in the Barb erini
pal ace in sets by Pietro da Corto na. Th e
design s are reproduced in a 1634 print of the
sco re, and Les Art s Floriss ants used them in
the candl e- lit production , by Benjamin Lazar,
that opened in Cae n and plays later thi s
month at the The atre des Cha mps-E lysees.
At the Barbican we had Lazar' s version de
conce rt, a full y enacted platform perform-
ance witho ut decor, co stumes simplified to
signifiers. It was totally gripping, deepl y mov-
ing : three hours of mu sic al sensitivity, vocal
and instrument al pro wess o n levels rarely
encountered. In beautiful , unforced , stea dy
ton es, words and mu sic al mo ves were
intentl y we ighted and tim ed , without affec-
tatn. Rom an-w ise, the cast was all-male. Th e
fifteen so loists included eight rem arkable
countertenor s, varied in voca l character and
all good to hear, none of them a ho oter or
shrieker. Philippe Jarou ssky (Alexis), M ax
Emanuel Cencic (hi s Wife), and Pascal Ber -
tin (a page) were especially eloq uent. An
expert choru s of sixteen men and fourt een
boys were vivid in the big sce nes , infern al
and celesti al, that contrast with the per son al
dram a play ed out in the pal ace .
18
Not out of the woods yet
JUDITH FL AN DE R S
L A BA Y ADER E
Covent Garden
CA R L OS AC OSTA
With guests from Ball et Nac io nal de Cuba
Sadler's Wells
ver the past quarter of a century, La
O Bayadere has becom e part of the
nineteenth- century Western danc e
ca non, the equal of Giselle, and with Sleep -
ing Beauty and Swan Lake the bar aga inst
which dancer s meas ure them sel ves. It is as
good a piece as any with which to take the
temp eratur e of the Roya l Ballet before the
co mpany moves to the twenti eth ce ntury with
Balan chin e' s Jew els, and befor e the seas onal
death that is The Nutcracker.
This production was fir st staged in 1989,
and it shows ; the prop s (always a bit peculi ar)
are now downri ght shabby : a tiger that would
ma ke a cat laugh, the ropi est snake eve r seen.
In 1989, the compa ny was going throu gh a
period of financial turm oil, and in the King-
do m of the Shades sce ne the corp s' numb er s
were cut from the original thirt y-two to
twent y-four , at which figur e it unfortun ately
rem ains. The last act has always been an
imposition on the audience : an unnecessary
interval of twent y minut es is follo wed by
eightee n minut es of labour ed chor eograph y,
the destru ction of a templ e indic ated by a few
agitated arm-wav ings and a blackout , and an
abse nce of dramatic logic, rem arkabl e eve n
by the standards of ballet narrati ve. (Why is
the grand Sultan's daughter getting married
at night , alone, in a clearin g in the woo ds?)
The corp s - the dram atic heart of Bayadere
- is in a sad state, see mingly short on
rehearsal time, and possibly troubl ed by
inju ry. In two performances I saw, repl ace-
me nts made a shambles of the pas d'actions ,
one dancer eve n visibly bein g talked through
the steps. The Kingdom of the Shades entry,
when the Shades wind acro ss the stage in
arabesque, need s to have the entire corp s
movin g and breathing as one. Instead , we had
legs lifted at different speeds , heads any-
where, arms all over the place.
In front of this, happil y, some very nice
dancin g was going on among the prin cip als.
Sta nding out as Solor - the wa rrior princ e
doom ed to marry the Sulta n's daughter
Gam zatti , instead of his true love, the templ e
danc er Nikiya - was Rob ert o Bolle, a danc er
of clean , light , elega nt technique. Bolle is
frequentl y overl ooked , not bein g flashy, and
not (to be truthful) much of a danc e-a ctor.
But his classical ease is wonderful to wa tch,
and his partnering is magnifi cent - well ,
magnificent when he is not stepping in for an
injured co lleague and partn erin g Alina Cojo -
caru. She is the comp any' s sma llest prin ci-
pal, possibl y not reachi ng five foot, while
Bolle is more regularl y the partn er of Zen a-
ida Yanowsky, who towers dram atic all y at
mor e than six foot on point e. Dancin g with
Cojocaru, Bolle performed admirably, consid-
er ing he was forced to adopt an unfortunate
Grou cho-crouch for most of the eve ning .
ARTS
CarIos Acosta (second from right) and /(uest artists from the Ballet NacionaI de Cuba
It was worth it, however: Cojocaru's devel-
opment as an artist has been inspirin g. She
gave a wo nderfully thou ght-through respon se
to the dual natur e of Nikiya (Ro mantic tem-
ple dancer versus Class ica l shade). Hand ed
all the gifts - a lovely shape , a fine, stro ng
technique - Cojocaru has something else that
cannot be taught , a musicalit y that pul ses
throu gh eac h step and phrase, producing
movem ent that is both lush and controlled .
Tam ara Rojo , the Royal' s oth er leadin g prin-
cip al, is less to my taste, bein g more self-
cont ained , less instincti vely respon sive to the
music or drama. Her turns are ex traordinary -
she we nt from supported to unsupported
-------------------~\-------------------
ames Macdon ald' s forc eful revival of
J Da vid Marnet ' s Glenga rry Glen Ross
lea ves the audienc e with an almost palpa-
ble sense of the wax ing and wa ning egos of
the four real- estate agents at its centre. The
Pulitz er Prize-winning 1983 play, based on
Mam er' s ow n experience of selling, as he put
it, " worthless land in Arizona to elderly
people" while working in a Chicag o real-
es tate agency as a graduate, revolves around
an offic e contest to mak e the mo st sales, in
which any shred of decency is a liability. The
winner gets a Cadillac and the loser s get the
sack, and the stakes are raised by the sales-
men ' s identification of their masculinity with
the size of the deals they clo se.
The fir st act consists of a trio of duologues
set in a Chinese restaurant, viewe d, in
Anthony Ward' s design, throu gh a cinema
scree n-shaped slot which hint s at the hit 1992
film version of the play direct ed by Jam es
Fole y, starring Jack Lemmon and Al Pacino.
The older age nts radiate desperati on as they
spe nd the time sche ming among them sel ves
to get their hand s on the "leads" , the names
and phon e numb er s of potenti al purchaser s of
the agenc y' s grandly nam ed but dud real
es tate - the Glengarry Highlands and G len
Ross Farms of the pla y' s title. Jon athan Pryce
TLS NO VE M BE R 2 20 07
pirou ette, so mething I' ve never see n befor e -
but her jumps are poor, and she doesn 't give
the same attention to the easier steps.
She was also acted off the stage by her
Gamzatti , the sharp and spiky Mari anela
Nufiez, who cas ua lly swiped the whole show
from und er her nose. Ga mza tti should have
equal billin g with Nikiya, but it is rarely
pl ayed that way . Nufiez made sure that we
were in no doubt: savage , imp eriou s, with her
enormous jump she got full measure out of
her virtuoso turn s, and dram aticall y played
the part like Gloria Swanson in Sunse t Boul e-
vard (" I am big. It' s the pictures that go t
sma ll" ). The onl y probl em was that one
Unreal
estate
KATHARIN E HIBB ERT
David Mam et
GL E NG ARR Y G L EN ROSS
ApolloTheatre
is out standing as Shell y Levine, a form er star
sales ma n, who plead s and bargain s pitifully
with offic e manager Williamson (Peter
McDonald). Bulli sh Dave Mo ss (Matthew
Marsh) con s dodd ery Geor ge Aaronow (Pa ul
Freeman) into a con spir acy to stea l the lead s,
suckering him with comic ally fin agled lan-
guage - whe n Aaron ow asks: "Are we talk-
ing about this?" , Moss repl ies: "No, we ' re
ju st spea king about it".
By contras t, the offic e' s current top dog
Richard Rom a (the onl y thin g nastier than
Aidan Gillen ' s cock sure portrayal of the
youngest salesma n is the horrid little mou s-
tache he sports) spies a potenti al punt er ove r
wondered why Solor was such a dolt as to
prefer Rojos Nikiya. Thiago Soares, partn er-
ing Nufiez when she swa ppe d her Gamzatti
scarlet for demure Nikiya chiffon , made as
much of Solor as the more reno wned Ca rlos
Acosta, with grea t sty le and bearin g. But
Solor doesn 't give much chanc e of dramatic
developm ent , and neith er man reall y got his
teeth into the part.
Aco sta has been eve ryw here rec entl y: he
has publi shed an autobiog raphy, he has
gues ted aro und the world, he has choreo-
graphed a dance version of his life, he has pro-
duc ed two highli ght s seaso ns at Sadl ers
Wells. The question is, will he turn himself
into the next Nureyev (and not in a goo d
way)? Is he sprea ding him self so thin that he
can do ju stice to nothing?
Last yea r he organi zed a week with col-
leagues from the Royal Ballet, and it was a
nicely meas ured coll ection of lollip ops and
more serious pieces. This yea r, he brou ght
ove r seven danc ers fro m the Ballet Naci onal
de Cuba, and the programming was less
attra cti ve, bein g three piec es by Alb erto
Mend ez, who works in the heavy-handed
1970s So viet style that has, thankfull y, all but
vanished. Muiiecos (Do lls), a pa s de deux for
Acosta and the charming Ann ette Del gado, is
a standard ballet story of doll s who com e to
life: not original, and not interestin g enough
choreo graphic ally. But it is a gem compared
to the next two pieces, El RIo y el Bosque
(Th e Rive r and the Forest), a Yorub a-Cub an
myth of two gods meetin g and matin g in
lurid , Iycra-clad heavin gs, and Paso a Tres, a
"comic" piece of mistimin gs, mis-step s and
misappr ehen sion s that was grimly unfunny.
Finall y Aco sta threw a bone to his fans with
the pas de deux from Le Corsai re, an old gala
warhorse . He and Vien gsay Valdes produced
show -stopp ing steps (revoltades from Aco sta
- where the bod y is flipp ed over the leg;
fo uettes with doubl e beat s in the whipped leg
from Vald es). But while it was technicall y
extraordinary, it was not mu sical. Thi s was
gy mnastics, not danc e.
a cup of tea. After a disjointed pseud o-
philo sophical spiel, he moves in for the kill
and clo ses a lucrati ve deal. Lunch is, after all,
for wimps. After the interval (unnecess ary in
this eighty-minute play), the action move s to
the ran sack ed offic e, and event s play out
inexorabl y, allo win g Levine in particul ar to
demon strat e his cruelt y when he believes
him self to be on an upward s trajectory, and
his cringing desperation on the way do wn.
The claustrophobic, drab sets suit this
inward s-turn ed pla y, where the age nts' onl y
referenc e to lives of their ow n are Levine ' s
pitiful mentions of hi s dau ghter - and , in
Pryces portrayal, they could be a hint of ge n-
uine feeling , o r merel y a salesman' s trick to
earn his coll eagues' sympathy . Th e exce llent
ca st brin g to life Mamet ' s slangy, oblique
dialo gue, littered with obsce nities and frac-
tured with interj ections. The production zip s
along, with the twists of the seco nd half
coming so swiftly that the audience is suck-
ered like a pot ent ial punt er. The am ounts of
money in question may be tin y when set
aga inst today ' s multi-million pound prop erty
deals, but the pla y' s exa mination of the wors t
side of the capitali st dream and its imp act on
tho se who buy into it, drawn out to full effect
by this produ ction, still re sonates.

In a tidal wave of titles
his year in Franc e, the "re ntree
T litteraire" - the publi shing equiva lent
of go ing back to school - is bigger
than eve r; some 72 7 literar y novels have
been publi shed since Augu st. The rentree is
a peculi arly French phenom enon which turn s
o n the fact that the big literary prizes
(Go nco urt, Re na udo t, lnt eralli e, Fe mina,
Academi c Franca ise, Medic is) are awa rded
between Octobe r and Nove mber. Of thi s
ye ar's novels, 234 are tran slation s fro m
another langu age, mostl y Eng lish or, to be
precise, Am erican. Thi s is an astonishing
figur e, es pec ially whe n comp ared with the
small numb er of translated wor ks publi shed
in Brita in, but it still leaves nearly 500
French novels to choose from.
Th e probl em with thi s tidal wave of new
novels has been that only the mos t po werful
publi shin g hou ses and the biggest nam es
are heard ; the few French writers who are
known in the United States or the United
Kingdom - Mi chel Houell ebecq, Arnelie
No thomb, M arie Darrieussecq - are the stars
of the French scene as we ll. And yet the
rentr ee does ensure that literatur e rem ain s
at the heart of French cultural life ; it is dis-
cu ssed and dissected at len gth in the press
and on radi o and television . It may take only
two hours by train from Lond on , but Paris is
still a wor ld away .
Nor is Paris the onl y city in France
to take its literatu re serious ly; Lyon has a
thri vin g cultural life and its literar y interests
are con cent rat ed at the Villa Gillet, a beauti-
ful hOtel particulier ove rloo king the city,
which hosts readin gs, debates and eve nts.
Last month five noveli sts brou ght their new
book s to the Villa Gi llet to give rea dings and
talk abo ut their work to audiences of several
hundred. These are not fir st-tim e no veli sts
but they are not yet full y es tablished - the old
new wave, perhaps. Th e dir ector of the Vill a
Gillet, Guy WaIter, ch ose we ll; all five have
been nominated for a prize .
Nuit ouve rte, by Clemence Boul ouqu e,
tell s two stories at once ; that of the first
woma n eve r to be made a rabbi , Regin a
Jon as, who was murd ered at Ausch witz
Clemence Bou lo uque, Vi ncent De lecroix,Louise Desbrusses, Eric Re inhardt and Olivia Rosenthal
Five novels from the rentree
L U CY DALLAS
Cl e m e n c e Boulouqu e
NUIT O UV ERT E
244pp. Flammarion. € t8.
9782 08 t202t 46
Vinc ent D el e croix
L A C HAU SSU RE S UR L E TOIT
217pp. Gallimard. €t6.
9782 07 078t 55 3
L oui s e D e sbru ss e s
C OUR ONN ES , BOUC LIERS ,
ARMU RES
178pp. P.O.L. €16.
978284682 184 I
Er ic R einh ardt
CEN DR IL L ON
577pp. Stock. €24.
9782234058149
Olivia R o s enth al
O N N'EST P AS LA P O UR
DI S P AR AiTRE
215pp. Verticales. €16.50.
978207 0785315
in 1944, and that of the (fiction al) actress
Elise Lermont, who is preparin g to port ray
Jona s in a film . Gripped by Jon as' s story,
Lermont learn s of her own famil y' s co llabor-
ation with the Vichy regim e in the Second
World War and strugg les to reconcil e her
grow ing awa reness of the horrors that took
plac e with the heroi sm that defied them .
Lerrnont' s story, told in the first person , takes
th e form of a diary. a confession and a testi-
mon y. When she says "J ' ai besoin de toi", it is
not clear who she is addr essing; does she need
a reader to bear witness? The two main char-
acters in Nuit ou verte rem ain shadowy and
opaque, but Lerrnont' s grandmother, a vain,
selfish woman happ y to enjoy the deli ght s
of Occupi ed Paris, is vividly drawn . The
novel poses fund ament al question s about
horror, guilt and remembrance that it does not
(or cann ot) answer, but it may be enough
TLS NOVE M BER 2 20 0 7
that the y are aga in brou ght to our atte ntion.
Vinc ent Delecroix' s rem arkable La
Chaussure sur le toit is a mor e pla yful affair;
the central subje ct of each of the book' s ten
ch apters is, ind eed , a discard ed shoe. Eac h
ch apter tell s a different story of how the shoe
ca me to be o n the roof of an apartme nt blo ck
in Pari s near the Ga re du Nord, a "quartier
populaire" - a polite name for a poor and
und esirabl e nei ghbourhood . Those interested
in the shoe include a yo ung girl who cann ot
slee p, ajeal ou s lover, a lonel y old lad y, a dog
and a conceptu al artist. The fifth chapt er,
"L 'elernent tragiqu e" , re-enact s Sophocles '
Phi/oetetes on the roof, with sma ll-time
cro ok s as Phil oct etes, Ulysses and Ne optole-
mus. Despit e its title, thi s is one of the
light est and witties t episodes in the boo k,
thou gh Delecroix does fini sh on a downb eat
not e. Each chapter is told in the fir st per son
by a resident of the building and each vo ice ,
even th e do g ' », ha s it s own ch arac te r a nd
dignity .
For all the jokes and con ceit s, most of the
stories here deal with lonelin ess. The last
chapter, presented as the one which ex plains
how the shoe arrived on the roof, is narr ated
by an ange lic figure who wa nts to bear the
we ight of the city' s unh appin ess, who wa nts
eve ryone to know that they cou ld
inventer toutes les histoires qu 'il s voudraie nt a
fin de se divertir de leur solitude, afin de se con-
vaincre - au ma ins p O Uf un temp s .. . qu ' its
n' etaient pas si seuls, afin qu ' au mai ns, dans
ces histoires, its puissent en parier.
(invent all the stories they like to distract them-
selves from their loneliness, to convince them-
se lves - at least for a while that they
we re n' t so alo ne, to be able at least, in these
stories, to talk about it)
Loui se Desbru sses ' s novel Couronnes ,
boucliers, armu res (approx imate ly, "cro wns,
shields , armo ur") is quit e unlik e all the oth er
no vels discu ssed here, and unt ypic al of the
rentr ee in ge neral. It tell s the story of two sis-
ter s, L' Ain ee and La Sec onde (the elder and
the younger, or the first and the second), and
their relationship with their moth er (referred
to throu ghout as Mere) within the wide r
19
famil y circle . No nam es are give n, so
although we know that the sisters have
unu sual names, give n by Mere to distin gui sh
them fro m the co mmon cro wd , there is no
clu e as to what they are. We know that Mere
is foreign and from a lower cla ss than her
husband , hen ce the cont empt she is held in by
her hu sband ' s famil y and her frantic need to
establish superior ity throu gh her daughters.
Th e no vel is structure d round three main
episodes ("c ouro nnes", "bo ucliers" and
"arrnures" ) durin g the course of a large
famil y celebration . The narr ati ve vo ice ho v-
ers around the two sisters and captures their
thoughts; the lan gu age is richl y worked and
dense . Desbru sses invert s word ord er and
uses repetiti on and rhym e, which gives the
text an almos t poeti c quality. Th e clau stro-
phobic, ho stile natu re of the family' s
ob session s and prejudices is reveal ed littl e by
littl e, and the story conce ntrates on whether
the younge r dau ght er will he ahle to hreak
away from Mere and her sis ter. Each section
is preceded by a short, unpunctuated par a-
graph which see ms to begin and end in the
middl e of a phr ase; these passages set the
sce ne, physicall y and emotionally, for the
drama about to unfold. Thi s kind of writing
makes grea t dem and s on the reader but
Desbru sses kno ws whe n to stop, and there is
not a word out of place . Another impressive
featur e of Cou ronnes, boucliers, armures is
that, despit e its impressioni stic ex perime nta-
tion , the narr ati ve is we ll paced and mana ges
to wro ng-foot the read er.
Eric Reinhardt' s Cend rillon (Cinde rella)
could not be mor e different ; a florid, autobio-
graphical work that swee ps all before it with
energy and hum our. Reinh ardt ' s no vel tell s
the story of four men, one of whom is the
noveli st Eric Reinhardt ; each man has a
troubled re lationship with his fath er and
suffers from feelin gs of inadequ acy and fear
in adolescence . Aft er similar beginnings, the
four go on to lead very differ ent lives; one
becom es a pathetic , murd erou s loner, one a
faceless geolog ist ob sessed with watching his
wife ha ve sex with oth er men ; another a
hedge-fund man ager headin g for di saster ; the
20
fourth , and mo st intere stin g, is Reinh ardt him-
self. In case we were in any doubt, the narra-
tor calls the three other men "rnes avatar s
synthetico-theor iques", and the blurb on the
bac k of the book asks sim ply "Que sera is-je
devenu si j e ri' avais pas renco ntre Margot a
vingt-tro is ans?". So Cendrillon is "There but
for the gra ce of Go d go I" writ large, a kind of
summing up of Reinh ardt ' s man y and var ied
obsession s: C inde rella, Monteverdi , the
autumn, high financ e, the Palais-Ro yal, the
arch of a foot, his love for his wife, Margot,
the mor al turpitude of the Parisia n left- wing
bour geoisie and rev iewe rs who fail to see the
genius of his work. With its extreme, obses -
sio nal men, dartin g off at tangent s and con-
stantly hun gerin g after wo men, Cendrillon
feels more Am erican than French, reminiscent
of Saul Bello w and Phi lip Roth, transposed to
a minutely obse rved Paris. The struc ture
seems chao tic but it is tightl y co ntrolled . At
one point Reinh ardt takes the reade r to
-----------------------~,-----------------------
The fires of youth
E M ILIE BI CK ERTO N
l r e n e Ne m i r o v s k y
F I RE I N T H E B LO OD
Translated by SandraSmith
156pp. Chatto and Windus. £12.99.
978070 1 181833
LE BA L
Translated by Sandra Smith
106pp. Vintage. Paperback, £7.99.
978 0 09 94 9397 6
rene Ne rnirovs ky co ntinues to be a
I
publi shin g sensa tion, but critical co nsider -
ation of her literar y achieve me nts is often
lost in the exc ite ment that surro unds the
release of another lon g-forgott en, tragically
conce ived manu script. The latest to emerge
is the novell a Fire in the Blood (C hd le ur
dans le sang) , written in 1941-2, but unpub-
lished until now. It arri ves at the same tim e
as the rei ssue of two shor t stories, "Le Bal"
(The Ball ), and "Les Mouches d' auto mne"
(literally The Flies in Autumn, translated as
Sn ow in Autumn), brou ght together under
the title Le Bul. The three wor ks are exa mples
of what characteri zes Ne rnirovs ky 's writing,
them atic ally and sty listically . Th e ex perience
of ex ile and the hidd en sec rets that acco m-
pan y us throu gh our lives are rend ered here
in charac ter-driven, tersely descripti ve
narr atives which lea ve their subje cts
mys ter ious.
Fire in the Blood co nsiders the passing
of yo uth, from the va ntage point of old age . It
is se t in a s m all v illage in th e c entr e o f France,
a place where "the da ys drag on but the years
fly by" . Silvio is an old farm er who enj oys
solitude and goo d wine : "I said goo dbye .. . at
the garde n gate; it opened with a sq uea k and
closed aga in with that heavy go ng-like sound
that is as pleasing to the ear as a matur e bottl e
of Burgundy to the palate". He is for ced out
of his tranquillity by the dea th of a neighb our ,
the hu sband of a yo ung woman who becom es
the focu s of local goss ip.
Thro ugh her detach ed narr ator, who has
returned to the reg ion after a perip atetic life,
Ne rnirovs ky regi sters the monotony , isola-
FICTION
Lond on to learn abo ut futur es tradin g from a
hedge-fund manager. He describ es the visit in
ex treme ly funn y detail ; only later do we rea l-
ize that one of his ava tars will end up doin g
the same job. Cendrillon is a tour de forc e, by
turn s ex uberant, infuri atin g and unexpected .
On n 'est pas la pour disparaitre , by Oli via
Rosenth al , also featur es its auth or - or at
least, a thirt y-nin e- year- old writer call ed
Oli via Ro senthal who lives in Pari s - but she
emerges only slow ly, afte r two other
characters have been intro du ced : Mon sieur
T, who has attac ked hi s wife in a dement ed
rage brou ght on by Alzheim er' s, and Dr
Al zheimer himself. The novel is an ex plora -
tion of the di sease, of the conflictin g emo -
tion s it pro vokes and, mo st rem arkabl y, an
acco unt of the ment al journ ey und ergon e
by Mon sieu r T so that we feel , in some way,
able to und erstand why he felt dri ven to kill
his wife . Rosenth al treat s thi s as a serious
subject, but she is able to mock her ow n
tion and social structures of the village . She
was never ro mantic abo ut rural life, and here
the descript ion of the paysan 's habit s is
dispassionat e, almos t cruel:
Co untry dinners ! So up thick enough for a
spo on to stand up in, enormo us pike from the
lake o n someo ne's esta te, tasty, but so full o f
bon es yo u fee l as if yo u're eati ng branches o f
thorns. And no one says a word. All those thick
necks leaning forward and slow ly chewing
like cattle in a shed.
Th e "fire in the blo od" of the title, which
is the cause of tragic death in the no vel , is
Silvios description of the folli es of youth,
used by Ne rnirovs ky as a metaphor for
emo tional and ph ysical passion . Secr ets and
love affa irs abo und in the story , all, she
sugges ts, the result of the brief tim e in o ur
twenti es when we reje ct our accepted future
(o r ou r "true nature" ) a nd ac t im pul si v el y
and out of charac ter, only to move back
qui ckl y to the stra ight and narrow. Her
port rayal of thi s peri od is ambiva lent: some -
tim es youthfu l impulses are mocked and
dismi ssed , but Silvio is also aware that the
brevity of an ex perience does not make it any
he Pearl- Fishers is a love story set
T
in the rur al Sco ttish parish of
Kilc almonell. Charting the arriva l of
a famil y of pearl-fi sher s returni ng fro m
Sunderland to bu ry their grandfa ther, Ro bin
Jenkins (1912-2005) ex plores the way a
community's prejudi ces ca n surface at the
threat of disruption. The parish ' s local
fore st er s , th eir w ives a nd th eir c h ildre n
form a rustic community which resembl es
the pasto ral idyll of a simpler past where
stro ng ly defined va lues order peopl e' s lives.
It is a community built aro und the fami liar
cycles of nature and routine, as emphas ized
by the open ing lines of the novel : "Every
seco nd Saturday, at midday, the men cam e
out of the forest and gathered at the hut
beside the road to coll ect their pay" .
This structured, repetiti ve ex istence has
the reson anc e of a church bell. It is both we l-
TLS NO VEM BE R 2 20 07
ass umptions and misgivin gs. She addresses
us dir ectl y and gives us ment al exe rcises to
do while readin g the novel:
Faites un exercice.
Imag inez que vie ux et ma lade, vous soyez
place dans une maison de retraite, que per-
sonne ne vien ne jamais vo us voir , ceux Oll
ce lles qui auraient pu vo us rendre vi site eta nt
dej a ma rts et enter res.
l e VOllS l' accorde, l'exerci ce n' est pas fame ux.
(Do an exercise .
Imagine that, o ld and ill, you are put in a retire-
me nt ho me and that no o ne ever co mes to see
yo u, those who might have come to visit being
already dead and buried.
I grant you, the exercise is not much fun.)
Rosenth al' s ow n story unfold s as
Mon sieur T declin es, and we learn abo ut her
own famil y traged y as another is bein g acted
out, as it were, alon gsid e. Eve nts happ en in
fits and starts ; the fragm ented , di sj oint ed
narrati ve moves from the coo l, intelli gent
less real ; it is o ur own willingness to forget
that crus hes the life o ut of such episo des.
Memorie s of the past wo uld return to us mo re
often if only we sought them out, sought their
intense sweetness . But we let them slumber
w ithin us and, wo rse, we let them rot ... . Our
purest, most pass ionate lo ve s take on the
depraved appearance of sordid pleasure .
Ne mirovs ky 's sharp, det ached sty le can
see m co ld; a ch aracteri stic that any transla-
tion into Engl ish inevit abl y acce ntuates .
Sand ra Smith - who has been largely respon-
sible for bri nging Ne rnirovs ky to anglop ho ne
readers - catch es the cla rity of the French
ori ginal. The story of Fire in the Blood is
unr em ark abl e, and, altho ug h Ne rnirovs ky
keep s her chara cters quit e intriguin g to the
end, her treatm ent of the idea of yo uth is
disa pp ointing : it is a mystical , ex terna l forc e,
"burning" and "blazing" , as peopl e "buckle
beneath the power of the flam es".
"Le Bal" and " Les Mou ches d ' automn e"
suggest that Ne mirovs ky was at her best with
the short story . Suite Francaise drew mu ch
of its streng th from its self-co ntained
vignettes, and these stories, which were first
publi shed in 1929 and 1930, show the author
at ease with the form . Ver y different in subje ct
matter, they both draw on Ne rnirovs ky's
personal history and politic al conc ern s: "Le
R ob in J enkin s
T H E P EARL - FI SH E RS
208pp. Polygon. Paperback, £6.99.
978 184697006 I
coming and excl usionary . A traditi on solidi-
fied over the ages, yet vulnerable to change.
Speakin g for the newcom er s is a beautiful
young woman nam ed Effie. As Gavin
Hamilton , a local man with aspirations to
becom e a mini ster, fall s mor e and mor e
deepl y in love with thi s deer-lik e beauty -
"she had the same grace , the same air of
wildness " - opinions within the parish dif-
fer. To some she is a tink er girl, "human
trash" , a gy psy who should not be tru sted or
help ed . In thi s clim ate, acts of hum anit y and
charit y, and the hopes for love and happi-
ness which they raise, are scrutinized for
moti ve and super ficiality . Eve n Effie,
vo ice of Oli via Rosenth al to Mon sieur T's
bewild ered incoheren ce to Mad ame T's
resentm ent , full of love and loyalt y. It may
see m unlik ely, but this story about A lzhe-
imer' s is life-affirming as we ll as terrifyin g.
A ltho ugh they are very different , these nov-
els do share common concerns; the influ ence
of autofiction is stro ngly felt in three out
of the five; four menti on Pari s and two are
stee ped in it; three address the reader dir ectly.
Stylistic ally, they are ambiti ous and that ambi-
tion is for the most part reali zed ; these writers
are not afra id to take risks with either fo rm or
cont ent and , as a result , their work is always
challen ging, from the poli shed cade nces of
Loui se Desbru sses' s dysfuncti on al family to
the deliri ou s foul-mouth ed rants of Eric
Reinh ardt' s avatars. It wo uld see m, on thi s
show ing at least, that cont emp orar y French
fiction is very much concerned with itself ,
with its capital city, and with its audience;
most importantl y, it is in go od hand s.
Bal" present s a psychological study of par ent-
hood , seen throu gh the mo ther- da ughter
confli ct in a nou veau-riche famil y. Before
carr ying out her publi c reven ge on the soc ially
c on sci ou s mother , w ho wants to anno unce her
arriva l into soc iety with a grand ball , the
daught er - revealin g the story 's crue l co nceit
- catches sight of herself ges turing ju st as her
moth er does; this makes her "tremble - like
someo ne who unexpectedl y find s herself
standing in front of a mir ror" .
"Les Mou ches d 'automne" is a histori cal
acco unt of the move of a bourgeois famil y
from Moscow to Pari s durin g the 1917
Revoluti on . In contrast to the dom esti c melo-
dram a of "Le Bal" , it distil s some of the
uph eavals in Ru ssian soc iety at the start of
the last century. The famil y' s arriva l in Pari s
is described by their elder ly servant:
Back and forth they went, between their four
walls, sile ntly, like flie s in autumn, after the
heat and light of summer had gone, barely able
to fly, weary and angry, buzzing around the win-
do ws, trailin g their broken w ings beh ind them .
Th ese two stor ies brin g out the streng ths
of lrene Ne mirovs ky 's wr iting, its ec ono my
of ex pression and bold descripti on ; her lack
of subtlety and depth , ex pose d in the lon ger
stretch of Fire in the Blood, is less ev ide nt in
the shorter, mor e dyn amic wor ks .
mo ved by her feeli ngs for Hamilton ,
question s the effects of his love on her :
" Hamilton was takin g from her in minut es
what she had spent her who le life holdin g on
to - not prid e, for how could she be proud of
the kin d of life she led, but simply a resolu-
tion not to be asha med or humiliated , for she
had never don e anythin g wro ng nor harmed
any one" Publi shed po sthum ou sly, The
Pearl-Fishers revisits man y of Robin
Jenkins' s past co ncerns : the for est worke rs
of The Cone-Gatherers (1955), the town of
Towellan from The Change ling (1958) and
Gav in Hamilt on from A Would-Be Saint
(1978). Wh at stands out is the style. Pared
down to a sharp cla rity, the pro se of this
novel cut s out all excess to show the cross -
current s running throu gh the heart of a
co mmunity .
N I C K SH EPL EY

Qiu Xiaolon g
A CASE OF TWO CITIES
307pp. Sceptre. £17.99.
978 0 340 89852 9
T he transition to a market economy in
China has been accompanied by a large-
sca le eruption of graft and greed. Modern
Chinese polit ics has become beset by tales of
corr uption and the Chinese gove rnment's
frequ ent, but often ineffective, purges to try
to put a stop to it. This is the topic
Q iu Xiaolong has chose n as the cen tral
co ncern of his fou rth Inspector Chen
mys tery .
Chen and his sidekick, Yu, are alm ost the
only honest cops in Shangha i. They co uld not
be more different. Chen is a Par ty cadre, a
bachelor about town and a poe t in his spa re
time. Yu is an old-fashioned plodding police-
ma n: methodica l, practical, down-t o-earth
and hap pil y married. Chen is chose n by a
sen ior Party offic ial to investigate the esca pe
to Am erica of Xing, a fabu lou sly rich
ga ngster, whose wea lth has been amasse d
through illegal property deals during the
boom development of Sha nghai. In one of the
ma ny references in A Case of Two Cities to
Chinese histor y and her Imperi al pas t, Chen
is give n "the empero r's swor d" : a letter of
auth orit y from Beijin g gra nting him unquali-
fied powers of investigation .
Chen applies him self ass iduously to his
task and, within da ys of his appointme nt, has
di scovered that there are those high up in
local gove rnmen t who have connections to
Xing . In the process, he ruffl es important
Red feathers and someo ne decides that his
mission should be delayed , so he is sent
to the United States as head of a writers '
delegation . The delegates assume that he is
there to poli ce them. The A mericans suspec t
that he is on a spyi ng mission , and he ca nnot
wor k out whether he has been sent away
becau se his inquiri es have becom e incon ven-
ient , or becau se his poetry and translations
are finally bein g recogni zed .
Before em igrating to the United States,
Qiu Xia olong was a member of the Chinese
Writ ers' Association . His hero ' s trip to
A merica allows the novelist to explore the
wor ld of modern Chinese literatur e and the
A merica n reac tion to it. The delegation is
made up of a ragbag of ch aracters represent-
ing different kind s of Chinese writing: there
is an ancient working-class poe t, remain-
dered from the Cultura l Revoluti on ; a
"rightist" playwri ght whose dissid ent status
ha s on ly ju st been lifted ; a "beauty author" ,
with impeccable party crede ntia ls; an essay -
ist deem ed to be a "historical counterrevol u-
tionary" ; and Chen him self , minor poet and
translator of Western crime fiction . This
di sparate group are unit ed in thei r shoc k and
surp rise at the ignorance of modern Chinese
writing show n by their American counter-
parts. The Am eri cans are only interested in
pre-Communi st times and dissident authors ,
and their campu s libraries and book shops
reflect this restricted knowledge. Thi s see ms
to be a complaint voiced by the author as well
as his characters. However , Q iu Xiaolong
peppers his wor k with extensive quotations
fro m archaic poets, and the onl y modern
poetry in the nove l is some doggerel put into
Chen's mouth du ring a rom antic interlud e.
The trip to Am erica also enables Chen to
reki ndle his re latio nship with US Marshal
FICTION IN BRIE F
Catherine Rohn , established when the two
met in Shanghai in the second Chen mystery,
A Loyal Charac ter Dancer. Togeth er, Chen
and Rohn investigate the murder of one of
the delegates and its link to Xing. After the
denou ement and death of Xing, Chen is left
pond ering defec tion and a life with Rohn. It
co mes as no surprise that, unlike his creator,
he chooses China and the Party over love,
romance and life in the West.
JUSTIN WARS H AW
Gilbert Adair
A M YST ERIO US AFFA IR O F STY LE
292pp. Faber. £12.99.
978 0 57 1 23435 7
hen the TLS reviewed Aga tha
W Christie's first novel, The Mysterious
Affair at Styles, in 1921 , it commen ted that
"the onl y fault this story has is that it is
almost too ingeni ous" (before revea ling
crucial aspec ts of its plot). A Mysterious
Affair of Style, the seco nd of Gilbert Adair's
affectionately satirica l celebrations of
Christies novels, after The Act of Roger
Murgatroyd (2006) , is equally ingenious.
In spite of its deft appropr iation of the
gene ric con venti ons of Go lden Age detecti ve
fiction, it is also rather laborious; and in
this res pec t at least it finall y see ms to be
closer to a po-faced pastiche of the for m
than the playful pos tm ode rnist parod y
it purports to be.
The plot unfold s from a chance enco unter,
sometime in the late 1940 s, in the tea room
of the Ritz Hotel, bet ween Chief-Inspec tor
Trubs hawe, a former office r of Sco tland
Yard, and Eva dne Mo unt , a detec tive novel-
ist nicknamed the "Dowager Duchess of
Crime". A decade earlier, these unlikely
thou gh familiar eo-co nspirators, the pett y-
bour geois profess iona l and the aristoc ratic
amateur, had coll aborated with one another
on the "ffolkes Manor murd er case", the
eve nts of which were record ed in The Act of
Roger Murgatroyd. On this occas ion, they
quickl y become em bro iled in a sca ndal
centr ed on the Briti sh film indu stry, when
Miss Mount' s oldest friend, the age ing
actress Co ra Ruth erford, is poisoned with
cya nide on the set of an Elstree thriller with
the title If Ever They Find Me Dead.
Ad air 's novel is as much a tribut e to the
faded and slightly tacky gen tility of British
film studios after the wa r as it is to the
paroc hial charms of crime fiction of the sa me
period. If Ever They Find Me Dead was to
have been directed by Alastair Farjeo n,
know n as "Fa rj", the Eng lish auteur respon-
sible for classics including An American in
Plaster-of- Paris. But shortly before shooting
begins he is found dead after a fire at his villa
in Cookha m, lying alongs ide the blond e star-
let he had cas t as his fem ale lead. Ob ese and
poisonously unpleasant, the director leaves
behind him an odd asso rtment of people
involved in makin g the movie: those who had
a motive for killi ng him had no opportun ity;
tho se with the opportunity for killing Cora
had no motives.
The novel' s satirical allegory of Alfred
Hitch ock' s career , which includ es a car too n-
ish ske tch of Franco is Truffaut , is quit e goo d
fun , as is the caricature of Christie and her
relentl essly flat-foot ed prose; but it is also, to
cite Mi ss Mount her self , " what you might
TLS NOVE M BER 2 2007
ca ll clever-cl ever, which sounds twice as
clever as clever itself but is actua lly only
half'. Thi s is a potenti ally facile criticism to
make of A Mysterious Affair of Style, of
course , for it is relentless ly conscious of the
fact that, in usin g impeccably clich ed writing
to satirize irredeem abl y cliched writing, it
risks incrimin atin g itself. Eve n if it imp licitly
ironi zes reader s' objec tions throughout , the
novel cann ot full y esca pe the susp icio n that
it achieves its tone of levity all too hea vy-
handedly.
M AT T H EW B EA U M O NT
Min ett e Wait ers
THE CHA ME LE ON'S SHA DO W
385pp. Macmillan. £ 17.99.
978 0230 0 1566 I
T he central figure in The Chameleon 's
Shadow is Lieutenant Charles Acland , a
young man disfigur ed and blind in one eye
as the result of a roadside bombin g in Iraq.
Menti oned in dispatches, sent home for
surgery, patched up but suffering from loss
of memory and crippling migraines, he is
rejected for active service. Too proud and
angry to take a desk job, he soon finds him self
adrift in London and becomes increasingly
withdraw n, erupting from time to time in
violent attacks that seem to be racia lly or
sexually motivated. There are two mys teries
here: who has been beating elderly army veter-
ans to death , and why ca n Acland hardly bear
to be touch ed? As time adva nces to August
2007 and secre ts fro m the past are uncovered,
these mysteries are solved simu ltaneously.
Charles Acland is not the only one to
have suffered a personalit y change.
Min ette Waiters is unusual among success -
ful conte mpora ry crime writers in having
resisted the com fortable formul a of a familiar
de tect ive in reliable surro undings , after the
model of Rebu s in Edinburgh and
Robichea ux in Loui siana. Alth ough she has
published a do zen novels since her brill iant
debut with The Ice House in 1992, she
bravely invent s new character s and settings
eve ry time. The constant ingredi ent s, instead,
are her explora tion of what are usually ca lled
the "depths" of the psyche - that is, the
ment al states of some rea lly nasty sadists -
and her attac hme nt to certain narrati ve
devices, notably the inclu sion of document s
such as newspaper report s, memos, ema ils,
witness stateme nts and medi cal recor ds .
The Chameleon 's Shadow is as frighteni ng
and as compulsively rea dable as Walter ss
previous novels, with as ingeniou s a plot , but
it seems in seve ral ways more than usuall y
improbable. The characters are morall y
uncomp licated , either wholly dece nt (rea d:
unselfi sh) or wholly rotten. The middle-class
pro fessio nals are saints, eve n the vividly
indi vidu ali zed beefy we ight-lifting lesbi an
known onl y as Jackson (prope rly Dr Jack-
son). With the introduction of psychi atr ic
assess me nts por traye d fro m the psychi atrist' s
point of view , WaIter s is in Pat Barker
territory, but the com parison does not work
to her adva ntage, for these psychi atri sts are
not normal hum an beings but min d-readers.
Onc e the mutinous idea of real life
has entered the reader ' s head, the very
dialogue co mes under suspicion: how likely
is it that virtually the who le cas t should pro ve
so articulate? Better to leave the claim s of
21
strict plau sibility behind , culti vate the suspen-
sion of di sbelief, and revel in this acco m-
plished psychol ogical thrill er.
H . J. JA C KSO N
Joan Smith
WH AT WIL L SU RV IVE
278pp. Arcadia Books. £ 15.99.
978 1 905 14756 4
J oan Sm ith intend s her new novel, What
Will Survive, as a sharp warni ng abo ut
the world of spin. Drawing on her own experi-
ences , as a newspaper columnist, of the
inner workings of the medi a, she find s fertil e ,
timely gro und in the months between the
land slide victory of the Labour Part y and the
death of Diana, Princ ess of Wales.
Ama nda Harri son , a j ou rnalist on a mass -
market paper , discove rs that the dea th in
Leb anon of Aisha, a top model and hum an-
rights acti vist, is big news . The highl y po liti-
cized ci rcums tances that lead to it - involv-
ing Middl e Eas tern prisons, targeted killin gs
by Israeli forc es, and tragic mistakes made by
people in powerful positions - are not. When
A man da sugges ts that she should not be
hounding Aisha's bereaved husband for an
interview, her Editor respond s: "What is this,
an outbrea k of truth , decency and fair play?
We 'r e journ os, for God ' s sake. We - you -
are paid to get stories". No one seems to care
that these stories, once published, may be
only curt, distant versions of actual eve nts,
unreco gni zabl y abridged, angled, or other-
wise distorted in the quest for higher circula-
tion figur es.
When Aisha's lover, Stephen Massi nger , a
Conserva tive MP, tells a gro up of six th-
form ers about the po st-electoral "nervous
breakdown" of his Party, a spokesman hints
that he is mentally ill. But those in the publi c
eye are not alone in bending the truth: un-
faithful spouses and unfulfilled professionals
are also capable of spinning a story. And
the truth , if it does come out , ofte n ca uses
pain : M assin ger may not mind the "b reak-
down" com ment, but he comes to regre t
tellin g his wife that he never should have
married her.
Scenes of politi cking, power-pl ayin g and
hypocri sy take place in bedro om s, news-
rooms and the Palace of Wes tm inster, as
Smith weaves together the experiences
of Am anda and Aisha - co nnec ted only by
"coverage" - and of their friends, colleag ues
and families into a we b of satirical intrig ue.
Some of the charac ters tend towards stereo-
types (the heartless, celebrity-ch asing editor -
in-chi ef, the witless goss ip columnist, the
brash, horsey Tory daughter, and Aisha's irre-
deem ably nas ty husband, a failed architec t
who ca nnot summon up any com pass ion for
anyone other than himself) but the novel' s
ove rall effect is chilling.
H EA TH E R THO M P SO N
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22
Art History
EMBLEMATIC A
An interdisciplin ary j ournal for emblem
studies
Brooklyn, NY: AMS. $ 148.50 per volume
S ymbolic repr esentations combining word
and image, " speaking pictures" , were
central to the intern ation al culture of the
Renai ssance and baroqu e worlds. It was
onc e thought that the study of these symbo lic
languages was the arc ane preser ve of a few
art-hi storical specialists in Continental uni ver-
sities . Thi s view , ho wev er , has been radica lly
revised in the past twent y ye ars, ofte n
through the efforts of regul ar contributors to
the journal Embl ematica . A vas t qu antity of
emblematic mat erial of the sixtee nth and
seve ntee nth centuries can now be accessed
electro nically , particularly throu gh the we b
proj ect s of the Universities of Utrecht and
Gl asgow.
It is now widely accepted that embl em s
and imprese we re ubiquitous in the lives of
all condition s of early modern peopl e. At the
simplest level , inn- sign s and shop signs drew
frequ entl y on these "speaking pictures".
Popul ar Prot estant sermo ns invited their
hear ers to visua lize emblems to fix the mor al
in their mind s, whil e Jesuit colleges wor ld-
wid e celebrated special occ asion s in the civic
and eccles iastica l year with ex hibitions of
emblems invent ed by ma ster s and pupil s. The
devisin g of emblems oft en accompanied the
LITERARY
IMAGINATION
LITERARY
IMAGINATION
Volume 7 Number 1 January 2007
www.litimag,oxfordjourn.a,o'K
www.litimag.oxfordjournals.org
I~~'ll'rl Published on behalf the Association
of Literary Scholars and Critics
LEARNED JOURNALS
rhetoric al ed ucation of tho se who atte nded
any kind of schoo l; evening cl asses offered
the as pirant urban middl e cla ss instruction in
emblems as part of a proc ess of civic form a-
tion. Amb assad or s and court official s alike
had, as an urgent professional necessit y, to be
wholly flu ent in the langu ages of pictu res,
symbols and devices. Embl em s we re pro-
duc ed as ev ide nce of treason in courts of law;
devising them and playin g with them was as
much the recr eation of ro yalt y as of scholars,
poet s and professors.
Emblems tran scended reli giou s division s,
ju st as much as they cro ssed class division s.
Few Ca lvinists obj ect ed to visual repr esenta-
tion s of abstract ideas, and , indeed , Scottish
decor ative art of the sev entee nth century was
centrally depend ent on the " safe"abstractions
of emblems . Th ere is an impr esa or near-
emblem on the title page of almo st eve ry
early mod ern print ed book. In the Ca tholic
wor ld, the emblem and alleg orical per sonifi-
cation form ed substantial parts of fea st-d ay
decor ation s: spiritua l dir ectors invented vast
imagin ary ga rde ns as mental territories to be
ex plored by their pupil s, while substantial col-
lections of print ed "speaking pictures" con-
templ ated the spiritual beauti es of the Qu een
of Heaven or the corporate achieve ments of
the Soc iety of Jesus.
And the discourse of the spe aking picture,
the doubl e impresa (image and mott o) or
trip artit e emblem (image , motto , explana-
tion ), spread to eve ry part of the early
mod ern wor ld which parti cipated in inter-
~ of the Lou vre and Ver saill es, and Yvan
OXFORC.JOURNAL.S
TLS NOVE M BER 2 20 07
national network s of trade, tra vel or circula-
tion of obj ects and idea s. One ubiquitous
exa mple (va riations on which supplied the
mat erial for book s translated into lan gu age
after lan gua ge) is the flaming heart sym boliz-
ing arde nt devotion. It is found in churches
fro m Sanct a Sophia in Kiev to the Jesuit
Church in Cord ova in Argentina, to the
Chiesa Nuov a in Rom e to the Ca thedral of
Stavan ger in Nor way. It symbolizes var i-
ou sly the raptures of St Philip Ne ri or St Ter-
esa of Avil a, the Zea l for Sion of a Parlia-
ment arian regim ent , or the ruinous loyalty of
the Jac obit e Earl of Mar.
All this prolo gu e is still necessary to the
prop er con sideration of Embl ematica: a
reluctanc e to accept the central importanc e of
thi s discourse of word and ima ge lin gers in
cert ain insular circles , much as does the
deni al of the central place of Latin in early
mod ern literature.
Th e fifteenth vo lume of Emb lemat ica
(Aug ust, 2007), gues t-edited by Mara R.
Wad e, illu strates the richn ess, breadth and
pot enti al of thi s study : here is a claim of inter-
disciplinarity which has real foundation. Nor
is the matter of the j ourn al confined to the
ea rly modern period, which form s, inevita-
bly, its main focu s: there are eleg ant ex pos i-
tion s of the emblem in the nouveau roman
and of the irredu cibl y emblematic nature of
the co vers of twenti eth-century pulp fiction
(including tho se of Queer Patterns and The
Stra nge Women ). Th ere are fin e articl es, all
based on rigoro us prim ary research, on the
embroidered emblems on Mar y Stu art' s bed
of state and the absolut e seriousness w ith
which the y we re interpreted by her cont empo-
raries; on the affinity of the epigram with the
illu strati on and the developm ent from epi-
gram to emblem associated with the nam e of
Alci ato ; on a seq uence of Hab sburg imp rese
in the castle of Telc in the Cze ch Republic ;
and on the publi shin g histor y of Menestri er ' s
A rt des Emb lemes, which includes spectacu-
larl y di vertin g illu strati on s of cont emporar y
firework displa ys. The re is an article on the
illu strati on of broadsides about prodi gies and
about early modern interpretati on s of the
prodi giou s and the mon strou s, including the
tend enc y to discover simulacra or conc ealed
writings in the natur al world, be it on the
scales of a herring or the markings within a
split rock. A beautiful ex pos ition of the
revival of the love emblem in the Neth er-
land s in the late seve ntee nth century empha-
sizes the perm eability of the boundaries
bet ween sacred and profane images and
bet ween Prot estant and Catho lic mystical
contemplation.
A section of reviews indi cates ju st
ho w much activity is takin g place within
thi s field: works surveyed include Ali son
Saunder s' s comprehen sive study The
Seven teenth Century French. Emblem: A
study in diversity, Nicolas Milovano vic ' s
readings of the great mon archic dec or s
Lou skoutoff' s study of the French Jesuit le
Mo yne, the title of which - The Arm orial of
Calliope - in itself opens a world.
Convincing and compellin g as the grea ter
part of the jo urna l's conte nts are, it is not
who lly free from mom ent s of se miotic silli-
ness or mec hanistic motif-spottin g. Overall ,
thou gh , it contain s heartenin g readin gs and
decodings, all dem on strating that such read-
ing and decodin g of the early mod ern wor ld
is still possibl e for scholars who are prepared
to take the trouble . Perh aps mo st important of
all, there is a palpable sense of delight in the
j ourn al - deli ght in research and deli ght in
the ingenuity and beaut y of what is bein g
studied. Th e Renaissanc e and baroque sense
of plea sur e as an esse ntial part of the use of
learning is not quit e dead.
P ET ER DAVIDSO N
Literary Criticism
TU L SA ST UDIES IN WOM EN 'S
LI T ER AT UR E
800 South Tucker Drive, Tu lsa, Oklahoma
74 104-3 189. $ 18 (US) or $2 1 (ROW) per year
I n Spri ng 1982 , Germ aine Gree r launched
Tu/sa Studies in Women 's Literature by
thro win g do wn the editor ial ga untlet: "The
Tul sa Ce nter for the Study of Wom en ' s Liter-
ature : What we are doin g and why we are
doin g it" . Writte n from the recently es tab-
lished Ce nter, in the cosy " Red Hou se" , in
the unlik ely spot of Tulsa, Oklahoma, the
piece is vintage Gre er:
Like the living language itself, the vast bulk of
multi farious utterance of women has died with
the people who produced it . . . . Dead though it
may be, however, wome n's utteran ce und erlies
our present day literary act ivities as the cora l
roc k supports the living reef.
Th e journal would excav ate these buri ed writ-
ings and lives and "reconstitute the literar y
land scape as composed of wome n as we ll as
m en" .
For a quarter of a ce ntury, the journal has
prett y much follo wed the path laid do wn by
Greer , thou gh futu re editors have ex panded
its mandate: Shari Ben stock add ed feminist
critici sm and theor y to literary history; Holl y
Laird emphas ized coll aboration ; and the
current Editor, Laur a Steve ns, has em pha-
sized the com mitm ent to achiev ing globa l
reach ("women' s literature of all tim es and
place s" ).
Th e journal appea rs twi ce a year, typi call y
publishin g seve n essays which range ove r
indi vidu al wo me n writers and works, "state-
of-the-fie ld" pieces, and reflection s on fe mi-
nist practic e. Special issues and sy mpos ium-
for a have attracted the most famous names in
femini st scholarship. The 1984 doubl e issue,
"Feminist Issues in Lit erary Sch olarship " ,
presented a roll- call of cutting-ed ge scholars :
Nin a Au erbach, Nina Baym , Jane Marcus,
Lilli an S . Robin son, Ela ine Sho walter and
Paul a A. Treichler , amo ng oth ers. "Woman
and Nation" (Fa ll 1987), "Redefining M argin-
ality" (Sp ring 1991 ), "South Afric an Women
Writi ng" (Spring 1992) , "The Adopti o n
Issu e" (Fall 2002 ), " Where in the World Is
Transnational Fe minism?" (Spring 2004 ): the
ve ry titl e s sugges t th e livel y , contenti ou s
debat es that the journal has fostered. Editors
have also worked to fo ster communication
and exchange , with Notes , Letters, Announce-
ment s, Book s Recei ved , and rich Archi ves
and Reviews sections . This yea r, " Innova-
tion s" was added to encourage new
approaches .
In Spring 2007 , the journal publi shed its
Silver Jubil ee issue under a title echoing
Greer : "What We Have Done & Where We
Are Going". Laura Stevens invited fifteen
essay ists to write personal reflec tions of the
past and futu re of women's literary history.

Tog ether, these rermruscences, project ion s
and analyses sugges t how the intervenin g
twent y-fi ve yea rs have com plicated, diversi-
fied and taken a toll on that confid ent "we" .
So me of the calls for co mplication are heart en-
ing: Frances Smith Foster, from her exper i-
ence as an Afric an-American in the acade my,
advocates greater engagement with cu ltural
and global diversity; Maram Epstein spea ks
from the very different perspective afford ed
by wo men in eighteenth-century China;
Hilary E. Wyss interprets the silences of
native women in seven teenth- and eighteenth-
century New Eng land.
Oth er ch allen ges see m entirely daunting.
Eliza beth Deed s Ermart h ex poses the grow -
ing gulf between femini st solidarity and the
profession aliz ation of femi nism , as visions of
wo men's community - along with the Eq ual
Right s Am endment and civil liberti es in
present-day Am eric a - go down before co m-
petition and corpor atization. Mar y Loui se
Pratt has a mor e enco urag ing message. Te ll-
ing the histor y of SOF A, the Soci ali st Fe mi-
nist Alli anc e of Latin Am eric ani sts who
crea ted a productive, nurturing enviro nmen t
throu gh out the 1980 s and 90s, she urges:
"yo u should write the histor y of the future
yo u want to mak e happ en".
Th at is exac tly what the Orla ndo Projec t
has don e . Th e story of Orl ando takes up the
Archi ves and Innovation s sec tions of this vo l-
um e. A collecti ve of femini st acade mics in
Ca nada have produced a massive we b-base d
literary histor y of wo men's writing in the
Briti sh Isles - we ll ove r one thou sand writers
"fro m the beginnings to the present ". As the
five cor e coll aborator s ex plain, "the encod-
ing enables the inquiring user by techn ologi-
ca l mean s to move freely acro ss the bounda-
ries separating indi vidu als from their contex t
and one indi vidual from another". The ir
wor king meth od and the multidirecti on al
result s def y atomization, historic al and cur-
rent ; Orl ando sounds like the online eq uiva-
lent of eve ry TSWL editor's vision.
A ve in of sadness run s through the celeb ra-
tion , however. In 1983, Lilli an S . Robin son
publi shed "Treas on Our Text: Fe minist
challenges to the literar y can on " , TSWL' s
most famou s, most repr inted cont ributi on .
For their twent y-fifth annive rsa ry, Robin son
took stoc k of her ow n ch allen ge on her death-
bed. "Treason Our Tex t: A preposthu mou s
view " was her fin al piece, writte n as she was
dyin g of ov arian ca ncer , and later prepared
for publi cation by Dou glas Mi cha el Ma ssin g.
Shari Be nstock, looking back on the vigo rous
ea rly yea rs in "Fro m a Form er Editor 's
Perspec tive : Wom en ' s literary histor y, con-
tinu ed" , needed the ass istance of Su zann e
Ferriss bec ause of her "incipient di sability".
And there are other mo me nts of pain and
death. In the specia l issue of 2005 , 'T he
Fem inist Legacy of Caro lyn Hcilbrun" ,
another roll-c all of famous nam es faced the
legacy of one of Am erica' s mo st trenchant
femini sts, who committed suicide in 2003.
Ali ce Jardine led off by interrogatin g with
devastatin g clear-sightedness the violence
enac ted by institutional power on what she
call s "The Invisibl e Woman in the Acad-
emy". Violenc e aga inst wo me n had also
come to the fore in Spring 1994 , whe n the
journal publi shed Susan Cleme nts 's piece on
Virginia Woolf and the destru cti veness of
hetero sexism : "The Point of ' Slater Pins':
Mi sreco gnition and the narr ati ve clo set" .
LEARNED JOURNALS
"Statue of Liberty from Caven Point Road, Jersey Cit y, New Jersey" (1967) by David
Plowden, from his book Vanishing Point: Fifty years ofphotography (340pp. Norton.
$100 ; distributed in th e UK by WHey. £60. 978 0 393 06254 0)
Cleme nts was a graduate stude nt at Ind iana
Unive rs ity . This piece wo n the uni versit y' s
awa rd for the best essay in Wom en ' s Studies;
soo n after, she was mu rdered by her ex-
boyfri en d.
In Spring 1996, Holly Laird reported that
the journal had mo ved quarters. Its cosy
hom e had been bulldozed ; "we scraped off
so me of Germ aine Greer's wa ll-paper to
rem emb er the hou se by" . La ird describ ed the
old building in lovin g term s: "its attra ctive
cas ualness , its faintl y sagg ing sho ulders, and
the appea ling openness of its por ched
fac ade". A ltho ugh the j ourn al has lon g been
hou sed on a floo r of one of the uni ver sity ' s
smart, mod ern buildings, that rem ain s a
warm ima ge for the community, histor y and
change TSWL has tried to nurture and
provoke.
C H R I S T INE BOLD
Literature
T HE AG E O F JO HNSO N
A scholarly annual
Volumes 17 and 18
547p p. Brookl yn, NY: AMS. $ 162
T he Age of Johnson has appeare d more or
less annually since it was conc eived, as a
"permanent rememb rance" of the great man,
in the run-up to the bicentenary of John son ' s
death . From the first volume in 1987, edited
by Paul J. Kor shin , who died in 2005, to Vol-
ume 18, a special issue subtitled Korshin
Memorial Essays (published later this year),
the jo urna l's aims and character have been
clear: all aspects of the literatur e, history and
culture of the period 1730-1 810 were to
be examine d, in articles of va ry ing len gth
by senior scho lars, younger acade mics and
amateur John soni ans, but John son' s "primary
influ enc e" on the age wo uld be unqu estioned .
There are rev iew essays (five in Volume
17) and genero us space for reviews of indi vid-
ual books. The prose aims for uncluttered
elega nce (no j argon , nothing co nges ted or
ob scur e); the erudition ca n be awesome . Pro-
d uced in a large format hardb ack with wide
margin s, The Age ofJohnson is a mag isterial
affa ir from AM S Press which now makes
so mething of a spec iality of eightee nth-
ce ntury journals edited from No rth Am eri can
TLS NO VE M BE R 2 2007
23
Scherwatzk y on "Samuel John son' s
Augu stini ani sm Revisited" , which discusses
Augu stin e ' s City of God in a way that evo kes
current Am eric an imp eri alism ; T im Arthur
and Steven GaIt on "Opium and Sa mue l
John son" (he was an addict, but then so was
ju st about eve ry body else); Art hur Cas h on
John son and Wilk es; Ho ward Weinbrot in a
wide -rang ing essay on writers mee ting
mon arch s; James Cru ise on Egy pt and the
Hieroglyph s in Eng land; Philip Smallwoo d
(tw ice) ana lytica lly survey ing literary
histori es and litera ry criticism; Maximilian
Novak on Defoe and "pseudo-mem oi rs"
which opens with Oprah Winfrey 's cas tiga-
tion of James Frey , whose book A Milli on Lit-
tle Pieces had been si multa neo us ly ma rketed
as both a memoir and as ficti o n - a blurring
of ge nre boundaries that, as Novak point s
out , cann ot shock an eightee nth-century
scho lar.
The Age of Johnson has been self-
co nsc iously hospit able to wo me n, both as
subje cts and as co ntributors. John L. Abbott
writes abo ut Frances Burn ey' s "affair" with
uni ver siti es. It has become, deser vedl y, the Geor ge Owen Cambridge, as revealed in her
leadin g j ourn al for John sonian studies . The journal, and Lanc e Wilc ox discusses the
latest two vo lumes di splay the journal' s Ca tholic Eliza beth Inchbald ' s A Simple Sto ry
strengths in abunda nce , and a few less appeal- as a C hristian study of idolatr y. Eve Tavor
ing aspects. (It's hard to resist makin g the Bann et , drawin g on still unedit ed and uncol-
analogy with John son him self, beni gn and lected letter s of Eliza beth Montagu in the
bear-lik e by turn s, since contributors do it at Huntington Lib rary, and proc eedin g "by
the drop of a hat.) For any one with eve n a ju xtapositions", con vincingly arg ues that
moderat e interest in John son and his tim es M ont agu and her sister Sarah Scott re ma ined
there is absorbing matter here: Steve n friend s but is un able to shed light on the
~ 1 Routledge
~\. Taylor S Prancis Croup
Feminist Economics
The international scholarly journal of the
International Association for Feminist
Economics (IAFFE)
Editor:
Diana Strassmann , Rice University, USA
Volume 14, 2008, 4 issues per year
"Feminis t Economics ... a leading forum for
discussions and debates concerning feminist
perspectives in economics. "
Amartya Sen, Nobel Prize for Economics 1998,
Harvard University, USA
Feminist Economics is a peer-reviewed journal that provides an open forum
for dialogue and debate about feminist economic perspectives, By opening
new areas of economic inquiry, welcom ing diverse voices , and encouraging
critical exchanges , the journal enlarges and enriches economic discourse.
The goal of Feminist Economics is not just to develop more illuminating
theories but to improve the condit ions of living for all children , women , and
men.
IAFFE Conference 2008
The 171h Annual Conference of Feminist Economics sponsored by the
International Associat ion for Feminist Economics will be held from June 19 -
21 2008 in Torino, Italy. For further information , please visit www.iaffe.org.
24 LEARNED JOURNALS

mystery of Sco u 's marriage from which her
famil y see m to have taken the unu sual step of
remo vin g her. Mon a Scheuermann ' s clo se
readin g of Man sfi eld Par k sugges ts that , like
John son , Austen can do no wro ng. Sch euer-
mann misses the savagery in A usten' s repr e-
sentation of her "gentle" classes and hence
the larger ironi es of the novel : the Bertr am s
might be committed to mor al decenc y but
they fail - throu gh indol ence, malic e, dim-
ness or compl acency - to achieve it. If there
is so mething a littl e predictable about these
topic s, that is more than made up for by the
late Glori a Sy bil Gro ss, whose last piece is a
wo nde rfully vigo ro us appreciati on of the
film s of Stanley Kub rick , "S tanley Kubrick' s
Lo ve Affair with the Eightee nth Ce ntury" .
Rob ert Folke nflik reminds us of the j oke
abo ut the con venti on of com edi ans who
didn 't both er to tell jokes but ju st called out
the numb ers; eve rybo dy knew the punch-
lines and lau ghed . Th ere is something of that
here in the regul ar "rev isitings" of famili ar
them es. Th ere are inevitable repetiti on s, elab-
orations and ove rlaps; also sq uabbles that run
from yea r to yea r, not all of them co nducted
with decorum. So me yea rs ago Aa ro n
Stavis ky , returning to the vexe d qu estion of
whether John son had as ked Mrs Th rale to tie
him up, sugges ted that WaIter Jack son Bate
and Don ald Gree ne had withhe ld ev ide nce of
mas ochism because it didn't fit "their"
John son. Vitupe rative exc hanges foll owed .
In Volumes 17 and 18 the matter in qu es-
tion is the Ossian cont ro ver sy. Tho mas M .
Curley 's gra ndiose and misleadin gly titled
"Samuel John son and Tru th : Th e first sys tem-
atic de tection of literar y decepti on in James
M acph erson ' s Ossia n" takes almost lOO
pa ges to lay out the ev ide nce aga inst
M acph erso n which Derick S. Tho mson had
already don e in 1952 in The Gae lic Sources
of Macpherson 's "Ossian". Curleys essay,
show ing that John son was right to suspect for-
ge ry, is comp rehen sive and useful, an ideal
referenc e for stude nts; so is hi s furth er contri-
buti on , on John son ' s friend ship with Willi am
Shaw , the eq ually gra ndiloq uently titled ,
'T heir Last Stand for Truth in the Ossian
Co ntroversy". But the ter ms on which he dis-
misses tho se who think differently give pause
for thou ght: we are told , for example, that
Nick Groo m in The Forger's Shadow
"departs from John son' s dictates abo ut trut h
and literatur e" , and that see ms to be eno ugh
to damn an intell ectuall y ad venturous book .
Ab solut e truth matters to John soni ans,
which is perh aps why they are so exe rcised
about for geri es. Groo m contributes a brief
respon se defending the study of for geries and
wo nde ring (reas onably eno ugh) why so
much umb rage was taken . An essay on
hoaxers, by the journal' s editor, Jack Lynch ,
continu es the Ossianic them e in more spec ula-
tive vein. Hi s "Three Fa kers of the 1760 s"
exe mplifies the best of The A ge of John son : it
is writte n with profound know ledge of the
period, eschews ad hominem attacks, and
opens the matter up to mode rn critica l
thought.
N O R M A C LA R KE
A RCH IP ELAG O
Thame: Clutag.
£ 10, plus £2.50 p&p, per issue
A literary island often symbo lizes indi vidu-
alis m and isolati on , but an arc hipelago
sugges ts clu sterin g and analogy. As lan
Nia ll, whose memory pres ides over the new
literary journal, Archipelago, once put it,
man "doesn' t ow n the world . . . but simply

Council of Editors of Learned Journals

The Council ofEditors
ofLearnedJournals
invites editors of'jo urnals that publish in
scholarly fields 0/inq uiry, esp ecially in the
Recent Contributors:
humanities, to j oin its active membership
HARRY CREWS

Why sho uld you join? Benefits of regular members hip include: RITADOVE

• a subscription to Thefournal ofScho!4rly Publishing (itself a $3 0 value), STEPHEN DUNN

• a listing and link for your journalon CEL]'swebsite, www.celj.org, MARGARET GIBSON

• access to Editor-L (CEL]'s electronlc discussiongroup) and to the expertise of over 400 editors. ALBERT GOLDBARTH
• the opportunity to displayyour journalat the CEL] booth at the Modern Language IHAB HASSAN
Association'sannual convention and to meet potential subscribers and contributorsat the MARyHOOD
exhibit, PHILIP LEVINE
• eligibility for the awards competition(subje6t to annual guidelines) in the categories of )OYCE CAROL OATES
scholarly achievement (BellNewJournal BellSpecialIssue. BellJournalDesign. PhoenixAward
ftr SignificantEditorialAchievement, DiflinguishedEditor) and literaryachievement (Bell New
LiteraryJournal Parnassus Awardftr SignificantEditorialAchievement. DiflinguishedLiterary
Editor).

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Comparative Literature Studies

The [ames Joyce Quarterly celebrates
its fortieth anniversary
of publishing unequalled
articles and notes on ]oyce, as
well as book reviews, conference
reports , a current bibliography,
and announcements of
scheduled world events
with a Joycean emphasis.
Direct subscriptions and inquiries
to the [ames Joyee Quarterly,
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STUDIES IN CANADIAN LITERATURE
invites sub mi ssions fo r th e fo llowing sp ecial issu es
wi th 2008 deadlin es:
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Scholarly, yes! But also exciting and provocative, -LITERATURES AND THEORIES OF AFRICA
thisrefereed semi-annual and bilingual journalpro-
vides criticalcommentary on Canadian literature For further informatio n , de adli ne s, submissio n an d
and interviews with Canadian authors subscrip tio n in formation, co ns ul t o ur w eb site at
www.cl-studies.psu .edu
Wc invite submissions, subscriptions, and
inquiries
Most Recent Special Issue:
"For the Loveof Words":
AboriginalWritersof Canada. 2006
The
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TLS NOVEMBER 2 20 07

"City, 1923" and "Church, 1923": two postcards for the Bauhaus exhibition,
July-October 1923; from Lyonel Feininger: Loebermann Collection (295pp. PresteI. £40 .
97837913 3767 8)
shares ex istence with oth er livin g thin gs".
Although the island motif run s throu ghout
thi s first numb er , so do es the desire to find
common gro und. Here, the sea rch for the
place within is pur sued in the kno wledg e that
there are always other island s, and parallel
pur suit s.
Niall' s son, Andrew Mc Neilli e, the Editor
of Arc hipelago, has brou ght togeth er new
work from the furth est reach es of what he
call s "the unn ameabl e con stellati on of
island s on the Eas tern Atlantic coa st" , but
despit e the distanc es bet ween the individual
contribution s a strong sense of recurrent con-
cern s and shared ex perience emerges. Eve n
the pieces that dra w most ob viou sly on vivid
personal ex perience present not a solo voy -
ager, but a writ er setting out with friend s or
famil y. Fro m Seamu s Heaney "on the thw arts
with a child on either knee" , or Robert Mac-
Council of Editors of Learned Journals
U NI V ER SIT Y O F PE NN SY L V A N I A
PR ES S
EARLY AMERICAN STUDIES, ISSN 1543-4 273
Publishes research covering the histories and cultures of North
America bef ore 1850.
HISPANIC REVI EW, ISSN 0018-21 76
Devoted to Hispanic lit erary and cult ural st udies f rom the
medieval period to the present.
THE JEWISH QUARTERLY REVIEW, ISSN 0021- 6682
The oldest English-language Jewish studies journal publishing
since 1889.
JOURNALOF MEDICALTOXICOLOGY, ISSN 1556-90"
An international, peer-reviewed journal dedicated to advanc-
ing the science and practice of medical toxicology.
THE HEDGEHOG REVIEW
CRITICAL REFLECTIONS ON CONTEMPORARY CULTURE
The Future, Utopia, and Dystopia
Politics and the Media
SUBSCRIPTIONS NOW AVAILABLE
orde r online www.virginia.edu/i asc/hedg ehag .html email hedgehag@virginia.edu
LEARNED JOURNALS
farlan e sa iling alon g the Llyn Penin sula with
John the skipper and his wife, Jan , to the poet
Paul Abbott' s visionary journey through the
Wa ste Land of cont emporary London und er
the guidance of William Blake, the person al
is con stantl y bein g corroborated by com-
pan y. Mick Iml ah ' s early monastic voya ge to
"Muck" takes the voice of a disgruntled oars-
man, mutt ering first about the blessed
Kevin ' s shaky navigati on , and then about his
lead er ' s bewild erin g retr eat from the pro-
spec t of mod ernity. Such a poem cro sses the
division s betw een the ancient wo rld of "The
Wanderer" , brou ght into the volume throu gh
Greg Delant y' s fin e tran slat ion, and that of
the cont emporary creati ve tra vellers, whose
track s reveal the con stant pull of the past.
Man y of the pieces her e reveal the depth of
the desire "for sunken origins" that Derek
Mahon articulates so powerfully in the po em
JOURN ALOF THEEARLY REPUBLIC, ISSN 0275 -127 5
Publishing scholarship on the history and cult ure of the United
Stat es f rom 1776-1 861.
JOURNALOF THEHISTDRY DFIDEAS, ISSN 0022- 5037
Examines the evolution of ideas and their influences on histor-
ical developments in the humanities and social sciences.
MAGIC,RITUAL, AND WITCHCRAFT, ISSN 1556- 8' "
An interdtscipllnarvjournal cov~r i ng tne serious study of magic.
ritual. and witchcraft. The journal draws from a broad spectrum
of perspectives and methods.
REVISTA HISpANICAMODERNA,ISSN 0034- 8583
A peer-reviewed journal ccmmltt ed to the dlssemlnatlc n of
superior scholarship on Hispanic and Luso- Brazilian literary
and cultural studies.
http://je urnaIs.pennpress.erg
2008 TOPICS
Citizenship
TLS N O VE M BE R 2 2 0 07
" Insomnia" . In "Tynybraich", Angh arad
Pric e celebr ates the mountain wh ere her
famil y have farm ed for centuries, but the
recoll ection of her grandfather ' s shee p farm-
ing is suffuse d with the same se nse of loss as
Wordsworth' s "Michael". Nicolas Jacobs' s
"Above Cras we ll" is as much a lament for
the lost world of unquestioning faith as it is
for the twenti eth-century vis ionary, Dav id
Jon es.
But for all thi s, the volume is kept aflo at by
a shared conviction that nature is never spent.
Despit e its restless an xiety about the cont em-
porary world, the vo lume is lifted by
moments of inten se deli ght , as in "Fragment"
by Heaney, beginn ing "One summe r night
in Nairn " . Rog er Deakin' s enthusias tic
description of the sculptor David Nash, who
spent years madl y pur suin g his hug e Wood en
Boulder downstream and into the sea, shows
ju st how liberating perpetual change can be,
and how new island s can be created as we ll
as redi scovered.
Th e different part s of Archipelago spea k to
each other, as well as to their read ers, and
once the image of the Wood en Bou lder is free
to flo at across Mark Willi am s' s thou ghtful
essay on modern Gaelic poetr y, for examp le,
the "seemingly imp ending death" of Scotti sh
Gaelic begin s to appear less absolut e. Th e
cluster of wor k in this Archip elago deri ves
gre at strength from what has been "left
behind", but it also find s hop e in what may
still emerge so surprisingly from the darkn ess.
FIONA STAFFORD
Music
OP ER A Q UARTERLY
Oxford University Press. £48 per annum
A s an acad emic subje ct separate
from mu sic olo gy, opera is a newcomer :
journals such as The Cambridge Opera
Journ al and Opera Quart erly began pub-
'Victorian
Periodicals
CJ?gview
VPR is a quarterly journal featuring articles on the
editorial and publishing history of Victorian peri -
odicals , with a historica l, critical , or bibliographical
emphasis on the importance of periodicals for an
understanding of the history and culture of Victorian
Britain, Ireland , and the Empire. It also publishes
book reviews on subjects pertaining to the interests
of its readers and a biannual bibliography of articles
dealing with periodicals in the period 1800-1914,
culled from nearly 200 periodicals and reference
works.
25
lic ation onl y in the 1980s. Of the two, Opera
Quart erly is more alert to performing
as pects of the discipline (" Pe rformance +
Theory + Histor y" is how it describes its
mission , with performance heading the
list). Interest in performance does not ex tend
to the inclu sion of review s of performanc es
(largely the preser ve of the venerable
monthly journal Opera), but reviews of
recordings make up a subs tantial section of
each issue. Sin gers such as Marilyn Horn e
and Regin a Resnik are included in the list of
"contributing and con sultin g ed itor s" , and
book review s are not confin ed , as the y tend
to be in Cambridge Opera Journ al , to critical
studies but include biographies of divas such
as Sybil Sanderson , Pauline Viardot and
Renee Fleming . Performance is also
address ed in the inclu sion of " Notes from
the Stage", a new feature in which op era
dir ectors ex plicate specific productions,
usuall y accompa nied by performanc e or
reh ear sal photogr aph s.
Th eor y, however, is central. With its tan-
gential placing again st dr ama , mu sic , politics
and philosoph y, and the perennial reshap ing
of the genre itself, opera studies pro vide s a
tempting field for theori sts. Man y get by
without both ering too much about mu sical
specifics , though this cannot be said of the
leadin g article of the "Echoed El sewhere"
issue (Autumn 2005), by Dan iel K. L. Chua,
which combines a clo se mu sic al reading
of Monteverdi ' s L 'Orf eo and Beetho ven ' s
Fidelio and the Eroi ca Symphony with
references to Adorno and Ca rolyn Abb ate
among oth ers. Abbate her self also mak es a
spirited app earance in that issue, with her
reflections on Wagnerian ec hoes in popu lar
film s of the 1930-50s. Histor y is not much
repr esent ed in the journal; there are few
articles along the lines of J. Q . Daviess
"Melodramatic Po ssession s: The Flyin g
Dut chman, South Africa and the Imperial
Stage" (a n ex amination of the role of mu sic
in melodramas give n on the London stage in
Coming Up in
theTLS...
9th November
Music
16th November
Chri stm as Books
Trade Publis hers
23rd November
Poetry
30th November
Inte rnational Books of the Year
26 L EARN ED JOURNALS
the first three deca des of the nineteent h ce n-
tury), where endno te references are to library
shelf mark s and cen turies-old issues of
newspapers, rather than to the views of other
theori sts.
Opera Quarterly is on the move. After the
death of the prev ious Edi tor (E. Thomas
Glasow), it has been und er new management
(Dav id J. Levin) durin g the past three issues,
and is hum min g with fres h ideas that vas tly
expa nd the range of material includ ed. In
add ition to "Notes from the Stage " there is
another new featur e, "A uditions", where
space is given to writers outside the
disciplin e, such as the philosopher Gilles
Deleuze (who seems, however, to have
remarkably little to say about opera), or the
cho reograp her George Balanchi ne, on "The
Dance Elemen t in Strav insky 's Music" .
Under Lev in there are now gues t editors who
preside over them ed issues. "So und Moves"
(Wi nter, 2006) stretches the bound s of the
disciplin e even further than its readership
might expect. The leadin g article is an
exa mination of "Mickey-M ousing" (a dero g-
atory technical term to desc ribe da ncers'
imit ati ons of musical ges tures) in one
spec ific ballet by Mark Morri s (Gloria); its
author is a dance-studi es ex pert who feels no
need to make much reference to its sister
ge nre of opera. Altho ugh reviews of opera
recordings are inclu ded, and there is an
article on the role of dance in opera by
Dani el Alb right , thi s is esse ntia lly a dance-
studies rather than opera-studies issue,
E~in?urgh:~
University Press • • >
Journals from EUP
Edinburgh University Press publishes more than 30 scholarly journals a year
in a range of subject areas covering the arts, humanities, social sciences and
science:
SUBJECT AREAS
• African Studies
• Historical Studies
• Islamic Studies
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Visit www.eup.ed.ac.uk to:
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For further information, please email journals@eup.ed.ac.uk
with articles on Dukas' s ballet La Peri ';
Ric hard Strauss 's ballet Schlagobers, and
Balanchin e' s choreography for Ravel' s La
Valse.
Earlier issues dea l more ce ntrally with
opera. The Flying Dutc hman issue
(Summer 2005) offers an exa mination
by three authors of the ro le of Senta : John
Dea thridge's "pale" Se nta, Da niel Albright's
"diabolical" Senta, and David J. Levin ' s
consideration of "Senta, Ab sorpti on and
Wagnerian Thea trica lity" . Tak ing issue with
Liszr' s stateme nt "Poor Erik, one has to pit y
him" , Alexand er Rehdin g makes a goo d case
for taking the opera 's also -ra n tenor rather
more seriously. Oth er articles here inclu de J.
Q. Davies' s study of Edward Ball's me lo-
dramatic play The Flying Dutchman, or the
Phantom Ship , sa id to have inspir ed Heines
story, which in turn inspired Wagner ' s opera.
Theory in its fiercest form is offered by
Lydi a Goehr, the most recent addition to the
editorial board, in her " Undoing the
Disco urse of Fate" . In the foll owin g issue she
gave a "critical reading" of Martinu ' s surrea l-
ist opera Jul ietta (co mpa red to We ill's
Mahagonny) based on an imp ressive range of
philosop hical and mu sicological references,
rather than any ev ident direct con tac t with
the mu sic itself.
J O HN TY R RE L L
Subscription rates for indiv iduals and
institiutions may vary.
• Film and Media Studies
• Philosophy and Religion
• Politics and Law
• Science and Medical
• Scottish Studies
TLS NO VEM BE R 2 20 07
The Tinsel Man
What with the yea r we' d had it was in the air
to dit ch that holid ay but the thin g is old,
it's alway s held,
so it isn 't up to us and to be fair
the children like it.
So we prised the coffin-box and a cold breeze
of dust was all his thin gs, while on the road
by the waysi de
the ma n him self was spo tted, his big face
not und erstanding.
That days arrive as dates is not a thing
he gets, so to be hoisted sho ulder -high
hip hip hooray
and to be crow ned wi th tin sel in the morn ing
sunshine was something !
And we laughed into the town , at the grea t fools
we were aga in, and we took his weight in turn s,
we wro te new lines
for age -old melodies, we banged the bell s
in our tradit ion.
And he was fed before he had a cha nce
to ask to be, and had his pick of girls
and was all sm iles
but didn't pick and they ju st stroked his hands
as he stared at us.
Who knows if he remembers thi s is what
we do with him ? Who kno ws if he believes
the town behaves
the same way eve ry day? Who gives a shit
is another thin g.
And an oth er thin g is timing . It was noo n,
then it was after noon, and the grey sky
so recentl y
blue in his brain was grey so he gripped his thron e
and with his language
fou ght to stop it getting dar k. His words
ca me out so loud they sounded all the sa me
so he dropped them
like a useless gun and ju st point ed skywa rds
like a useless man.
Mim e was all. We think what he meant was Fig ht,
They Are Eve ryw here, They are Co ming! But the sun
blushed the maroon
of all the girls and was out of there. It was night
and he didn 't stop
screa ming till the dawn ca me as it does.
We leave him to his Mo rning Victor y March
to the near edge
of the woo d as he sheds his terribl e old cl othes
and decorati ons.
GL Y N M AXW E LL

eligious belief is curren tly under heavy
R fire. Books by Richard Dawkin s,
Chr istopher Hitchens and others tell us
that religion is a corr upting delusion. Desp ite
their assertions of the rationality of atheism,
the style of their onslaughts has been strongly
polemica l and rhetorical, rather than reason -
ably argued. Historical evidence is selective ly
surveye d. Attention is focused on inquisitions
and crusa des , while the significance of Hitler
and Stalin is downplayed. Believers in young-
earth creationism are presented as if they
were typical of religious people in genera l.
The two books under review aim to make a
more temp erate contribution to the debate.
John Cornwe ll has hit on the amusing
co nceit of writing in the persona of Richard
Dawkin s' s guardian angel, a being, moreover,
who had earlier stood in the same relationship
to Charles Darwin. The book' s tone is gently
iron ic and its style that of modest discussion,
which all makes for an enlightening read. The
twenty-one shor t chapters each consider
some claim made in Dawkinss book The God
Delusion (rev iewed in the TLS, January 19)
and then subjec t it to reasoned questionin g.
Comwe ll begins by pointing out that
Dawkins makes no serious attempt to engage
with the academic disc ussion of religiou s
thought and practice . His book is "as innocent
of heavy scholarship as it is free from false
modes ty". When it asserts that Jesus' call to
love our neighb our referred only to relations
between Jews (despi te this claim bein g in
clear co ntradiction to the point of the parable
of the Goo d Samarit an), the only suppo rt
quoted for this highly questionable stateme nt
is a book written by an anaes thes iologis t.
Ove r the cen turies, theol ogians have wres-
tled with how hum an language ca n attempt to
spea k about the nature of God, emphatica lly
rejec ting the idea that the deit y is simply an
invisibl e objec t among the other obje cts of
the wo rld. Yet, as Co rnwell po ints out, the
God in whom Dawk ins disbe lieves is a kind
of "Great Sc ience Profess or in the Sky", a
simp listic notion that any thinking theist
wo uld be qui ck to rejec t. We are continua lly
told that theology is no proper academic disci-
pline , a concl usion that could only be reached
by someone whose knowledge of the subjec t
was compara ble to the scientific know ledge
di splayed by those who wri te in green ink
that "E instein was wro ng" .
Daw kins is relentlessly rude about reli-
gious believers. They are said to be "malevo-
lent , barking mad , mendacious, delud ed" and
much more . He can not have the courtesy to
take seriously those of us who are both scien-
tists and believer s. Relig ious educa tion of the
young is equated with child abu se. Dar win' s
angel pertinently asks, "Wo uld you rea lly
trade chil d sex ua l abuse for bein g brought up
in the religion of your paren ts?" . The tone of
conte mpt - one might almos t say hatred -
that charac terizes many of the asse rtions in
The God Delusion is one of the most disturb-
ing aspec ts of the book.
In God We Doubt di splays much more
eve n-handedness . John Humphrys is respec t-
ful of re ligious belief and the kind of life that
often, but not invariabl y, issues fro m it, while
emphas izi ng that he is unable himself to
accept such belief. His approa ch is that of
one who remain s open and questioning about
these matt ers, as indi cated by the subtitle of
hi s book , Confessio ns of a fa iled atheist.
Humphrys writes in the chirpy colloqui al
R ELI GI ON
One of the hosts
JOH N POLKI NGHOR N E
J oh n C o rnwe l l
DARW IN'S ANGEL
An ange lic riposte to "The God Delusion"
171pp. Profile. £ 10.99.
978 I 846680489
John Humph r y s
I N G OD WE DO U B T
Confess ions of a failed atheist
323pp. Hodder and Stoughton. £ 18.99.
978 0 340 95 126 2
sty le one might expec t from a presenter of
the Today programm e on Radio 4. In fact, the
book originated partly from interviews he
conducted with the Archbishop of Ca nter-
bur y, the Chie f Rabbi and Tariq Ram adan , a
Mu slim acad emic, for the rad io, and from the
delu ge of correspond ence that foll owed.
Humphrys takes very seriously the human
exper ience of conscience, urging us to do
some things and to refuse to do others. No
doubt , evo lutionary thin king offers us some
partial understandin g of this, with its concept s
of kin altruism (protecting the famil y gene
pool) and reciproc al altruism (I' ll help you in
the expectation that you will help me). Neve r-
theless, Humphrys rightly sees that these
concepts fail to offer insight into the kind of
radical altruism which, to use an exa mple he
discusses at some length, led Irena Sendlerova
repeatedly to risk her life in saving 2,500 Jew-
ish children who were trapped in the Warsaw
ghetto. Hum phrys sees ethical intuition as the
signal of a transcendent dim ension in life,
which he values but does not know how to
explain from an atheist point of view.
Humphrys believes that the case for God
made by the Abrahami c faith s is "riddled
with holes". He fails to acknow ledge the
subtlety and truth- seekin g character of
theol ogical thought , or to recognize that the
care and discrimination exerc ised in serious
biblical studies carries us we ll beyond a
plodding, cryp to-litera list approa ch to the
interpr etation of Scripture .
Both Dawkin s and Humphr ys rightly
engage with the cha llenge to theism that is
rep resent ed by the ex iste nce of a wo rld
claimed to be the crea tio n of a good and
powe rful God, but wh ich neverth eless con-
tain s so much ev il and suffering. This is
surely the grea test diffic ulty ho lding peop le
back from religious belief, and it is one that
cont inua lly troubl es religiou s be lieve rs. One
could not claim that there is a complete and
stra ightforwa rd answer ava ilable to rem ove
th e pe rp lex ity. Ye t th er e are some arg ume nts,
not di scussed by either Humphrys or by
Dawkin s, which offer modest help as theol o-
gia ns strugg le with the pro blems of theodi cy.
Interestin gly, scie nce is of so me assistance
in this regard. Its und er stand ing of how the
wor ld wor ks shows that natur al proc esses are
inextricably entangled with eac h other. They
ca nno t be sepa rated out, so that tho se with
good consequences could have been retained
by a competen t creator who, at the same time,
eliminated tho se with bad consequences. The
integrity of creation is a kind of pac kage dea l.
For exa mple, the process of genet ic mutatio n
TLS NOVE M BER 2 2007
Siena Cathed ral; from Wonders ofthe
World, edited by Benoit Nacci and Patri ce
MiIleron (312pp. Abrams. £25.95; US $50.
9780810994492)
produ ced new form s of life, but it has also
result ed in malignancy. You can not have the
one without the other. Humphrys asks why
there are not repea ted divine interventi ons to
aver t ev il consequences. Such thin gs could
onl y happen in a magical wor ld, and that kind
of world is not this one, becau se its crea tor is
not a capricious magician. On ly a world with
sufficie nt reliabilit y for deeds to have foresee-
able consequences could be one in which
moral responsibility was exerc ised. These
insights do not dispose of all the angui sh and
anger that we feel in the face of individual
human suffering, but they sugges t that it is
not simp ly gratuitous, eas ily remova ble by
a Go d who was a bit less ca llous .
F un da menta l to the di scu ssio n to wh ich
both books are see king to contribute is the
relationship between faith and reason. To o
often the two have been pitted aga inst each
other, as if they were in necessary contradi c-
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27
tion. Religi ous faith is not a matter of the
unqu estionin g acce ptance of unmoti vated
belief, dem anded of us by so me overrid ing
authority. Quit e the co ntrary. Faith is a com -
mitmen t to a form of motivated belief, differ-
ing only fro m scientific reaso n in the natur e
of the subjec t of that belief and the kin d of
motivations appropria te to it. Scie nce achieves
its success by the modesty of its ambition,
only considering impersonal expe rience open
to repetiti on at will. Personal experience, let
alone encounter with the tran spersonal realit y
of Go d, does not fit within this limit ed pro to-
col. The concept of realit y offered by scient-
ism is that of a wor ld of metastabl e, rep lica t-
ing and information- processing sys tems, but
it has no persons in it. Darwin ' s ange l criti-
cizes Dawkin s for a lack of trust in the power
of imagi nation to explore realit y, such as we
exe rcise through poetry. He is said to sound
"as though he would substitute a series of
case-notes on senile dementia for King Lear",
No progress will be made in the debate
about religiou s belief unless participants are
prepared to recognize that the issue of truth
is as import ant to religion as it is to science.
Dawkins invokes Bertrand Russell's parable
of the teapot irrationally claimed to be in unob-
served orb it in the solar system. Of course
there are no gro unds for belief in this piece of
ce lestial crockery, but there are grounds
offered for religiou s belief, though admittedly
different people eva luate their persuasiveness
differentl y. Religion does not have access to
absolute proo f of its beliefs but, on careful
analysis, nor does science . In all realms of
hum an inquiry, the interlacing of experience
and interpr etation introd uces a degree of
precariousness into the argume nt. Yet this
does not mean that we cannot attain beliefs
sufficiently well motivated to be the basis for
rational commitment. In his book on the philos-
ophy of science, Personal Knowlege (1964),
Michael Polanyi stated that he was writing in
order to explain how (scientifically) he could
commit himself to what he believed to be true,
while knowing it might be false. That is the
huma n episte m ic conditio n. Rec og nizing thi s
should encourage caution, but not induce
intellectual para lysis. It is in this spirit that the
dialogue between science and religio n needs
to be conducted.
28
hirty ye ars ago, a pair of newcom ers to
T the bo ok trade asked an es tablished
old-timer, " How do yo u start a sma ll
publishin g hou se in Ca nada? " . Th e answe r
was that it' s easy : " You ju st start a large one
and wa it". Th ou gh we ll outside the remit of
James Raven ' s impressive new hi story of the
bu siness, twenti eth- century - and for that
matter, twent y-fir st-century - publi shin g in
the form er Brit ish co lonies ex hibits obv ious
continuities with the previou s five cen turies,
not least in the degree of risk that is a recur-
rent theme of this study . Earlier histori es,
written by triumphant surv ivors or their
admirers, have been give n to ce lebra ting
success; thi s one goes out of its way to chart
di sappointment and failur e. The end result is
neverth eless a tribut e to the strength and
persistenc e of the enterprise at large . Raven
o utlines the inh erent fin ancial risks of
publishin g and describ es various means by
which publi shers, ove r the yea rs, have tried
to reduce them - see king patent s, purchasing
cop yrights, or joining in cooperativ e syndi-
ca tes . He also docu ment s ph ysical hazards
such as lead poisoning and fire, and the
acti on s of Church and State which led some
very early book seller s to "print mart yrdom" ,
and oth ers, later, to the pill ory ; but the less
spec tacular record of losses and bankruptcies
is the mor e co mpelling . A s Raven tren ch-
antl y rem arks, "the prim ary co nce rn of most
book seller s was profit , and mor e booksell ers
res ided (or died ) in prison because of debt
than bec ause of treason, libel, or blasph em y" .
This qu otation neatly illu strates a numb er
of featur es of The Business of Books - its dry
to ne, its refu sal to ideali ze, and, mo st imp or-
tant , its ca lculated limit ation s. A history
co verin g 400 yea rs has to find a focu s some-
how, or wa llow. The title and subtitle of thi s
book are designed to ex press its focu s very
precisely. It is not to be mistaken for a ge n-
era l survey of Briti sh book history. It deals
with business histor y, with the co mme rcial
aspect s of the trade, not politics or tech no-
logy or abstract ec ono mic analysis. Its natu-
ral lan gu age is of capitaliza tion, intellectu al
pro perty, trad eable asse ts, lines of credit ,
trade di scounts, unit cos ts, mark et base, eco -
nomi es of sca le, and so on . It is a histor y of
the trade in books, not in print ge nera lly .
C hoos ing thi s word allows for the inclu sion
of manuscript book s but not for broadsides or
jobbing printin g, thou gh tho se may be men-
tion ed in passing, and newspapers, as the prin-
cipal carriers of adve rtising for book s, are
give n co nside rable atte ntion. It is a histor y of
booksellers, not of publi shers, thou gh most
of these bookseller s were also publi shers,
becau se the emp has is has to be on mo vin g a
product. As scho lars of the histor y of publi sh-
ing always say , the meanin g of the wor d
"bookseller" cha nged over tim e, invol vin g
compli cated rel ation ship s w ith printers, sta-
tioner s and other trades, and only gradually
separa ting the fun ction s of retail ve ndor and
publisher.
The age nts in Raven' s hi story all had in
common the fact that they were engaged in
the se lling of book s. Th e word "English"
represe nts an imp ort ant , potenti ally co ntro-
versia l dec ision. Raven does not pretend to
deal with the larger subject of Briti sh , let
alon e intern ation al trad e, thou gh he has quit e
a lot to say about the Sco ttish presence in
Eng lish publi shin g and about Edinburg h
and Dublin as rival publishing centres in the
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Shelved
H. 1. JA CKSO N work. To balance the oppose d dem and s of
plot an d det ail, ge neral move me nt and spe-
J am e s R a v en cifi c fact , he ado pts a bro adl y ch ronol ogical
developm ent but pauses over new eleme nts
TH E BUS INESS O F BO O KS as they are introduced, thu s incorporatin g
Booksellers and the English book trade, 1450-1 850 mini-histori es (be it of shop signs, the Station-
493p p. Yale University Press. £35 (US $65). ers ' Com pa ny, trad e auctions, cata log ues ,
978 0300 1226 19
congers, women in the trade, pap er, second-
hand book s, or illu strati on ) within the main
eightee nth and nin eteenth centuries. He does narrati ve. Thi s method may cause a littl e co n-
not entirely ignore wo rld mark ets either, fu sion in the chronology here and there but
thou gh he is un able to do much mor e than the overall drift is easy enough to follow.
ges ture towards their significa nce . " Books in Eng land in the fifteenth ce ntury ,
Th e subtitle also makes it clear that his man y manufactured abroad , circulated to rela-
topic is the book trade, not trades as so me tively few" , Raven tell s us. "Four hund red
histori ans might prefer. Tho ugh allowance is yea rs later , after success ive tran sfor mation s
made for the co ntribution of many trades of the trade, book s, print ed and marvell ou sly
toward s the production of book s, Raven con- dive rse in subje ct, size, and price, had
centr ates on the book sell er ' s point of view. beco me part of the fabric of life. Fro m being
Finally, the spa n of years from 1450 to 1850 an often imp ort ed and eso teric luxur y, book s
rou ghl y corres ponds to the age of the hand and periodi cals no w made up a hu gely
press. Th e mech aniz ation of printing and success ful indu stry that was ex por ted across
paper-making, along with other new techn o- the globe. " Charting the way that the book
logies that mad e mass producti on possibl e, business passed from one point to the other,
was still und er developm ent in the early Raven reli es on sure fact s and labori ou sly
nineteenth century , and the hand press hun g asse mbled figur es, con sci ou sly rejectin g the
on. Raven is in any case a gra dualis t, ave rse exa mple of the "older, imp ressioni stic chro ni-
to wa tershed dates. cles" of the boo k wor ld, with its hero es and
" The Bibliophilist's Haunt; or Creech 's Bookshop" (cl850) by WilIiam Fettes Douglas
The Business of Books is not in direct com- titans, as we ll as the myth-makin g of com-
petition with the ongo ing Cambridge History ment ator s like Ma caulay who "created a
of the Book in Britain and similar national waters hed where there was non e" . This is an
histori es, but it invites comparison with them . austere, co rrec tive proj ect that avo ids perso n-
Its ran ge of topic s is necessaril y narro wer. It alities and anecd otes on principle, and treat s
has almos t nothin g to say abo ut authors, seve rely predecessor s who yielded to ove r-
ed itors, critics, readers, or co llec tors ; about stateme nt and sensa tionalism or whose statis-
instituti on al publi shers (uni versity presses, tic al studies were not sufficiently rigorou s.
for exam ple), circulating libraries, prov incial (Raven warns us to be cauti ou s, for instance,
publi shing, or bibli om ani a. (Rave n has writ- about arg uments construc ted on the ba sis of
ten on some of these topi cs elsew here, and a title-counts and oth er records ex tracted from
separate study is promi sed that will include the Eng lish Short-Title Cata log ue.) The fact s
bibl iomania.) On the other hand , its chro no- are solid but the style is seldo m lively. Some
logical range is unu sually ambitious. It has readers may pin e for the era of ch aracters and
the adva ntage of a single author and co nse - impressions.
quentl y of a degree of coherence never found For tunately, Raven has hobb y hor ses and
in multivolume, multi- auth ored wor ks. enthus ias ms of his own , however restrained
Within its acknow ledge d limit ation s, it is in ex press ion. He is full y committed to the
ex traordinarily co mprehensive . Ra ven draws business-hi stor y appro ach , which serves to
on the labour s of hund red s of scho lars who correc t exaggerated cl aim s about the imp ort-
have writte n abo ut the arca na of publi shin g, ance of ideology or technolo gy. Change
as we ll as on his ow n ex tensive archival ca me abo ut in thi s peri od, he decl ares,
TLS NOVE M BER 2 2 0 07
throu gh the evo lution, mut ation and ada pta -
tion of busin ess practi ces. In a po ssibly
ungu ard ed mom ent , he refers to a "commer-
cial revolution" in the eightee nth century.
He also takes a spec ial interest in the geo -
graphy of the trade , the way in which it can
be show n as grad ually radiating out from the
area of sma ll stree ts aro und St Paul ' s Churc h-
yar d, epitomized by Patern oster Row ("the
Row" ). W heneve r thi s topi c arises, the narra-
tive moves along as smoothly as a car turning
into its ow n dri ve: "For the coac hing inn or
coffee house reader in the country town s [in
the late seve ntee nth century]' the world of
book s was con structed from these names: St
Pau l' s Churchya rd, Patern oster Row, Am en
Corne r, Ave Maria Lane, Ivy Lane, the Cha p-
ter Co ffee Hou se, and (much loved by the
unlic en sed ) Pissing All ey". Raven advocates
his meth od of top ographi cal analysis as a
way of makin g up for inadequate reco rds and
of recoverin g the sma ll bu sinesses - the poor,
the tran sient , the ordinary - in co ntrast to the
detested use of anec dotes which favours "the
great, the malevolent , or the peculi ar". The
cha pter in which he introduces and illu strates
thi s method is the most fascin atin g in the
vo lume. (As sec ond-mos t fascin atin g, I
reco mmend Cha pter Te n, "Risking Failu re". )
It uses land-tax record s, leases, insur anc e
rec ords and the like to recon stru ct the prin ci-
pal sites of book-trade activi ty after the
Great Fire of Londo n and includes evi de nce
of square foot age and shop front ages to co n-
tradict so me earlier acco unts - including the
author' s ow n, as he frankl y co nfesses.
St Paul' s Churc hya rd could be sa id to be
the Gard en of Ede n in the originary myth
of The Business of Books, which sets out
fro m that starting point to tell a story of grow -
ing diversifi cati on , of the eme rge nce of a
"charmed circle of major copyr ight-ho lding
book sellers" and of challen ges to their
control of the trade. Basic struc tures remain
stable but inno vation from within and compe-
tition from without combine to produce a
dyn ami c indu stry and lead to the founding
of grea t dyn asties such as tho se of the Robin-
sons, New berys , Lon gm ans, Murrays and
Mac mill ans, as we ll as witness ing the unex-
pected, some times tran sfor min g activiti es of
newcom ers, lon ers and out sid ers. The all-but
ex clusive focu s on Lond on is liabl e to annoy
if not to outrage book historians, es pec ially
tho se who study publishin g in the pro vinc es.
It is not that Raven has not absorbed their
work, but that takin g a lon g view reveals Lon-
don ' s over whelming dominanc e of the mar-
ket through out the period . He defend s his
position vigo rous ly.
The Bus iness of Books pres umes littl e prior
knowled ge of the subjec t and takes care, as
a rule, to ex pla in co nce pts that might be
unfamili ar; but it is not ju st an introductory
study. Packed with inform ation , and offering
an or iginal perspecti ve, it will interest the spe-
cialist as we ll as the genera l reader. Both
wo uld be well advise d to read it through once
and then to keep it on hand as a referenc e
book for the sake of its co ncise mini-histori es,
its comp rehen sive and up-to-date bibliogr a-
ph y, and an exce llent ind ex that ma kes these
thin gs rea dily accessible. The end-notes are
illuminating; wo uld they had been footn otes.
Illustration s are few and not of high qu ality,
but they are we ll chose n and earn their places.
Jam es Raven himself deserves a plaque on
what littl e is left of the Row.

n one respect at least, The Dramatic
I Imagination of Robert Brownin g is the
kind of biography of which its subject
might have approved. The strength of
Brow ning 's desire to keep his private life
sec ret - in January 1889 he devoted a whole
wee k to burni ng lett ers to his family that he
had care fu lly ama ssed over many yea rs -
seems to have ca lled forth an equal and
op posite des ire on the part of many of his
biographe rs to uneart h these secrets. Th ere
have , as a result, been ma ny attempts to read
Brow ning' s poe try as a cove rt or unco nscious
exerc ise in self-expression, in spite of his dec-
laratio n that his poe ms we re "always dram a-
tic in principle, an d so ma ny utterances of so
ma ny imagin ar y per sons, not min e" . Richar d
S. Kenned y and Do nald S. Hair, however,
take Browning at his word . There is no scour-
ing of the poetr y for clues to the poe t's hid-
den life, no pruri ent spec ulation abo ut his
marr ied life wi th Eliza beth Barre tt or his re la-
tion ship s with his var ious female admirers;
instead they place the emphasis on the cul-
tural and social forces that led him to ado pt
the "dramatic" mode of exp ression in the first
place .
Partly because of the circums tances in
which it was written - Hair revised and com -
pleted Ken nedy's manu script after the death of
his co-author, adding the final eight chapters -
this biography is weighted towards the ear ly
and middle periods of Brownin g' s life. The
authors show a good deal of resourcefulness in
reconstruc ting the poet ' s poorly docu mented
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BI O GR APHY
Open societies
JO E PH E L AN
Ri ch a rd S . K c nn cd y a n d
D o n ald S. H ai r
THE DRAMATIC I M A GI N A TIO N O F
ROBERT B RO W NI N G
A literary life
492pp. University of Missouri Press. $49.95.
97808262 1691 5
early years, plundering the diaries and mem-
oirs offriends and acquaintances to fill in some
ofthe gaps; and their acco unt of the poet' s mar-
riage and residence in Italy is considera bly
enhanced by extensive use of the Kenyan Type-
script in the British Library, which includ es
severa l unpubl ished letters from Elizabeth to
Robert' s sister Saria nna and other close
friends. In spite of this diligence, however, the
story that emerges is a very fam iliar one, and
the strictly biographical portion of this book
some times feels like a dut iful plod through
what Brownin g him self (in a different context)
calls "mere commonplace old facts which
every body knows" . There are, moreove r, some
questionable jud gements offered along the
way , such as the assertion that Browni ng "did
not adm ire Wordsworth ' s poetry", or the
sugge stion that he co uld be charac terized in
political term s as an "ordinary unsoph isticated
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TLS N O VE M B E R 2 2007
29
inevitable mediation s involved in all acts of
reading and interp retation . Bro wnin g was par-
ticul arly im patien t with those reade rs - mem-
bers, for the most part, of the var ious " Brown-
liberal" . It is difficult to think of any area ing Soc ieties" that spra ng up during the last
of Brow ning ' s thought for which the word decade of his life - who thought that "years of
"unsophisticated" wo uld be appropriate. study in diction aries" wo uld brin g them to a
Such jud gement s are symptomatic of the better understandi ng of his work. " You imag -
boo k' s rather old-fashioned and belletri stic ine", he wro te to one such reader, "that with
tone which makes itself felt most clearly (and more learnin g you would ' understand' more
most damagingly) in its critical sections. How- abo ut my poetry ... as if you wo uld some-
eve r j ustifiab le in theory, the dec ision to keep where find it alread y written - only wa iting to
the life and the work separate leads in practi ce be tran slated into English and my ver ses ."
to some aw kwa rd tran sition s and perfun ctory Wh at he wan ted from his readers, as he
chap ters. It is, for instance, diffi cult to see the goes on to say in that letter, was an act of re-
purpose of the ten pages on Men and Women, anim ation or eo-creation ; the kind of act
which inform usthat the chara cter of Karshish that form s the centre of his Balaustion 's
in Brownin g' s poem of that name is "very Adventure, which both includ es and is itself a
appealing" , and that "Bishop Blougram' s Apo- version of the Al cestis of Euripides. Yet
logy" is one of the " most puzz ling" poem s in Browning was realistic en ough to recog nize
the co llection. The discussion of the dramatic that such eo-creation wa s beyond mos t of his
monologue is similarly unaware of much of reade rs, who co ntinued to be seduced by the
the co ntemporary critical specu lation on lure of biographi cal or critica l "explanation"
Bro wnin g' s work , and simply fails to engage of his work. Do nald Hair and Richard
with many of the question s a twent y-fir st- Kennedy perfor m a valuable serv ice by high-
cen tury reader might want to ask abo ut it. lighti ng Bro wnin g' s cons tant endeavour to
These strictures app ly with much less force kee p his reade rs focused on the poe try itself,
to the closing chap ters of the book , in which but they do not, perhaps, reflec t on the impli-
Bro wnin g' s notoriou sly cross -grai ned later cations of his stance for their ow n enterp rise.
po etr y is dealt with in a way which acknow l- Th e rash of recent bio graphi es of Brown ing -
edges the poet ' s disconcerting ability to antici- thi s is the third in the past four years - wo uld
pate futur e readi ngs (and misreadings) of his appear to sugges t that we are still only too will-
wor k. There is, in the poe try of the 1870 s in ing to be distracted from the diffi cult but
particular, a focus on the act of translation , rewarding task of grappling with his poetry by
which becom es a kind of metap hor for the the comfortin g famili arit y of his life story .
, D Raw,,,,,
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30
n 1835, the India-born Englishman Jam es
I Brook e, ex-soldier and failed trader,
bou ght him self a hea vily-arm ed schoo ner
and turned merc enar y. Six yea rs later he was
rewarded for his services to the Sultan of
Brun ei with the territory of Sarawak, in north-
ern Born eo, becoming the fir st of a dynasty
of white Rajah s. He was succee ded by his
neph ew, and by the latter ' s son Vyner
Brook e, who effectively so ld Sarawak to Brit-
ain in 1946 (to the vociferou s chagrin of his
heir s), and whose wife Sylvia, the last Ranee,
is the subjec t of this book.
Sylvia was a writer herself. "Q ueen of the
Head-Hunters" , the sobriquet Philip Eade has
borr owed, was the characteristically self-
dramatizing title of one of her autobiog ra-
phi es. Eade is slighting of her work, but he' s
on shaky ground. The rev iewe r of her The
Th ree White Raj as wrote disapp rovingly in
this paper, in 1939, that she preferred "the
presentation of character" to the "discussio n
of politic s". The sa me could be said of Eade
hi mself. His biograph y contains little or no
inform ation on the peo ple, culture, ec onomy
or gove rna nce of Sar awak. The Brook e raj
was an anach roni sm by the time it cam e to an
end, but its story is part of the large and fasci-
natin g one of how the gree dy private enter-
pri se of the fir st, freelanc e, Briti sh empire-
build er s was gradually ove rla id and ob scured
by ideal s of public service and the hierarchi es
of the Colonial Service. But that is not the
story Eade wa nts to tell. He, like his chosen
subjec t, is interested, with almos t comi cal
ex clusive ness , in "character".
And who can blame him, give n the
material at his di sposal? Fro m begin ning (her
nursemaid used to beat her with sticks
-----------------------~,-----------------------
rom the subtitle of Tracy Barm an' s
P book, you might suppose there to be a
differenc e bet ween the roles of royal
mistress and royal servant. If such a distin c-
tion ex ists, it was not made clear to Henri etta
Howard, who serve d, in various capacities,
both George II and his wife, Qu een Caroline,
as Wom an of the Bed Cha mber. For the best
part of twenty years Mrs Howard began her
day on bend ed knee befor e the Queen, the
roya l was hbasin in her arms, and ended it lis-
tenin g to the King recite to her, in exa ct
detail, the complicated famil y trees of the
princ es of Europe and the types and co lours
of the uniform s worn by milit ary regim ent s.
His Highn ess, so one courti er said, insisted
on the con versation of tho se around him
bein g new, while his own rem ained "always
the sa me thing over and ove r aga in" .
Henr ietta Howard, serious, determined,
and intelligent, hid her "private virtues" , Jona-
than Swift said, "like cloath s in a chest". Two
of her three intim ate relation ship s were with
me n w ho had no intere st in see ing w hat she
stored away . Her first husband , Char les
Howard , with his mou stache-t widdling vil-
lain y and all-round boori shness, seems to
ha ve wa ndered into the bio graph y from a
gothic novel. Wh y they married was a mys-
tery eve n to Henri etta ' s friend s. "How she
came to love him , or how he came to love any-
bod y, is unaccountable" , as Lord Ches ter-
field put it. "Thus they loved , thu s they mar-
ried, and thus they hated each other for the
res t of their lives." By way of getting herself
out of the povert y and hom elessness brou ght
on by her husband ' s violence, gambling and
BIOGRAPHY
Dog and cat
L UCY H UGH ES-HALL ETT
Philip Ea de
SY LV lA, QUEEN OF THE
HEA D HUNT ER S
A n outrageo us Eng lis hwoman and her lost kingdom
362pp. Weidenfeld & Nicolson. £20.
978 0 297 84788 5
ado rned with carved dogs' head s - a pug for
minor naughtin ess, a spiky greyhound for
grave r offences) to end (the heir apparent to
Sarawak claim ed to be in cont act with "extra-
terrestrial bein gs" ), Sylvia's story is ove r-
cro wded with ecce ntrics and reprobates. She
was born into the highest circl es: Queen
Victo ria frequ entl y ca me to ca ll. Sylvia's
fath er , Reggie Brett (sub sequentl y Lord
Esher) turn ed down a sequence of gove rn-
ment offic es but found a niche for him self
orga nizing ceremoni al eve nts - royal wed-
dings, fun erals and jubilees. It was presum a-
bly from him that Sy lvia got her taste for rega-
lia. " 1 wa nt cro wns plastered eve ryw here",
she wro te to him after her marri age. She did
not, however , get his love. That was reserved
for her broth er Maurice, and expresse d itself
in ways that we nt way beyond the norm all y
patern al. Reggie called Mauric e "M olly" ,
wo uld stalk the stree ts of Eton at night to
gaze up at his window, and wrote him ardent
letter s. " 1 was almos t cert ainl y the first
hum an bein g who kissed you at all, and quit e
Much repetition
F R ANCE S WILSO N
T r ac y Barman
HEN R I ETTA HOWA RD
King 's mistre ss, Queen 's servant
324pp. Ionathan Cape . £20.
978 0 224 07606 7
alcoholism, Mr s Howard set herself up as mis-
tress to the futur e King, for whom she cared
little and who see ms to ha ve cared less for
her. Caught between Scy lla and Chary bdis,
Henri etta Howard was kept afloa t by the
friend ship of almo st all the eightee nth-
century' s men of letters. Ches terfie ld, Pope,
Sw ift, Arbuthnot, John Gay and, later ,
Horace Walpole, each admired her mind and
manners, and Henri etta Howard was branded
a Woman of R eason .
They made an odd couple, this intellectu-
ally curious courtier and the sobbingly dreary
mon arch. Erratic and foul-t emp ered , when
told that he was now the King of England,
Ge orge II respond ed "Dat is va n big lie" and
stomped off. He would fly into a rage if a
cha ir had been moved by a fracti on.
Ob sessed with routin e, he waited eve ry day
until 7pm to visit Henri etta, kee ping to the
allotted hour "with such dull pun ctu alit y",
said Horace Walpole, "that he frequ entl y
wa lked about his ch amber for ten minut es
with his wa tch in his hand , if the stated
TLS NOVE M BER 2 2 0 07
cert ainl y the first who kissed you passion-
ately. I love to linger on these facts".
Sylvia and her sister Doroth y (better known
as Brett, painter and intim ate friend of Dora
Cani ngton, of Ottoline Morrell and of D. H.
Lawrence) received less of their father' s atten-
tion. But distin guished grow n-up company
was not lackin g. Doroth y was pounc ed on by
Lord Harcourt , futur e Co lonial Secretary, an
experience to which she attributed her subse-
quent inabilit y to enjoy sex. Sy lvia 's early
father-substitut es includ ed W. T. Stead and
Georg e Bernard Shaw, who encourage d her in
her writing. In her twenti es she fell in love
with J. M. Barrie - another mentor and more
than twice her age - called him the "Furry
Bea st" and prop osed to him : he declin ed. All
this is so luridl y colourful , and so noisy with
the clangour of grand names being dropp ed,
it' s perh aps unsurp rising that Eade finds it
more amusing than politi cs.
Still unmarried at the age of twenty-six,
Sylvia thought herself ugly, and published a
story, "The Left Lady" , about spinsterhood,
which she expec ted to be her fate. She was
rescued from it by Vyner Brook e. Their court-
ship was dreary. On their first date they
talked about lavatori es. Duri ng their honey-
moon he kept the con versation going by read-
ing aloud from a book of jokes. But Sy lvia,
who later admitted she took "a very poor
view" of sex ual interc ou rse, was not lookin g
for erotic exc ite ment. Instead , her mar riage
brought her ce lebrity and exal ted status, both
minut e was not arrived" . Bor man is surely
right in her sugges tion that Geor ge ll' s obses -
s io n w ith tim ekeepin g and o rder may have
been the sympto ms of Asperger's syndro me,
although we must add to this the effec ts of
continuous flatt ery and the impa ct of his
mother , Queen Sophia, having been impri s-
oned by his father for the last thirt y yea rs of
her life.
Th e rel ationship bet ween George II and
Henri ett a Ho ward was fired by necessity as
opp osed to passion. The King reserved his
passion for the Queen , who m he adored, and
see ms only to have taken a mistress because
he felt it incumbent on him to do so. As it
was, Queen Caro line behaved more like a
mistress than a spouse, bearin g Georges
monologues with patience, performing her
duti es eve ry night , and responding to his tan-
trums with indul genc e and co mpliance , while
Henr iett a, as Walpole put it, "had in realit y
all the slights of a wife". Her life pick ed up
when she at last becam e a widow, which hap-
pened five yea rs after legall y separating from
Charles Howar d. To this pleasure was added
the unexpected acquisition of his famil y title,
makin g her a count ess, and a gift of money
from the usually parsimonious King. By the
time she reached her forti es, Henri etta found
that for the first time in her life she was look-
ing at the possibil ity of freedom , and she
made the scan dalous move of leaving the
court. Th e Queen , who had enjoyed per secut-
of which she relished , and a lifestyle which
allowed her plent y of time to "relax in the
swimm ing pool with a gin sling" .
She was prett y generally di sliked . Her
broth er called her the "arch-cat", and Briti sh
Co lonial Offic ers saw her as a self-serving
troubl em aker. Eade makes little attempt to
count er their opinion. But ju st visible beneath
the anecdote-spangled surface of his account
is another possible version of her life. The pro-
lific author who go t up at dawn and wrote for
five hour s eve ry day befor e reachin g for the
gin is not the relentl essly frivol ous idler she
was imagined to be. Her beautifully embroi-
dered sarongs embarrasse d her friend s when
she wore them in England, but must have
see med fittin g to her subjec ts. When ,
es tranged from Vyner , living on her own in
New York and strapped for cas h, she took to
tellin g fortun es for money und er the name of
Toots, she was "undignified" (a word fre-
quentl y used aga inst her) but she was also
independent and resourceful. There is no
trace in this book of her having don e anything
substantial for the people of Sarawa k, but it is
unclear whether that is Sy lvia's fault or her
biograph er ' s. Eade is so much more inter-
es ted in goss ip about the "queen" than he is in
the predic ament of the "head-hunters", that
he refers to Vyner ' s "expeditions aga inst
refractor y Dyaks" so cursoril y as to sugges t
they were ju st another form of blood sport.
Philip Eade's book may tell us little about
Sarawak, but it affo rds an entertaining
peep- sho w view of the Briti sh rulin g class at
the end of the Imperial age. Thi s is not a
monolithic Establishment, but a loose and
louche asse mbly of questionabl e ladies and
extreme ly rum chaps .
ing her husband ' s whore ove r the past two
decades, was sorry to see her go. "What the
devil did you mean" , King George roared on
hearin g that his wife had tried to keep Henri-
etta at the palace, "by trying to make an old,
dull , deaf, peevish beast stay and plague me
when I had so good an opp ortu nity to be rid
of her?"
Henr ietta, or Lady Suffolk as she was now
known , built herself a delightful hou se, Mar-
ble Hill , on the Tha mes, and found herself a
delightful husband , Ge orge Berkeley, to
share it with. Not all her friends were pleased
at this goo d fortun e. "To behold ye happ y
Pair ; & at night , to see her deaf- Ear , & his
Lame-leg; put into Bed on Purpose bau ght ,
for ye unexpected Nuptia lls", spat Theresa
Blount to Pope, who also felt put out that
Henri etta had now less time for him.
Books about royal mistresses are more
comm on than fish in Icel and , so it takes skill
to produ ce one that stands out. While Bor man
has cert ainly fou nd an unsung and unusual
heroi ne, what eleva tes this biograph y above
the others in its genre is the author' s sense of
hum our. Henrietta Howard is cas t as the
long-suffering voice of reason in a Christmas
panto ; her strugg le to find a life in which she
ca n think , and talk , and love is interrupt ed by
a string of comi c sce nes, such as the one in
which Ge orge I, flank ed by his mistresses,
"The Maypol e" and "The Eleph ant" , tells the
English that they are "the best-shaped ... and
lovingest people in the world" . Tracy Bor-
man has a theatrical feel for her subje ct, and
Henrietta Howard, her first produ ction,
deserves a long and success ful run .

Watch the feed
n February of AD 3 13, Licin ius was on
I his hurri ed way fro m Ca rn untum to
M ilan. Travel in winter across the passes
of the Juli an Alp s was usually imp ossibl e,
but Licinius was on his way to marry Co nstan-
tia, the half- sister of Consta ntine. Blizzards
brou ght the terrifyin g, num bing co ld known
to the hippi atroi as caus ing tetanos, a veter i-
nari an' s ter m for the fin al stages of freezin g,
when a hor se' s heart stopped. Some hor ses
and the mounted soldiers soo n fro ze, stiff in
place, and one knew the men we re dead since
their teeth were show ing, lips draw n back in
a horrifi c grimace. A few hor ses stumbled for-
war d carryin g the soldiers ' corpses, still
clut chin g wea po ns and rein s, until the hor ses
too stiffe ned, standing imm obilized where
their hearts had fro zen. Am on g the atte nda nts
to Liciniu s on his harrowin g j ourn ey was Th e-
omnestus, a "hor se-doctor" (Greek hippia-
tros; Latin mulomedicus or veterinariusi with
ex perience in the cav alry, whose acc ount of
Lic inius' s mid wint er passage of the Julian
A lps is preserved in the Greek texts kno wn as
the Corpus hippiatricorum Graeco rum .
A mong man y other highli ght s in Ann e
McCabe ' s most welcome and carefully writ-
ten mon ograph , A Byzantine Encyclopedia of
Horse Medicine: The sources , compilation
and transmission of the "Hippiatrica ", is the
inclu sion of both the Greek text and an
Eng lish tran slation of Theo mnes tus ' "case
hi story" of tetanos. Unusually among
the ancient veterinary authors, Th eomnestu s
pointedly ex presses fondn ess for his charges,
demonstratin g that he ow ned and ca red for
hor ses in his ow n right.
Often forgotten, now that the wides pread
military use of hor ses has been ove rtaken by
ad van ced techn olo gies, is the strikingly
recent aspec t of Hitler' s invasion of Poland,
in 1939, in which large numbers of hor ses
dragged artillery. An d eve n mor e recentl y,
the mos t technologically adva nced arm y in
the mod ern wo rld has redi scovered how
essential hor ses are in getti ng from plac e to
place in the mountain s of Afghanistan .
Mil itary histori ans might be we ll aw are of
the continual use of cava lry in almost all wars
from dimmest antiq uity through to the twenti-
eth century, but classici sts frequ entl y ignore
the ess ential cont exts of agriculture, the basic
intim acy which alm ost eve ryone had with
anim als, plant s, crop s and seas ons, and ho w a
Rom an farm er' s sense of what he knew as the
mos ma iorum eventu all y birth ed the institu-
tion s of the Rom an Republic and its succes -
sor em pires. Histori ans of ancient medicine
likewi se generally omit con sid erati on of
"what the farm er kn ew" (th ink of Cato the
Elde r, Varro, Ce lsus ' lost wor k on agricul-
ture, with its prominent section on veterinary
medi cin e, and Colume lla's gentleman farm s)
about health and disease both in his own
ex tended famil y and in dom estic anima ls.
Thi s knowled ge fed a bod y of medical folk-
lore that encompasse d the healin g effects of
plant s, min erals, anima l parts and products,
ra nging from the anaes thetic prop erti es of
ma ndra ke-apples and the hypert onic prop er-
ties of hone y and bee-glu e throu gh the hun-
dr eds of fat s, oils, resins, and food stuffs that
ensure d reason able health in an open environ-
MEDICINE 31
JOH N SCARBORO UGH
Ann e McC ab e
A BY Z A NTI N E E N CY CLOPAEDI A
O F H O RS E M E D IC IN E
Th e sources, compilation, and transmission of the
Hippiatrica
347pp. Oxford Univers ity Press. £65 (US $99) .
978 0 19 927755 1
ment, a "lifestyle" emin entl y predictable and
reli abl e. Plough s and plou gh shares required a
sturdy ox, one that remained healthy seas on
after seas on. Not surprisingly, peopl e who British cava lry on the Arras-Cambrai road, April 1917 ; from The Animals ' War :
knew their animals - es pecially tho se Animals in wartime from the First World War to the present day by J ulie t Gardiner
animals that gave woo l, lanolin, mi lk, cheese, (Portrait. 978 0 7499 5103 6)
leather, mea t and a large vari ety of glues -
knew from ancient cu stom and curre nt ex peri- necessaril y und ergird ed Al exand er the Byzant ine Encyclopae dia is her abi lity to set
ence that di sea se in one of the herd oft en Great ' s ex pedition into the far reach es of out clear ly what we kno w no w abo ut the
became disease in the whole herd , and there- the Persian Empire. lives, car eers and writings of Anato lius,
for e separa tion of the sick animals prevent ed It is, however , in the era of the military Eume lus , Pelagon ius, Ap syrtu s, Theomnes -
what we wo uld term contag ion of them all. If reforms of Diocl etian and Co nstantine that tus, Hierocl es and Hippocrates the Veter inar-
man y tract s on medi cin e were frequ entl y one discern s the radic al shift from depend- ian , and how and whe n the Hipp iatrica came
translated from Gree k into Latin , an eq ually ence on infantr y to cavalry, " shock troop s" to be compiled. Her unt angling of the manu -
important number of tract s on ag riculture and able to move rapid ly from frontier to frontier script traditions is preci se and car eful , and
veterinary matters we re translat ed from Latin or oth er point s of trouble. Maint enance of she gives full credit to the few scholars pre-
into Greek, and the Rom ans we re acknow l- hor ses in the Rom an army was basic to thi s cedin g her, from the ninet eenth century to the
edged by all as the abs olute master s of "how reform, and the hippi atros or mulomedicus or present , who ha ve laboured to ex plicate thi s
to run a farm ". veterinarius probably achieve d a prominent most important, if ge nera lly ignored, aspect
A parallel bod y of kno wled ge - mo stly plac e in the rank s of commanders in thi s of ancient medi cine .
informal, and passed o n from generation to new army . Such officers ' ex periences with Afi cion ado s of hor ses from all back -
generation - grew up about hor ses, and , as the diseases of hor ses and other pack animals grounds can deri ve much benefit from this
Mc Cabe shows in her brief but inci sive became priceless reco rds of "how to keep pioneering book : all Greek and Latin pas-
back ground acco unt of Assyri an , Greek, them health y" , "what to do when they exh ib- sages are carefull y tran slated into English.Spe-
Carthag inian and earlie r Roman veterinary ited illness" and "prescriptions (pharmaceuti- cialists will burro w deepl y into analyses of ter-
medicine, such ex pertise en abled not merely cal, surg ical, dietetic) for cur es of equine ail- min ologies, manu script histori es, pharmaceu-
the breeding of fin e racing hor ses, but also ment s". Mc Cabe brin gs to light the writte n tical recip es, and how the veterinarian in late
the development of hor ses particularl y suited texts that surv ive in Greek, pa ssed do wn in Roman and Byzantin e times und erstood the
fo r wa r. Xenophon ' s A rt of Horsemanship compacted and fragm ent ar y form , as con- anatom y and physiol ogy of hor ses. Milit ary
alludes to equine ailm ent s, eve n as the treat- tra sted to the mor e ex tens ive veterinary histori ans will also find thi s aspect of the
ise conce ntrates on grooming and appea r- writings that have survived in Latin - tho se Roman army rather more clear than before,
ance ; and when Ari stot le provid es detai led by Vegetiu s, Pelagoniu s, Pall adiu s; the very and studen ts of th e famous ch ariot rac es in th e
description of the breeding and lifespan s of perc epti ve tract we kno w as the Mu lomedic- hipp odromes of the Byzantin e centuries will
hor ses, donk eys and mule s, including a ina Chironis; and oth ers which date to mine the medic al and breed ing detail s to
ment ion of tho se who are "experienced" rough ly the same era as that in which the orig- create a far more conv incin g acco unt of who
with hor ses, one perc ei ves a hint of the inal Gre ek manual s were set down. rai sed what sorts of hor ses for what purpose,
rura l specialists in veterinary med icine who Ann e Mc Cab e' s major achieve ment in her and why a particular "feed" was good for a
racehorse and not for a mi litary steed. Histori -
ans of anci ent and Byzantine medicine (as
David Smith, "Wagon II" (1964) well as of later Arabi c hor sem anship , in some
fac et s) will find Mc Cabe' s clarity about glan-
ders, scours and other equine ailme nts usefu l
in comp aring what phy sician s "knew" as con -
A figure sleeps standing becau se the wag on it rides trasted to veterinarians .
never roll s on its diverse wheels, is carried Mc Cab e' s book lays out with unusual
lucidit y the mu ltitudinous part iculars about
from studio to mu seum and back by no anatom y, physiology and blood lettin g; the
moti ve of its own , or at least non e it knows. occ asiona lly remarkabl e surge ries performed
on hrok en hones of the legs; dru gs as purga-
The stee l's trem endous we ight is at odds tives and sudorifics and analges ics; the argu-
with its cur ves, their sugges tion of velocity . ment s among lingui stic specialists about the
meanin g of words and phra ses; the conte xts of
Som etimes the wagon supposes it eme rge d as is, popular natura l histor y and agriculture as
full y form ed , one of the an gel s, exe mplified by the Byzant ine Geoponica; trav-
ellers ' record s of way stations, and how
till it rememb ers the message etched on its largest wheel, pilgrims calcul ated day s and weeks "on the
a greeting from maker to daughter - Hi, Candida! - road" ; the usual hazard s to men and their
mount s; and man y other aspect s of Roman and
that lessens the vehicle's grav itas Byzantin e veterinary lore. Th e multilingual
and gravity, as if with a light push .. .. bib liography is exemp lary. Ann e Mc Cabe ' s
fascination with her subject - and love for her
CARRI E ETTER char ges - shines from every page.
TLS N OVE M BER 2 2 0 07
32
Literary Criticism
Richard Sugg
M URD ER A FT ER DEATH
Literature and anatomy
in early modern England
259pp. Cornell University Press. $45.
9780 801445095
I n the ir An atomie (1668) , Tho mas Syd en-
ham and John Lock e insisted that anatomi-
ca dissection s merely reveal " more superfi-
cies ... to stare at" . A doz en years later, in
the mid st of another anatomical vog ue, the
ph ysici an John Mee agre ed : "Anatomy is of
the greates t fame and reput e, tho not of much
real use to ... curing". Oft en redundant at the
bed side, dissecti on arrog ated too much fame
(a nd perh aps not eno ugh inf am y), these
authors sugges t; its celebrity cont inu es un a-
bat ed , now as then . In Murder afte r Death, a
bo ok that develop s and refin es Jon athan Saw-
da y' s The Body Emblazo ned (19 95), Rich ard
Su gg is the late st writer to reli sh the viscera.
Fro m repr esent ation s of di ssecti on and
vivise ction in dr ama , sermons and scientific
and ima gin ati ve texts to early modern
thou ght abo ut "mummy" (prese rve d, app ar-
ently medi cin al hum an flesh) and cannibal-
ism , Sug g ex plores the repr esent ation and
rhetoric of anatomic al and, occasion ally, post-
mor te m di ssection. His is a lissom mind, cap-
able at once of bold claim s (for Europeans,
anatom y was a "preferable form of agg res -
sion" to cannibali sm) and sophisticated new
readin gs of famili ar texts. Th e book is fin el y
produced, eng ag ingly writte n and replete
with odd , gro tesque lore. In its breadth of ref-
erence and depth of readin g, it is a remark-
able achi evem ent.
But for a book concern ed with anat om ical
rhetori c , Murder Aft er Death is rem arkably
quiet about rhetoric itself: there are subtle
sightings of thin gs anato mical, "superficies"
on e might say, in a myriad of popular, littl e-
known and canoni cal texts, but next to
nothing on "anatomy" as a ge nre or a mo de
of redescription, prese nt and popul ar long
before anyone paid to see a body opened at
Barb er-Surgeon' s Hall (those writers who
deplo y anatomica l rhetori c need not have
witnesse d a theatric al anatomica l dissection :
ex pe rie nce at war, or re ading , mi ght suffice) .
A s Matthias Curtius , a stude nt of Andrea s
Ves alius, wro te in 1540 , dissecti on may be
performed " in one way reall y or actually, in
anoth er way throu gh description, e .g. in writ-
ing or lecturing. For thi s is also to dissect the
bod y". This is all the mor e surp rising since,
as Sugg him self argues, "literature spurred
medicine" , at lea st, he says , "to some ex tent".
Di scu ssing anatomical images and illustra-
tion s, Su gg clai ms, quoting John Berger, that
seei ng com es before words . Yet it seems that ,
with early mod ern anatom y - and es pec ially
with specific instanc es of mispri sion , like the
IN BRIEF
A detail from the choir roof at Carlisle; from Cathedral: The great English cathedrals and
the world that made them, by Jon Cannon (543pp. Constable. £30 . 9781845298418
cont rover sy about whether humans possessed
the rete mirabile, a network of arteries and
veins found in some vertebra tes - words
came we ll before, and certainly outlive d,
some ways of see ing. It might be that the
anatomica l illu strati on s Su gg so deftl y
ex plores are the culmination of centuries of
(so metimes antic, so met imes accurate) thick ,
rhetorical description.
STEPHEN P E ND ER
Christopher D' Addario
EX ILE AN D JO UR NEY IN
SE VENTEENTH- C ENTU R Y
LI T ER AT URE
199pp. Cambridge University Press. £45.
978 0 521 87029 0
T he ex perience of bani shm ent imbu es
writings with a complex mournfulness.
Ho w do writers respond to bein g a stra nge r,
to losing langua ge, to beco min g mar gin al ;
ho w do they identify them selves and remem-
ber their hom eland s? In answe ring these ques-
tion s, we can see anew the proc esses of ident-
ity form ation , the shifting reli ef of alleg iance
and the action of writing itself. In a brief vo l-
ume - give n the scope of the subject matter
thi s might happily have been twice its 150
pages - Christopher D' Addario introduces
ex ile as a key concern for writers from the
1640 s to the 1690 s. His central texts are
mainly canoni cal - Dryden, Milton , Hobbes
- but hi s proj ect is to place these writers in
the bro ader cont ext of the ex perience of
exi le.
D'Addario begin s with poem s and pam-
phl ets writte n in New England durin g the
1640 s, con siderin g the colonial ex perience
as bein g in so me fashion abo ut self-impose d
ex ile from England. A second chapter
TLS N OVE M BER 2 20 07
ex plores ho w the ex perience of bani shm ent in
defeat affected Royali sts durin g the 1650s ,
and in particul ar the ways in which the
"powerful psychol ogical effect of ex ile" influ-
enced Hobb es' s writing of Leviathan . Th ese
two chapters illu strat e the compl exities and
contradiction s inherent in writings produced
when abroa d: writers are con stantl y reconfig-
urin g their relati on ship to their own commu-
nity and to their hom eland , while repea tedly
tryin g to deal with their ow n "provisionality".
The seco nd half of the book elucida tes a
conception of " internal ex ile" - that ex peri-
enced by Milt on and Dryd en - and stretches
the motif a littl e, with mixed result s. Both
poet s spent tim e outside the politic al and cul-
tural main stream , and the ex perience of loss
and the pain of ex pulsion are felt in Paradise
Lost and Dryden' s translation of Virgil. Here
D ' Addario is less sure-footed, and his ideas
are mor e tent ati ve than in the ass ure d ea rlier
sec tions.
J EROM E D E G RO OT
Classics
Philip Matyszak
ANC IEN T ROME ON FIV E DENARIl
A DAY
144pp. Thames and Hudson.
Paperback, £12.95.
978 0 500 05 147 4
A ncient Rome on Five Denari i a Day per-
form s the functi on s of all the best
guides : it packs in a vas t amount of easily
retr ieved inform ation and gives a vivid pic-
ture of the destin ati on. "W hat to Wear " :
don 't pack a toga, hot in summer, drau ght y in
winter, and in any case for Ro man citi zens
onl y. "W here to Sta y" gives a succ inct top o-
graphy of the cit y' s region s foll owed by use-
ful tip s on sanitation (wa tch out for mischi e-
vous youths setting fire to hank s of wool and
sailing them along the clo aca). Woad, it
app ears, is a useful antiseptic, so maybe our
own ances tors were not as wild as they were
paint ed. If invited to a dinn er part y, check on
whether heavy drinking will be invol ved so
yo u can book a litt er hom e. Usefu l phr ases
include the Latin fo r " How lon g must I
wa it?" and "G ive me a beer". The sectio ns on
food and shopping and the acco unt of the five
hu ge terr aces of the market at Tr ajan ' s
Foru m and the stores on Via Sacra, prob abl y
the mo st luxurio us in the world, are parti cu-
larl y enj oya ble. Th ere are hand y guides to
currenc y and we ights and mea sur es, so yo u
won 't ge t overcharged.
Such practic al detail s of dail y life form
an invaluable counterb alance to mo st guide
book s to Ro me, which focu s largely on majes-
tic monum ent s, but Philip Matyszak doesn 't
make the mistake man y writers make of try-
ing to bri ng the ancient wor ld within popul ar
reach, sugges ting that the ancient Romans
"were ju st like us" . Thi s is a travel book
where the subjec t retain s its otherness . The
peculiarities of Rom e, its sys tems of puni sh-
ment and entertainment, are not erased. Thi s
is an ex celle nt introduction to Roman life:
pack it alon gside your modern guide -
thou gh , give n the attractions of the Via
Sacra, I doubt if I wou ld have managed on
five denarii per diem .
J A NE J AK EM AN
Economics
Peter Chapman
JUNG LE C APITALISTS
A story of globalisation, greed and revolution
224pp. Canongate. Paper back, £10.99.
978 1 84 195909 2
J ungle Capitalists is a biograph y of the
United Fruit Co mpany (born 1899, died
cl975) - less a biograph y, in fact , than a crim-
inograph y. Its subtitle, "A story of globa liza -
ti on , g ree d and re volution", m ig ht be more
accurately rendered "exploitation, cynici sm
and manipulation". Peter Chapman, a for eign
corr espo ndent with an und ergradu ate passion
for banana republics, bro aches several goo d
stor ies in one short book : too man y, perh aps,
to be entirely co nv incing, but more than
enoug h to sustain a rambunctious retellin g.
Th e sty le is repo rtorial; the ton e is hostile ; the
author gives eve ry appea rance of enj oy ing
him self.
United Fruit was a ph en om en on. In its day
its opera tions ex te nded ove r some 3 milli on
acres across the Caribbea n. As Cha pm an
po ints out , it was not so much a compan y as
an unr ecogniz ed state, less dependent o n its
hosts than they were on it (govern me nts bor-
rowed from !Jnited Fruit, rath er than the
other way round). It is notoriou s, above all,
for its foreign polic y, and for its collu sion
with Washin gton . United Fruit had blo od on
its hands. It was impli cated in an invasion of
Honduras in 1911 , a massacre of striking
work ers in Co lombia in 1928 , a coup in
Gu atemal a in 1954 , and the disastrous Bay of
Pigs operation in Cuba in 1961.
Th e ori gin al idea of the "banana republic"
is indebt ed to United Fruit. The term was
coin ed by the writer O . Henr y, it see ms , in
a collecti on en titled Cabbages and Kings
(1904 ), in which the " Vesuvius Fruit Co m-
 IN BRIEF 33

pany" orch estrates a coup in "A nchuria"
(Honduras) . Sub sequently, the whol e busi-
ness of the fruit comp any and the banana
republi c has been explored by a galaxy of liter-
ary talent: Pablo Neruda, Gabriel Ga rcia Mar-
quez and Miguel Angel Asturi as, not to speak
of Joseph Conrad in Nos tromo - all of them
deftl y, if rather breathl essly, woven in here.
For Chapma n, this is a tale for our times.
United Fruit, he think s, was the very model of
the modern multin ational , a kind of malign
exe mplar, cosy with gove rnment, fat with cor-
porat e greed, knee-deep in covert operations.
Si mo nu me ntum req uiris , circ umspice.
A LEX D ANCH EV
History
Alistair Moffat
T HE REIVERS
The story of the Border Reivers
32 1pp. Birlinn. £16.99.
978 I 84 158 5499
what it meant for the people who lived plished shor t film s, each in some way pre- Fre nch higher administration, but he also
between the October Revoluti on and the figurin g the intern ational features which fol- we nt much furth er. Selectin g a time of
1990s. By way of a taster from an engaging, lowed . Frida Kahlo and Joseph Beuys are national crisis, when Fra nce was strugg ling
sometimes opaque and also disconcertin g see n as formative to Ca mpion's developm ent aga inst milit ary defeat, he focu sed on the
ex amination, con sider Badiou on Freud. The as an artist. McHu gh attributes her di stincti on men whom Ga mbetta cho se not only to mobi-
father of psy choa nalysis set the ce ntury up and success to "the deft synthesis of the mult i- lize the pro vincial war effort but also to repub-
for "a grea t battle about sex ". At one level, he ple influ ences on her filmm akin g" . But lica nize a reticent popul ation in preparation
revealed its polymorphous perversity, a Carnpi ons skilful mi xing of auteurist and for the 1871 genera l election. That he failed
confront ation with the rea lity of sex that is genre film makin g has been at least as instru- in both these missions does not det ract from
alrea dy too much . But Freud we nt furth er: he mental in es tablishing her audience. the va lue of pinp ointin g who these men were .
revived for modernity the ancient fears of the McHu gh' s exa mination is likely to margin- For tho se with a fraction of the patience that
Church Fathers who knew that "sex can com- alize its ow n readership by tyin g itself up in Vincent Wri ght displ ayed in building up the
mand a concep tion of truth separate fro m numerous dialecti cal knots. She gives the port raits of these heroic offic ials, this volume
meanin g". Many may now feel unconcerned study a feminist orient ation , which is signifi- has much to teach.
with this spiritual anxiety, having opted for cant for so me but not all aspects of the sub- JACK H AYWARD
hedoni sm. But then, continues Badiou , when ject. The academic prose is unwield y and the
life is so lely about enjoy ment, atrocity is grasp of cinematic vernacular incompl ete. Art History
not far away - and the centu ry surely spoke But it is the laudat ory tone of much of the
powerfully on that matter too. text that sits most unea sily with its purp ose as Claudia Mesch and Viola Michely, editors
Th e Cen tury is disconcertin g in two senses . a critical study. Th e synopses of the film s JO SEPH BEU YS
One stems from the twenti eth century' s wo uld have been more usefull y placed in the The reader
brutality. Ca pitalism has become obsessed by film ograph y than amid the unsch em aticall y 334pp. Tauris. £ 16.99.
numb ers, and Badiou plays back some titled chapters, and the stills selected from the 978 I 845 11 3636
figur es aga inst it. For exa mple, by the year fil ms are poorl y reprodu ced , and in one

T he story of the Bord er Reivers is a tragic 2000 , the three rich est people in the wo rld instance wro ngly attributed. Fortun ately, the
one. For almos t 300 years, from the time possessed a combined fortun e greater than book offers three interviews with Campion in
of Edwa rd I until the Union of the Crow ns the combined total GDP of the fort y-eight which her directn ess sets the most important
I n the priestly dialect known as Art speak ,
Joseph Beuys is said to be "problematic" .
His death in 1986 see ms to have abstrac ted
und er James I in 1603, the bord er region poorest countries . Hum anit y was inventi ve eleme nts of the record straight. him from his work, which now resembl es
between England and Scotland was a lawless and inspired in the twenti eth century, but the C H RISTOPH WARRACK nothin g so much as a coll ection of holy relics ,
battleground, in which the royal writ did not horr ors that filled it twisted the creative spirit its playfuln ess and contin gency ha ving
run, to the extent that it was claim ed eve n the of Einstein, Frege and others into techn olo- ossified into empty monum ent alit y. The
local clergy we nt armed with a dagger for pro- gies for the pursuit of power and profit.
French History mu seum , which was far from his favou rite
tecti on. The story of this often neglected but Thinking of the hundreds of milli ons who Vincent Wright habit at, now threaten s to claim him . Inten sely
ultim ately fascinati ng period is brou ght to life died as a result of war or state terror point s to LES PR EFETS DE GAMB ET TA (if naively) politic al, Beuys believed that the
in Alistair Moffat' s new book, The Reivers. the second sense in which the book is discon- 482pp. Presses de l' Universite Paris- ritu al of makin g art could be perfo rmed by
In their own phrase the Rei vers - Anglo-Scot- certin g. When discussing Ma o, Badiou Sorbonne. €45. anyone, and entail more or less anything.
tish marauders - " shook loose the bord er". excuses the Cultura l Revoluti on in term s of 978 2 84050 504 4 He used the sa me word, Plastik, to describ e
They co ntinued to shake it for as long as was the Great Leader ' s proj ect of ema ncipation. performanc e pieces, installations and more
practically possible. Their legacy remains in Thi s, at best embarrass ing, apology arises
the words blackm ail (the tribut e exa cted from partly from Badiou' s philosoph y of emancipa- O f the Briti sh writers on French adminis-
trati ve history, Vincent Wright was with-
farm ers in the bord ers) and bereave (to tion and the good, which aim s to lift human- out question the finest. His dedic ated frequ en-
con ventional-l ookin g pictur es or sculptures .
Meanin g was something which should
be willed or dreamed into bein g. With out
depri ve or dispo ssess). What charact erized ity above mere surviva l, above the politi cs of tation of the local and national archives was him around to do the dreamin g, the wor k
their time, and form s the backdrop to the animality. It also reflect s internal strugg les based on his co nvict ion that the French state ju st sits there, part shrine, part shipwrec ked
book, was sense less violence: for exa mple, between the Left and neo-lib erals in cont em- could only be understood from belo w as we ll hulk.
the slaughter of the Ma xwells by the John- porary French phil osoph y. And yet, in an as from above . As Sudhir Hazareesingh Th e ess ays here are fairl y diverse and com-
stons at the Battle of Dyrfe Sands near Locker- otherw ise inventi ve discu ssion, abating such makes clear in his luminou s introduction to prehensive. Beuys is prodd ed fro m man y
bie, in Decemb er 1593. Here the slaughter crim es is a fla w. Les Pr efe ts de Gambetta, this ena bled him to angles, both gently and not so gently. A recur-
amounted almos t to genocide, with, Moff at M ARK VER NON de mystify ge ne ra liza tio ns suc h as ce ntra liza - rin g them e is hi s rel ati on ship to Ger man
tells us, 700 Maxwells being killed in one tion , to decon struct analytica lly the co nven - Romanticism (itself a stra nge sort of death
afternoon, and the blood run ning throu gh the Film tion al categ ories that were mindl essly cult ); another is the way the bod y met aphor s
stree ts of Lockerbi e itself. repea ted, to contextua lize the instituti onal in his work reflect the grand narratives of
Unlike Sir Waiter Scott , who redi sco vered Kathleen McHugh constraint s on the administration. He did not moderni sm ("textb ook Bataill e" , sniffs
the Bord er Ballad s in the late eightee nth cen- JANE CA M PION live to put the fini shin g touches to his Rosalind Krauss). A gro up of journ alists and
tury, and cre ated the modern cult of the Rei v- I86pp. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. monum ent al prosopograph y of 136 prefects Green politi cians hold a round-table di scu s-
ers, Moff at does not rom ant icize his subjec t. Paperback, $ 19.95; distributed in the UK appointed by Gamb etta dur ing the ephemera l sion on his failed bid to win a parli ament ary
But after a while the reader begin s to wo nder by NBN. £ 10.99. Gove rnme nt of National Defenc e from Sep- nomination in 1983. No r is Beuys him self
how much more gratuitous violence there is 978 0 252 07447 9 temb er 1870 to February 1871. This has been entirely abse nt; there ' s a tran script of a talk
to learn about. For me this point was reac hed scrupulously done by Hazareesin gh and the he gave at the Docum ent a festival in 1972,
with the description of the capture and decapi-
tation of a fugiti ve in York, and the subse- H alfway through Jane Ca mpion's The Sorbonne historian Eric Anceau.
Piano, set in nineteenth- century New Wh y was it worth Wright's while to devote
quent return of his severed head in a sac k, to Zea land, there is a perform anc e of Blueb ear d many thousands of hour s to accumulating the
and he is extensively quot ed elsew here.
If it' s true, as many here seem to be say ing,
that Beuys' s most vital contribution to art in
the famil y sea t of the Kerr s at Fernie hurst, stage d by colonial settlers. When it look s as intimidating masses of detailed pe rsona l the late twenti eth century was not hi s wizar d-
near Kelso, in order to prove that the contract though Bluebeard is about to kill his wife, inform ation about these prefects? He did so ish persona but his ideas about - for wa nt of a
killin g had been ca rried out. This is about as several Maori s in the audience rush on to the because of the delectati on with which he better word - pedagogy, then in fact hi s
far remo ved from the ord ered world of Eliza- stage to rescue the actress. Whil e defendin g researched in a parti cul arly challe nging field , alum ni are everywhe re. Colla horative or
beth an England as it is possibl e to imag ine . Ca mp ion from criticism levelled at her depi c- but also because he was con scious that kno w- community-based proje cts, fro m Ant on y
ROBERT TU RNBU LL tion of the Ma ori s, Kathlee n McHu gh takes ledge of their soc ial background, politi cal Gorml ey ' s Field sculptures to any old bit of
this sce ne as signalling her ability to distil a opinions and careers wo uld enable his read- garden-making or quilt- stitchin g, can readil y
wea lth of themes and techniques: the possibil- ers to und erstand the politi cal and admini stra- be slotted into the cont ext of his belief in a
Philo sophy ity of objecti vity in the mind s of charac ter tive elite of the Third Republic at its incep- new rel ationship between artists and the
Alain Badiou and audience, the boundaries of perform ance tion. They includ e a futur e President of the publi c. It is ju st that Beuys him self was ,
T H E CENTU RY and story telling in society. Republi c (Sadi Carno t), two Prim e Mini sters amo ng other thin gs, a sty list or willer-to-
233pp. Polity Press. £55 (paperback, £ 15.99). The mid nineteenth century fostered the (Jules Ferry and Charles de Freycinet), eight form. His own works are instantl y identifi a-
978 0 7456 363 1 3 science of anthropology and the medium of other ministers and fift y-eight memb er s of ble, and that identit y ca n easi ly be fixed and
photograph y, as well as a wea lth of radic al the French parli ament , as we ll as many senior fetishi zed by the curatori at. Looked at from

A lain Badiou' s aim in The Century is to fem ale literatur e. McHu gh describ es how civil servan ts.
have the twenti eth century spea k for Ca mp ion pursued these interests as a student, Wright depl oyed a lifetim e ' s erudition in
itself: he see ks to be faithful to it by asking and transform ed her researches into accom- the service of an exemplary ana lysis of
out side the acade my it' s hard to see what is
automatica lly so bad about that.
KEITH MILLER

TLS NOVE M BER 2 20 07

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 35

Ros em ary Ashton' s most recent book , 142
Strand: A radical address in Victorian
London, will be publi shed in paperb ack early
next year.
Matthew Beaumont is a lecturer in Eng lish
at University Co llege London. His recent
publication s include a mon ograph, Utopia
Ltd.: Ideologies of socia l dreaming in
England, 1870-1 900 , 2005.
Emilie Bickerton works for New Left
Review.
Christine Bold is the author of Writers,
Plumbers, and An archists: The WPA writers'
project in Massachusetts and Rememb ering
Women M urdered by Men: M emorials across
Canada , both published last year. She is
curr ently editing a volume of the Oxford
History of Popular Print Culture.
John Bowen is Professor of Ninetee nth-
Century Litera ture at the University of York.
His book Other Dickens: Pickw ick to Chuzr le-
wit appea red in paperback in 2003. He is also
the co-editor of Palgrave Advances in
Char les Dickens Stud ies, 2005.
Norma Clarke is Senior Lecturer at the
University of Kingston . Her books includ e Dr
Johnson 's Women, 2001 , and The Rise and
Fall of the Woman of Letters, 2004.
Lu cy Dallas is the editor of the TLS website
and In Brief pages.
Alex Danchev is Professor of International
Relations at the University of No ttingham.
His book Georges Braque: A life was
publi shed this yea r. He is working on a bio-
graphy of Ceza nne, and a collection of essays
on art and war and terror.
Peter Davidson is Profess or of Renaissance
Studies at the University of Aberdeen. His
monograph , The Universa l Baroque, is to be
publi shed later this month.
lain Elliot is Director of Eas t-Wes t Insight , Dan Jacobson is Professor Emeritus of Andrew Porter is chief music critic of the
intern ation al consultants wor king in the English at Univers ity Co llege Londo n. His TLS.
countri es of the form er Sov iet Union. most recent novel is All for Love, 2005.
He was awarded the Soc iety of Authors Francis Robinson is Profess or of the History
Carrie Etter' s first coll ection , The Tethers, Fellows hip in 1986. of South Asia at Roya l Holl oway, University
will be publi shed in 2009. Divining for of Lond on. The M ughal Emperors: An d the
Starters is due to appea r a year later. Jane J akeman is an Islamic art historian Islamic dynasties of India, Iran and
who has been on the staff of the Bodleian and Cen tra l Asia 1206-1 925 appea red earlier this
Judith Flanders ' s most recent book, Ashmolea n libraries. Her novel Death in ye ar.
Consuming Passions: Leisure and pleas ure Cognac appeared ea rlier this yea r.
in Victoria n Br itain, was publi shed last John Scarborough is Professor in both the
year. John Keay is the author of twent y books, School of Pharm acy and the Dept artm ent of
mostly histories. He is co-edit or of the third Classics at the Unive rsity of Wi sconsin ,
J erome de Groot is a Lecturer in Renaissance edition of The London Encyclopaedia and Madi son . A seco nd edition of his Roman
Literature and Culture at the University of author of China: A history, both to be M edicine is in preparation .
Manchester. His book on the English Civil publi shed in 200 8.
War appeared in 2004. Nick Shepley is writing his seco nd novel and
Glyn Maxwell' s most recent book of poems a PhD on Henr y Gree n at Unive rsity Co llege
Jack Hayward is Professor in the Department is The Sugar Mil e, 2005 . The seco nd volume Lond on .
of Politics and International Studies at the of his plays, Plays Two: Broken Journ ey ;
University of Hull. Recent publications include Best Man Speec h and The Last Valentine, Fiona Stafford is the author of Start ing
Fragmen ted France: Two centuries ofdispu ted was publi shed last yea r. Lin es in Scottish, Irish, and Eng lish Poetry:
identity , 2007. From Burns to Heaney, 2000.
Keith Miller is a freelanc e writer livin g in
Katharine Hibbert was shortlisted as London. His book about St Peter' s Basilic a Heather Thompson lives in Berlin. She is
Youn g Journ alist of the Year in the 2006 was publi shed ea rlier this yea r. wor king on a novel.
Briti sh Press Aw ards for her wor k at the
Sunday Times Magazine. Bernard O 'Donoghue' s latest work, a verse John Tyrrell' s Jandcek: Years of a life,
tra nslation of Sir Gawa in and the Green Volume 2, 1914-1 928: Tsa r of the Forests is
Patrice Higonnet' s Paris: Capita l of Knight , was publi shed in 2006. He is a publi shed this month .
the world was publi shed in 2002 . He is teacher and Fellow in English at Wadham
curr entl y wor king on a survey of the French College, Oxford . Mark Vernon ' s most rece nt books are Af ter
Revoluti on (The Sleep of Reason) and a brief A theism, 2000 , and What Not To Say, which
Life of the architec t Richard Miqu e. He is Stephen Pender is Associate Pro fessor of is publi shed this month.
Professor of French Histor y at Harvard English and Director of the Hum aniti es
University. Research Group at the University of Justin Warshaw is a barri ster.
Wind sor, Cana da .
Lucy Hughes-Hallett is the author of Hugo Williams' s new coll ection of poems,
Cleopatra: Histories, dream s and dis tor - Joe Phelan is Sen ior Lectur er in English at Dear Room , was publi shed last yea r.
tions, 1990, and Heroes: Saviours, traitors De Montfort University, Leicester. His book
and supermen - A history of hero wors hip, on the nineteenth-century so nnet was Be e Wilson is the author of The Hive: The
2004. publi shed in 2004. story of the honeybee and us, 2004.
Swindled: From po ison swee ts to counterfeit
H. J . J ackson is the author of Romantic John Polkinghorne was form erly Professo r coffee. The dark his tory of the food cheats, is
Readers, 2005. She has also serve d as editor of Mathematical Physics at Ca mbridge due to appear early next yea r.
or co-editor of six volumes of the Boll ingen University, and President of Queens' Co llege .
Edition of the Collec ted Works of s. T. His autobiogra phy From Physicist to Priest Frances Wilson' s book about Doroth y
Coler idge . was publi shed this year. Word sworth is to be publi shed next yea r.

TLS CROSSWORD 716 H

A
U S
P
B A
L
N D
I
V A
I
C
L
H E
N
L L
0
N G A I 0 V 0 L I I M A N D
A CROSS DOWN
S N T A E V C G
I Way to rise in the church describe d by 1 Those under socia lism were discussed
0 R N A T E A B S E N T E E
Co mpton Mac kenz ie (5, 5) by J. B. Priest ley (4)
6 The rest of him is found in Mill in' s 2 Model heard around Belgium is C U R I A L A 0 Y P E R C Y
work (4) renowned poet (3, 4)
9 The poetcould be thus erotic (10) 3 New fan from China for piano virtuoso B L A C K R 0 B E S U S A N

to Iris Murdoch' s sank without a trace (4) (12)

( N
12 Wes ley's way of address ing the co lo- 4 Eterna l preoccupat ion of romantic I"
nove list (8)
G IW
nies (4)
13 Nor man Lake Poet (9) 5 Article in hum orous magazine
15 Playwright to liven year 's beginn ings
eage rly (8)
16 "La ! the great - ' s ancient reign
describes outstanding feature of Falstaff
(6)
7 Although he saw his country as trag ic
•
SO LUTI ON TO CROSSWO RD 712
1L

restor' d' (Pope. The Dunc iads (6)
18 Co unc il co ndemning iconoclasts in
Midi tow n quarter (6)
20 Protector of Storey's stage wor k (8)
23 It becomes unavailable as soon as booked
(5,4)
24 Egyp tian god in Maugham story (4)
26 Reported ly dese rves essent ial elements
of Hydriotaphia (4 )
27 " I do desire you not to deny this - "
(Merchant of Yenice) (10)
28 Shaw'x enduring archbis hop (4)
29 Hidden meaning need s runes, perhaps
(10)
he felt it was worth saving (7)
8 Despo nd anato mized by Democr itus The winner of Crossword 712 is
Junior (10) Roger Hallam, London, N13.
11 " I' ll run away until I'm bigger , but
then I' ll fight" said this noble Roman lad
(5,7)
Th e se nde r of the first correc t
14 St Helen s players cove r a critic ( 10)
so lution opened on November 30
17 Vicar in proper bloomer (8)
w ill rece ive a cas h prize of £4 0.
19 Dai ly improved con dition of Sha ke-
speare after Bowd ler? (7) Entries sho uld be ad dressed to
21 High priest is rising on abridge ment (7)
TLS Crossword 7 16,
Ti mes Hou se, I Pe nning ton Stree t,
22 Usual peruse r of Woo lf (6)
25 She agreed to Acton in sib ling solidar - Lo ndon E98 IBS.
lily (4)

TLS NOVE MBER 2 2 007

36
T he late st issue of the Oxford magazine
Arete, edited by Craig Raine, contain s an
account of T. S. Eliot's car eer as a publ isher
at Faber and Faber. The article by Ronald
Schu chard quot es liberally from the copious
pap er work ge nerated by Eliot in his job at the
firm , including reports on book s submitted
and blurb s for tho se sched uled for publica-
tion. As an editor, Eliot was mainl y con-
cern ed with poetr y, but was present at ge neral
editor ial meetin gs, spea king for or again st
thrill ers, work s of reference and oth er book s.
"Eliot' s colourful reports are fascin ating
because they show both his wittiest and his
most discernin g self' , Schuchard says , "freely
ex press ing his taste and , often irreverentl y,
his literar y opinions of contemporaries."
At one meetin g in Jun e 1937, Eliot reported
on three book s in success ion. The first was
The Black Book by Lawrenc e Durrell:
Thi s man has some ability. One ca n see why
Henry Miller thinks so highly of him, and all
the wro ng reasons ... why Henry Mill er do es
so think. It is a pity that such a genial talent indul gent and pertin ent :
sho uld go to waste , and some thing must be
do ne about it.
Durrell would go on to be a highl y success ful
Faber author. The Black Book, which Eliot
described as "a mess " in 1937, was publi shed
by the Ob eli sk Press in Pari s in 1938 - with a
recommendation hy Eliot.
Anoth er bo ok up for discu ssion that da y "T . S. Eliot at Fa bers" alone is worth the seco nd-ha nd book shop s. Our sole reser vati on
was The Diary of An ai:' Nin. Eliot describ ed pric e of A rete (£7 .99; £2 1 per year, from about Fos ter's is that it tend s to be on the
it as "off my key-board, out side of my audi- 8 New College Lane, Oxford OXI 3BN ); if pric ey side . Recentl y, ho wever , we pick ed up
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -----, Fermo rs onl y no vel , The Violins of Saint-
Kulcher for woodlice
tor y range, like bats, bagpipes and Welsh
min ers". It would "pro ve fascin atin g to any-
one who is interested in the psychology of
woodlice ... living as they do mo stly under
stones" . Again, he was prepared to act against
him self by acceptin g a piece for the Criterion
on Nin by Mill er, her greates t admirer.
The third report was on Ezra Pound' s
Guide to Kulchu r, which Faber wo uld pub-
lish the follo win g yea r. Here, Eliot was both
We asked for this and we have got it. It is only
a damned kulchered person who will be able to Litvino v and her dau ght er Ta tiana, publi shed
find his way about in this book, but for the per-
cep tive there are a good many plums, and for
the judicious who kno w ho w to trim the boat sion have been set in pre viou s wee ks: an
with their ow n intelli gence there is a good deal admirable but overl ook ed work by a not able
of wis do m .
TLS NOVE M BER 2 20 0 7
you need more, there is work by Juli an
Barn es, David Lodge and Tom Stoppard.
P
era mbulatory Christmas Books, Part VI.
Amid the boutiques and emas culated
pub s of Chisw ick High Street , there nestles a
PAT RIC K
bo w-wind owed bookshop called Fos ter's
(the sign above says simp ly " Boo ks") . Our LEIG H
regul ar perambulation s have yie lded all sorts FER MOR
of treasur e, from a first edition of All en Gin s-
berg ' s Ho wl to Eng lish versions of Turge nev ted passin g by, or in the shadows at a part y.
and Pushkin by the Eng lish writer Ivy
Wh en we said "mingled", we wa nted cont act.
Som e novels spec ialize in thi s sor t of
in the So viet Union for Western edification. thin g, of course. Leo Len sing reminds us of
The conditions for Perambulator y inclu- Ragtim e by E. L. Docto row, "which is full of
interaction s between ficti on al character s and
histori cal figur es that include Houdini and
w rite r, c os ting £5 or le ss at on e of London' s Em ma Go ld rna n. As the plot reaches its cli-
max, there is an enco unter bet ween Booker
T. Wa shin gton and the ficti on al anti-hero
Coa lhou se Walker in the Mor gan Library at
an attr acti ve Pen guin edition of Patri ck Leigh 225 Madi son A venu e."
Th e mo st up-t o-date exa mples are to be
Jacques, first publi shed in 195 3, and issued found in Ala sdair Gray 's new novel Old Men
in paperb ack eight years later. in Love, in which the narrator John Tunnock
Fermor is clo sely ass oc iated with Greece and his exec utor com e into conta ct with the
but his first book , The Traveller 's Tree real-life histori an Angus Calder, the editor of
(1950 ), was an acco unt of a journey in the the literary magazine Chapman, and a writer
Caribbean, where the acti on of The Violins call ed Al asdair Gray , "who lived locall y".
also takes plac e. Characteristica lly, he is not Indeed , practi call y eve ry thing we have
cont ent with ju st tellin g a story : it is a tal e- sought for Metafictions I, II , III and IV turn s
within-a-tale, with footn otes to ex plain up somew here in his wor k. The reader who
"queer" Latin j argon or to clarify a song in a dr aws our attention to this is Al asdair Gray.
French dialect. Th e myster y lies in "the Whi ch see ms a fittin g mom ent to dr aw thi s
absence of the nam e of Sa int-Ja cq ues fr om enjoyable caper to a clo se, with thanks to him
the atlas page" ; the story resolves it. Ev ery - and eve ryone el se who has contributed.
thin g is present ed with an ex uberance that
has since been restricted to Fermo rs personal
tra vel narr ati ves.
Fermor is sca rce ly a neglected author, but
S everal writers have signed a lett er to the
Welsh Western Mail , protestin g again st
the Nati onal Library of Wales' s proj ect to
The Violins of Saint-Jacques is littl e rea d, make Welsh periodicals and magazines ava il-
even amon g his admirers . Hardl y anything at able on the intern et. Welsh Journal s Online is
Foster' s feels like a snip, but thi s neat , sturdy a publicly fund ed scheme (£840,000 is the
Pen guin did , at £4. The co ver illu strati on by figur e give n) which wo uld pro vid e "free
Phi lip Gou gh , reproduced here, shows the on line, searcha ble access " to the cont ent s of
Pall adi an villa menti oned in the text and the ninet y journals, while offerin g nothing to
smo ulde ring cone of the volca no, Salpetri ere, their authors . Instead , accor ding to the lett er
the eru ption of which accounts for the signed by Gillian Clarke, To ny C urtis, Stevie
erasure of Saint-Jacques from the record s. Davie s, Philip Gross, Oli ver Reyno lds and
man y others, the Lib rar y hop es "that right s
F or Metaficti on IV, we sought scenes from
no vels in w hich hi sto rical per son ages
min gle with mad e-up character s at recogniza-
hold er s will allow their material to be used
for free . . .. Until this matt er is addressed,
writers who want to kee p Wel sh writing on a
ble locati on s. The term s of qu alific ation we re profession al basis will not allow the Na tional
no doubt a littl e wide , and a few reader s sug - Libr ary of Wales to digiti ze their wor k."
gested vignettes in which a real person is spot- J .C .
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